This paper discusses some aspects of the growth, development and influence of the “disease” conception of alcoholism, the positivistic base of this conception, and on the criticisms centering on the validity and usefulness of the conception to fully explain the alcoholism phenomenon. Though the ‘disease conception’ has seemingly triumphed, it occupies an uneasy status, for the tempo of the criticism of the concept has increased in recent years, in these (and other) areas: (1) the alleged “predisposing characteristics” of alcoholics; (2) alcoholism as a progressive, inexorable process; (3) the notion of supposed “loss of control,” (4) the necessity of abstinence in treatment; (5) the reification of the concept; (6) the all-inclusive properties of the concept. It is suggested that more modest, less ambitious, more phenomenologically oriented terminology and concepts be employed, to do some justice to the complex and variegated nature of the alcoholism phenomenon.
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