Rethinking cultural competence

In recent years, cultural competence has become a popular term for a variety ofstrategies to address the challenge of cultural diversity in mental health services.This issue of Transcultural Psychiatry presents papers from the McGill AdvancedStudy Institute in Cultural Psychiatry on ‘‘Rethinking Cultural Competencefrom International Perspectives,’’ which was held in Montreal, April 27and 28, 2010. Selected papers from the meeting have been supplemented withother contributions to the journal that fit the theme. Taken together, thesepapers show how conceptual analysis and critique of cultural competence canpoint toward ways to improve the cultural responsiveness, appropriateness andeffectiveness of clinical…