When and why was it established?

The Yugoslav Union of Associations for Psychotherapy was founded in Belgrade on December 23, 1997, and it was registered with the federal Ministry of Justice on January 19, 1998. 

It was founded as an independent, non-government, non-profit and non-party association with an aim to gather and unite associations and individuals – psychotherapists of different orientations (psychoanalysts, Jungists, group analysis, gestalt, body-therapy, psychodrama, art-therapy, transaction analysis, behaviour-cognitive, family, structural, integrative, etc.) in order to ensure the protection of their common interests in the sphere of developing and promoting psychotherapy as a profession: its theory, practice, education, and research, as well as with a view to uniting psychotherapists of various orientations into one organization and establishing cooperation with similar professional organizations in the country and abroad.

Members

The founder and president of the Union (since 1997) is Prof. Snezana Milenkovic, PhD.

The members of the Presidency, as the Union’s organ, are: Nevena Calovska Hercog, D.Sci. (Secretary General), Vice Presidents: Mladen Kostic, specialist of clinical psychology, and Dr Zorka Lopicic, as well as other members of the Presidency: Prof. Dr Ljiljana Klisic Djordjevic, Prof. Dr Vesna Petrovic, Dr Zoran Milivojevic, Dr Zoran Djuric, Prof. Dr Dusan Stojnov, Dr Zoran Vojic,  Marija Stefanovic i Jelena Sakotic Kurbalija, MA (treasurer). Beside the Presidency, there are other organs of the Union: Professional Board, consisting of 17 representatives of different psychotherapeutic orientations, then the Supervisory Board, Ethnical Committee, and the Court of Honour, consisting of three members each.

Aims

The main goals of the Union are the recognition of the psychotherapy as an independent occupation, the establishing of educational standards and norms, as well as ethical standards of psychotherapeutic work, development of expert practice and encouraging scientific research, publishing of expert and scientific papers, liaising and cooperating with similar associations in the country and abroad, and monitoring the work of psychotherapist with respect to observing the professional Code of Ethics.

Membership in Europe

Not long after the establishing, on February 14, 1998, in Vienna, the Union was accepted in the European Association for Psychotherapy (EAP) which currently comprises 128 organizations (26 NUO, 18 EWAO) from 41 European countries with more than 120 000 therapists.  EAP is based on 1990 Strasbourg Declaration for Psychotherapy, according to which high standards for training are required in order to achieve scientifically-founded free and independent practice of psychotherapy as a profession.  Our Union has become an organizational member of EAP and since then we have had close and fruitful cooperation with Europe and our European colleagues.

Certificates

During the war (NATO aggression on Serbia), on May 24, 1999, we started awarding the national (Yugoslav) certificates for psychotherapy and 186 our therapists have been awarded so far.  The process is still underway.  Criteria for awarding certificates have been harmonized with European ones.

Besides, EAP began awarding European Certificates for Psychotherapy and 73 of our psychotherapists have so far been granted this highest award in the field of psychotherapy.

Activities

Despite difficult times, our psychotherapists have been present on both internal and international psychotherapeutic scenes ever since the foundation of the Union: they have contributed to the work of the European board, participated at European psychotherapy congresses, and attended national professional meetings; they have published their works in renowned international and national magazines, organized numerous workshops, seminars and projects related to humanitarian activities.  New psychotherapeutic associations have also been established, and with the ones that already exist, they make the total of 17.

REALISATION AND PLANS

Since its founding in 1998, the Union has had the status of the national umbrella organization or NUO, which means that it has gathered different psychotherapeutic organizations under one and the same ‘umbrella’.  The Union also has the status of the national Awarding Organization or NAO, which means that it has been accredited by EAP to propose our Union members for the European Certificate for Psychotherapy (ECP).  It is a great honour and privilege for our therapists to be awarded the European Certificate, but it is also a great challenge.  It is a great honour because it confirms the quality of our psychotherapists and psychotherapy, a privilege, because it enables us to practice psychotherapy and work throughout Europe  This means that we have to harmonize our educational standards in the field of psychotherapy with the European ones.  This presents a serious task, since we have first to establish our won standards and criteria related to the education of psychotherapists, then harmonize these with the European standards and, finally, give our contribution to the Law on Psychotherapy that is supposed to help establish psychotherapy as an independent profession in our country in the nearest future. and even world, and the challenge because, beside granting us certain rights and privileges, it obliges us.

Seven European countries have passed laws on psychotherapy so far.

Besides, five of our training schools have been accredited by Europe, and the process is still underway, open for other modalities.

In 2004 we organized 12th European Congress for Psychotherapy, which took place in Belgrade, 24-27 June, and following which we have published a volume of collected papers in English entitled EUROPEAN IDENTITY & PSYCHOTHERAPY, as an edition of EAP, the Institute for Mental Health, YUAP and Čigoja Štampa.

Psychotherapists – Future Needs

Since worldwide estimates say that about 5 % of the population has the need for psychotherapy in industrialized countries and since these same sources estimate that one therapist covers approximately 100 patients, it is estimated that Serbia currently needs about 4000 therapists.  We believe that the situation regarding psychotherapy and psychotherapists in our country is far from favourable, since there are only just above two hundred licence-holding therapists who meet both domestic and European criteria, so it is obvious that we need at least 20 times more therapists than there already are.