El niño problema como objeto institucional: la psiquiatría infantil en Cuba, 1926-1945

The emergence of child psychiatry in 1920s Cuba mirrored the ascent of psychiatry as a discipline imbued with broader social relevance. The extension of psychiatric expertise was centrally concerned with the figure of the “problem child”, posited as a synecdoche for a maturing sovereign state. As reformers set out to rehabilitate mentally ill and “delinquent” children, however, they frequently found themselves running up against the problem of political corruption as it impacted the institutions in which they sought to intervene. Ultimately, psychiatrists and social crusaders who had identified the problem child as a potent site for political regeneration were forced to reverse the causal direction of their reformist logic: it was the state itself that would have to be rehabilitated in order to achieve their medical and social goals.