Alternative futures: Fields, boundaries, and divergent professionalisation strategies within the Chiropractic profession

Brosnan, C

Alternative futures: Fields, boundaries, and divergent professionalisation strategies within the Chiropractic profession

Brosnan, C

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Publication Type:: Journal Article
Citation:: Social Science and Medicine, 2017, 190 pp. 83 - 91
Issue Date:: 2017-10-01

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Field	Value	Language
dc.contributor.author	Brosnan, C https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2104-4937	en_US
dc.date.available	2017-08-17	en_US
dc.date.issued	2017-10-01	en_US
dc.identifier.citation	Social Science and Medicine, 2017, 190 pp. 83 - 91	en_US
dc.identifier.issn	0277-9536	en_US
dc.identifier.uri	http://hdl.handle.net/10453/123400
dc.description.abstract	© 2017 Elsevier Ltd Sociological studies of the complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) occupations have documented the professionalisation strategies these groups use to establish boundaries between themselves and their competitors, including seeking educational accreditation and statutory regulation/licensure. Chiropractic has been particularly successful at professionalising and in Australia and the UK it is taught within public universities. Recent events have threatened chiropractic's university foothold, however, showing that professionalisation needs to be understood as an ongoing process of negotiation. Based on interviews with chiropractors in Australia and the UK, this paper examines the professionalisation strategies deployed by chiropractors within and outside of the university. Highly divergent strategies are identified across different sectors of the profession, relating to defining the chiropractic paradigm, directing education and constructing professional identity. In each domain, chiropractic academics tended to prioritise building the evidence base and becoming more aligned with medicine and other allied health professions. Although some practitioners supported this agenda, others strove to preserve chiropractic's vitalistic philosophy and professional distinction. Following Bourdieu, these intra-professional struggles are interpreted as occurring within a field in which chiropractors compete for different forms of capital, pulled by two opposing poles. The differing orientations and strategies pursued at the two poles of the field point to a number of possible futures for this CAM profession, including a potential split within the profession itself.	en_US
dc.relation.ispartof	Social Science and Medicine	en_US
dc.relation.isbasedon	10.1016/j.socscimed.2017.08.018	en_US
dc.subject.classification	Public Health	en_US
dc.subject.mesh	Humans	en_US
dc.subject.mesh	Complementary Therapies	en_US
dc.subject.mesh	Chiropractic	en_US
dc.subject.mesh	Universities	en_US
dc.subject.mesh	Ethics, Professional	en_US
dc.subject.mesh	Australia	en_US
dc.subject.mesh	United Kingdom	en_US
dc.subject.mesh	Workforce	en_US
dc.title	Alternative futures: Fields, boundaries, and divergent professionalisation strategies within the Chiropractic profession	en_US
dc.type	Journal Article
utslib.citation.volume	190	en_US
utslib.for	1117 Public Health and Health Services	en_US
utslib.for	1601 Anthropology	en_US
utslib.for	1608 Sociology	en_US
utslib.for	11 Medical and Health Sciences	en_US
utslib.for	16 Studies in Human Society	en_US
pubs.embargo.period	Not known	en_US
pubs.organisational-group	/University of Technology Sydney
pubs.organisational-group	/University of Technology Sydney/Faculty of Health
utslib.copyright.status	closed_access
pubs.publication-status	Published	en_US
pubs.volume	190	en_US

Abstract:

© 2017 Elsevier Ltd Sociological studies of the complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) occupations have documented the professionalisation strategies these groups use to establish boundaries between themselves and their competitors, including seeking educational accreditation and statutory regulation/licensure. Chiropractic has been particularly successful at professionalising and in Australia and the UK it is taught within public universities. Recent events have threatened chiropractic's university foothold, however, showing that professionalisation needs to be understood as an ongoing process of negotiation. Based on interviews with chiropractors in Australia and the UK, this paper examines the professionalisation strategies deployed by chiropractors within and outside of the university. Highly divergent strategies are identified across different sectors of the profession, relating to defining the chiropractic paradigm, directing education and constructing professional identity. In each domain, chiropractic academics tended to prioritise building the evidence base and becoming more aligned with medicine and other allied health professions. Although some practitioners supported this agenda, others strove to preserve chiropractic's vitalistic philosophy and professional distinction. Following Bourdieu, these intra-professional struggles are interpreted as occurring within a field in which chiropractors compete for different forms of capital, pulled by two opposing poles. The differing orientations and strategies pursued at the two poles of the field point to a number of possible futures for this CAM profession, including a potential split within the profession itself.

Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item:

http://hdl.handle.net/10453/123400