Nomad RSI - Therapeutic diversity and the environment

This project sought to support the symbolic value and the practical efficacy of various forms of traditional therapy that coexist and complement one another in the Indo-Nepalese communities of the isolated west of Nepal. These traditional healers come in a variety of forms: herbalists, healers by birth, medium-oracles and Ayurvedic doctors. Modern medicine (or biomedicine), progressing slowly everywhere in the countryside, brings new tensions into this system. While biomedicine may present an enormous advantage in treating a great number of pathologies, it also brings in its wake a negative image of traditional knowledge and encourages their abandonment. This leads to a situation in which the healers who have long been effectively treating the majority of common afflictions affecting the Indo-Nepalese are in retreat and are losing their significance. New forms of dependency thus arise, from the partial nature of healthcare, the lack of health security and the growth of health bureaucracy, which serve to reinforce social inequalities.

The work of Nomad RSI began with a detailed exploration of the local therapeutic systems (work that was begun in 1998), a mapping of their respective actions and an inventory of the pharmacopoeia used in treatment. This first phase defined the spaces for intervention: the formation of working groups of practitioners (including traditional midwives) and other villagers, to draw out their ideas for further action.

The second phase of the project brought logistical support to these propositions and assisted in their development. Particular attention was paid to the internal function of the working groups and the manner in which their project ideas expanded, aware of the inevitable socio-political issues of the different interest groups that always arise when NGOs intervene in local affairs. The intention was not to ignore or gloss over these different positions, but rather to bring them out in open discussion.

Overall, the project cannot be seen as solely medical in focus, but above all as a cultural and human endeavour: the intention was not to “educate” but to facilitate collective reflection on local cultural identity at a nodal point in the social, physical and psychological realms of contemporary Indo-Nepalese life. Putting in train a real dialogue between the participants, not only seeing the technical issues and internal power challenges, but considering the position of each participant in the society, would have been the greatest sign of success. Indeed, only this kind of awareness (not as a theoretical position but as something born from the daily enactment of social relationships) is able to give rise to a genuine wish to take control of social change.

Unfortunately, the project had to be suddenly suspended due to the political instability that followed the seizure of power by the Maoist of Nepal.

Other past projects

 Cambodia - Preah Vihear
 Senegal
 India - Karnataka
 India - Tamil Nadu
 Andorra