Doctoral Dissertation Research: Legal and Regulatory Inconsistency at the Community Level

职务名称：博士论文研究：社区层面的法律的和监管的不一致性摘要：美国的许多职业都存在于一个法律的背景下的监管不一致的各个司法管辖区的做法，导致缺乏稳定性的合法性，这些职业。一个最好的例子是美国的分娩方式，因为越来越多的家庭寻求替代标准的医院分娩，产科医生参加的药物分娩，如家庭分娩。注册专业助产士是经过专门培训的专业提供者，为越来越多的选择在家分娩的家庭提供护理，受到各种法律和政策的监管。本项目将调查家庭助产的法律的设置在不同的实践社区的背景下，他们对不同的监管框架的反应。使用混合的方法来分析家庭分娩的不一致的法律的环境，该项目将采用人种学的方法，包括深入的采访和分析档案数据收集在不同的司法管辖区的情况。这项研究将调查的反应缺乏稳定性的国家治疗的专业知识，特点是家庭出生的监管环境。研究设计包括参与观察围绕家庭分娩专业人员在几个现场的做法。除了人种学研究之外，还将采访负责管理家庭接生做法的官员和家庭接生专业网络的其他成员。研究结果将有助于理解法律的意识，监管安排，专业知识和专业化的政治之间的关系。此外，该项目将通过阐明从业者如何应对目前在全国范围内使用的各种执照模式，提供现有监管策略的影响。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并被认为值得通过使用基金会的智力价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估来支持。

Title: Doctoral Dissertation Research: Legal and Regulatory Inconsistency at the Community LevelAbstract: Many professions in the U.S exist in a legal context of regulatory inconsistency across the various jurisdictions in which the practice operates, leading to a lack of stability regarding the legality of those professions. A prime example concerns how childbirth occurs in the U.S, as more families seek alternatives to standard hospital-based, obstetrician-attended medicated birth, such as home birth. Certified Professional Midwives, the professional providers specifically trained to provide care to the growing community of families choosing home birth, are regulated by enormously varied laws and policies. This project will investigate the legal setting of home birth midwifery in the context of varied communities of practice and their responses to differing regulatory frameworks.Using mixed-methods to analyze the inconsistent legal environment of home birth, the project will employ an ethnographic approach, including in-depth interviews and analysis of archival data collected across varied jurisdictional contexts. The study will investigate responses to a lack of stability about state treatment of expertise that characterizes the regulatory context of home birth. The research design includes participant observation centered around the practices of home birth professionals in several field sites. Ethnographic research will be supplemented by interviews with officials charged with regulating the practice of home birth midwifery and with other members of the professional networks of home birth midwives. Findings will contribute to an understanding of the relationship between legal consciousness, regulatory arrangements, and the politics of expertise and professionalization. Additionally, the project will provide implications of existing regulatory strategies by illuminating how practitioners respond to the various models of licensure currently in use across the country.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.