Modernisation of Maternity Care in Malawi
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 12965188 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Alessandra Sarelin (Åbo Akademi University, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2014 |
| Volume | 32 |
| Issue | 4 |
| Pages | 331-351 |
| Publication date | 2014-10-02 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Nordic Journal of Human Rights (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1891-814X • E-ISSN: 1891-8131 |
| Publisher | Taylor & Francis (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1080/18918131.2014.957463 |
| OpenAlex | W2073648675 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 6 |
Low-income countries have by and large adopted antenatal programmes and policies regarding childbirth of high-income countries. The logic behind human rights and development interventions leads to increased regulation and homogenisation of what is considered the socially acceptable, safe and normal way to handle birth. In an effort to decrease maternal and neonatal deaths and to modernise and institutionalise childbirth, the Government of Malawi, in cooperation with donors and the international community, is creating new regulatory regimes regarding where, how and under whose care to give birth. The government has made out-of-facility births with traditional birth attendants (TBAs) illegal by banning TBAs from practising. Customary legal mechanisms have been used to compel women to seek skilled birth attendance (i.e., modern practices) and to penalise TBAs who continue to practice. The traditional birth culture embodied in TBAs is portrayed as conservative, unchanging, primitive and impossible to control and monitor due to the oral tradition it is based upon and the low literacy rate. The ban on TBAs applies as a contribution to social norms on childbirth and normalisation practices of facility-based birth. As theorised by Michel Foucault, biopolitical governance means governing people's conduct within a framework and making use of traditional legal mechanisms. In the present case, a post-colonial state employs these means in order to change people's behaviour in the area of childbirth. The purpose of this article is to analyse the modernisation process of maternity care from a biopolitical perspective, focusing on the normalising and rationalising aspects that seem to underpin the safety arguments behind the TBA ban. The starting point is that the customary law represents a political battle over what it means to be a modern state concerned with the female population; law is a discursive site, as theorised by Ratna Kapur
Attendance · Childbirth · Economic growth · Economics · Government (linguistics · Modernization theory · Political science · Pregnancy · Sociology · Global Maternal and Child Health · Law
| Unique citing works | 6 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 0,6 |
| Citation span | 2016 - 2019 (4) |
| Citation velocity | historical |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 6 |