Australian asylum discourses permeating therapeutic work with asylum seekers: A thematic analysis of specialist practitioners’ experiences

Abstract

The current research analyses interviews that were conducted with nine specialist practitioners who worked with asylum seekers in Australia. It investigates the aspects in which the Australian asylum legislative framework impacts on therapeutic work with asylum seekers. Epistemologically, the research is grounded in a social constructionist theoretical foundation that is interested in unravelling how discourses and language construct psychological reality. The interviews were analysed by following thematic analysis. The findings of the study reveal that participants recognise that the political discourses on asylum are forcefully dominant and rigid and generate detrimental effects on asylum seekers’ mental health. Likewise, they demonstrate that political discourses inform the therapeutic relationship between practitioner and client in a negative fashion and often produce an experience of professional impotence for practitioners who work with this population.