ABSTRACT
Midwives are now being joined by a growing number of doctors and obstetricians who are expressing their deep unease over the obstetric scene of the 1980s. They are recognising the error of classifying all pregnancies as being at ‘risk’ or ‘high risk’, and of subjecting all pregnant women to the indiscriminate barrage of modern technology; indeed they acknowledge that routine inflexible policies and doctor-controlled labours and deliveries have dehumanised the act of birth and at the same time have de-skilled the midwife. As the cultural pattern of childbirth becomes increasingly scientific the role of the midwife changes and may disappear completely. Midwives have recently allowed themselves to wallow in a pool of self-pity, blaming their managers, obstetricians, other health professionals, or even the government for steady and undeniable erosion of their unique role. Technologised childbirth removes at a stroke the craft skills from midwifery and diminishes the midwives’ area of responsibility as practitioners in their own right.
