Del transexualismo a la disforia de género en el DSM. Cambios terminológicos, misma esencia patologizante

This paper analyses how transsexuality has been con-ceptualized in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM). We will see how the successive changes in the denomination and diagnostic criteria are largely due to the pressure that the editors of the manual have received by scientists, academics, political organ-isations and organisations for the transgender rights. As a result of these tensions the transsexuality has been reconceptualised in several occasions, although the con-notations inherent to the diagnostic category which treat it as a disease have endured. Likewise, we will address the current debate on pathologisation of transsexual-ity which is dominated by two opposed discourses: one which justifies the inclusion of transsexuality in the DSM because it considers that the diagnostic guarantees the access to hormonal and surgical therapy, and the other which criticises its inclusion because it considers that it contributes to the stigmatisation of the transgender peo-ple. The paper concludes that the trans-specific health resources should be regarded as a fundamental right which cannot be subject to clinical requirements.