Standardizing psychotropic drugs and drug practices in the twentieth century: paradox of order and disorder

►The rising supply and demand for psychiatric ills and pills was met by standardizing diagnosis and therapy. ►The process of standardisation is fraught with contradictions and inconsistencies. ►At all stages order-disorder transitions occur. ►Psychiatric mind-bodies are continuously reconfigured according to changing standards. ►Standardization is a metaphor for the disciplining of our individuality in modern and post-modern society. According to ongoing historical research, standardizing the production and consumption of psychotropic drugs is a process fraught with contradictions and inconsistencies. Both the construction and change of drug standards can be highly unsettling events and do not necessarily lead to more order. The balance between order and disorder appears to be rather fragile and paradoxically at all stages in the evolution of standards we see order–disorder transitions.