Issue 4:1 Spring 2005
Esitorial: Expanding the Dialogue.
We are very pleased to note that, beginning with this first issue of Volume 4, PCEP will go out to the 1100 members of the British Association for the Person-Centred Approach (BAPCA). We offer a warm welcome to our new readers, and are taking this opportunity to re-introduce PCEP to readers new and old.
PCEP is grounded in inclusiveness and aims to foster communication among people who hold varying views. The person-centered and experiential (PCE) family (or ‘tribes’) includes some who take a traditional person-centered position, some who like focusingoriented psychotherapy, some who describe their approach as ‘process-guiding’, some who take dialogic, existential, or postmodern perspectives, and some who see the relationship as superseding technical and conceptual issues. PCEP encourages dialogue among all such alternatives, on the assumption that mutual understanding can benefit everyone. One of our current projects is to encourage more practice-oriented papers where readers can see each other’s work in concrete terms through transcripts and detailed descriptions of therapy process. By observing and reporting, we can discover what the actual differences are, or, perhaps, that our similarities are greater than our differences.
Our new readers are also potential contributors, and we look forward to submissions that reflect the interests and concerns of BAPCA members. Although PCEP’s last name is Psychotherapies, the journal’s scope encompasses work on the facilitative power of the Person-Centered Approach in numerous contexts. In particular, we do not distinguish editorially between counseling and psychotherapy. We invite papers on theory, philosophical underpinnings, research, practice and politics as these affect the work. We recognize that there are numerous differences in terminology across countries and practice communities, and we encourage authors to use and explain the terms and concepts that are relevant in the contexts they write about.
Our newly expanded British readership will notice that this is an international journal that conforms to standard academic conventions in regard to the use of American English spellings. We hope that this convention does not offend, and we note that American English is the native vernacular of the Person-Centered Approach.
PCEP’s international structure aims to facilitate communication throughout the world. PCEP carries abstracts in English, German, Spanish, and will add other languages as interest and opportunity allow. Our Editorial Board includes speakers of numerous languages, so we can consider work that originates in English, German, French, Spanish, Japanese, Portuguese, Italian, Dutch and Greek, among others. When possible, we offer language mentoring for writers whose first language is not English. The international aspect of the journal affords a particular status for writers based in universities and for clinicians whose academic output is integral to their continued professional development.
We are hoping to take this international support even further by developing a system whereby writers can be helped to access abstracts of related work in other parts of the world. For example, a child-centered play therapist writing about their British-based work might use such a system to consider the developments in their field in Germany if the bulk of those publications are in the German language (and vice versa).
In a world that emphasizes research, theory and critical analysis of practice it is important to have an academic voice. PCEP can now become the academic voice for BAPCA as well as for WAPCEPC. We welcome our new readers and authors, and we appreciate the continued support of those who have subscribed over the past three years. We invite BAPCA members to consider PCEP as their premier academic journal, and we look forward to more submissions from the UK.
PCEP’s editorial panel has always taken a team approach to editing, seeking a blend of experience and skills across the team. With that in mind, as of January 1st, 2005, we are pleased to announce the expansion of our team of editors to include William B. (Bill) Stiles. Bill has written widely on psychotherapy theory and research, informed by his background as a person-centered therapist. We welcome his wisdom, editorial experience, inclusiveness, and team spirit.
As PCEP enters its fourth volume with this issue, we are proud to have met our target of being on schedule with four issues in each year. We have developed an efficient editorial and publishing regime that moves papers from their initial drafts through to publication in less than half the time of other international journals. That is important for facilitating up-to-date dialogue around the world and for authors who want their papers published in a top-quality journal.
In this issue the international nature of the Journal is reflected in the papers from Holland, Japan, England, Belgium and Scotland. Peter Scharwächter continues a theme evident in the Focusing Folio and also in Ton Coffeng’s recent paper in PCEP 3:4, by showing how Focusing-oriented Psychotherapy can be integrated into a conceptualization of therapy for clients experiencing PTSD. Similarly, Gillian Proctor offers another exploration of practice under difficult circumstances, as she delineates critical issues in working in a forensic context where PCE is well suited to a clientele whose psychological disturbance is compounded by their powerlessness within this setting, but where the values of PCE run counter to agency politics. In our first paper from Japan, Akira Ikem advances another dialogue that has been prominent in PCEP (see Purton in 3:4) on the intersections between Rogers and Gendlin. In his paper Ikemi pays particular attention to the work of both men on the bodily felt sense. The diversity of PCEP in encompassing all aspects of person-centered and experiential psychotherapies is reflected also in Frans Depestele’s process orientation and in Mick Cooper’s postmodern perspective on PCE. This postmodern influence emphasizes the centrality of relationship and forges links with existential psychotherapists from outside the person-centered tradition. This is an exciting development; despite considerable philosophical convergence between Rogers and Laing, they never managed to develop the link in the context of their own relationship.
We are pleased by PCEP’s progress as it makes its way onto the world stage of scholarly therapy journals. We encourage other associations in the PCE tradition to follow the example of the BAPCA in making mutually beneficial cooperative arrangements. Through PCEP, the PCE orientations can enter as a full partner in dialogue with other therapeutic orientations.
The vitality of the dialogue is also evidenced by the Person-Centered symposium to take place at this August’s World Psychotherapy Congress in Buenos Aires. We hope to see you there!
Robert Elliott, Dave Mearns, Peter F. Schmid, William B. Stiles.
January 2005
Journal of the World Association for Person-Centered and Experiential Psychotherapy and Counseling
Co-editors: Robert Elliott, USA • Dave Mearns, Scotland • Peter F. Schmid, Austria • Bill Stiles, USA