'New midwifery' in Australia: what kind of professionalization is likely to emerge from a process of change?

Australian maternity services are divided between public and private sectors and differ between states and regions. A 2009 Commonwealth review proposed a greater role for midwives in primary and cooperative care and opened Medicare funding for private practice within certain limits. This paper addresses the type of professionalizing project being envisaged in Australia based on an analysis of the publicly available submissions to the review. These were downloaded from the websites of the Commonwealth and various professional organisations and analysed thematically. Major issues arising from the submissions were the predominance of a ‘new midwifery’ identity whilst conceding the complexity of midwifery in Australia; the distinctively Australian demand for State support of private midwifery practice; the invisibility of much publicly funded midwifery innovation; and the strategic use of evidence by different professional groups. The paper draws attention to contradictions in the type of midwifery professionalization envisaged in the submissions especially between ‘democratic egalitarian’ models of professionalism and traditional ‘social trustee’ autonomy. It notes some divergence in the submissions of medical organisations and concludes that it is publicly funded midwifery practising within co-operative guidelines which is more in accord with neo-liberal models of governance backed by the contemporary state while private practice midwifery shares more in common with a traditional model of professionalism.