Biomédicalisation massive de l’accouchement au Cambodge après 150 ans de résistance

Abstract

While the French protectorate tried unsuccessfully to medicalize childbirth in Cambodia through the creation of midwifery schools, the opening of maternity wards and financial incentives, global health policies strongly relayed in the early 2000s led to an extremely rapid biomedicalization of childbirth in Cambodia, causing an unprecedented medical and social disruption in the country. Based on a doctoral research conducted between 2013 and 2016 and mobilizing a mixed methodology (qualitative and quantitative), the article shows that today, the use of biotechnology is massive in the capital Phnom Penh. The practice of episiotomy is systematic, the use of perineorraphy (aimed at tightening women’s vagina) is frequent, and caesarean section rates are increasing rapidly, responding to a socially constructed demand. If this biomedicalization of childbirth has undeniably contributed to the recent and spectacular decrease in the maternal mortality rate in Cambodia, it also contributes to the shaping of women’s bodies and to the construction of a female body that meets social and conjugal norms.

Keywords

• maternal health
• childbirth
• biomedicalization
• biotechnology
• Cambodia