Gender, Crime and Justice

What are the gender patterns in crime?

4 out of 5 convicted offenders in England & Wales are male
by age 40, 9% of females have a criminal conviction vs 32% of males

What are the gender differences among offenders?

- higher proportion of female than male offenders are convicted of property offences (except burglary) & higher proportion of male than female offenders are convicted of violence or sexual offences
- males are more likely to be repeat offenders, to have longer criminal careers & to commit more serious crimes e.g. men are 15x more likely to be convicted of homocide

Do women commit more crime?

- some argue that stats underest the amount of female as against male offending
- typically 'female' crimes are less likely to be reported e.g. shoplifting is likely to be noticed or reported than the violent or sexual crimes more often committed by men & prostitution is unlikely to be reported by either party
- even when women's crimes are detected or reported, they are less likely to be prosecuted or if prosecuted, more likely to be let off relatively lightly

What is the chivalry thesis?

most criminal justice agents are men & men are socialised to act in a 'chivalrous' way towards women
CJS is more lenient w/ women & so their crimes are less likely to end up in OS - in turn gives an invalid picture that exaggerates the extent of gender differences

Pollak (1950) - Chivalry Thesis

men have a protective attitude towards women & that 'men hate to accuse women and thus send them to their punishment, police officers dislike to arrest them, district attorneys to prosecute them, judges and juries to find them guilty...'

How do court statistics appear to support the chivalry thesis?

- females are more likely than males to be released on bail rather than remanded in custody
- females are more likely than males to receive a fine or a community service & less likely to be sent to prison, women on avg receive shorter prison sentences
- only 1 in 9 female offenders receive a prison sentence for shoplifting vs 1 in 5 males

Farrington and Morris (1983) - EV: Chivalry Thesis

study of sentencing 408 offences of theft
found women were not sentenced more leniently

How do self-report studies provide evidence that males commit more crimes?

young men are more likely to report binge drinking, taking illegal drugs or engage in disorderly conduct

What does the chivalry thesis ignore?

that many male crimes do not get reported e.g. 2012 only 8% of females who had been victims of serious sexual assault reported it to the police
crimes of the powerful are also under-represented in self-report & victim surveys - more likely to be committed by men due to their more privileged position in job marker

What do feminists argue about gender differences?

CJS is biassed against women

Heidensohn (1996)

courts treat females more harshly than males when they deviate from gender norms

How do courts treat women more harshly?

- double standards - courts punish girls but not boys for premature or promiscuous sexual activity, 'Wayward' girls can end up in care w/out ever having committed an offence
- women who do not conform to accepted standards of monogamous heterosexuality & motherhood are punished more harshly

Carlen (1997) - Bias against women

when women are jailed, it is less for the 'seriousness of their crime and more according to the court's assessment of them as wives, mothers and daughters'
girls who parents believe them to beyond control are more likely to receive custodial sentences vs girls who live more 'conventional' lives
Scottish judges more likely to jail women who children were in care vs women who they saw as good mothers

Walklate (1998) - Bias against women

in rape cases it is not the defendant who is on trial but the victim, since she has to prove her respectability in order to have her evidence accepted

What are the three main explanations of gender differences in crime?

sex role theory
control theory
liberation thesis

What is the Functionalist sex role theory?

focuses on diff in socialisation of males & females e.g. boys are encouraged to be tough, aggressive & risk taking & this can mean they are more disposed to commit acts of violence or take advantage of criminal opportunities

Parsons (1955)

diff in c+d traced to conventional NF
while men take the instrumental, breadwinner role performed largely outside the home, women perform the expressive role in the home
this gives girls access to an adult role model but tends to mean that boys reject fem models of behaviour that express tenderness, gentleness & emotion - boys seek to distance themselves by engaging in 'compensatory compulsory masc' through aggression & anti-social behaviour, which can slip into acts of delinquency

What do New Right theorists argue about the absence of male role models?

absence of male role models in matrifocal lone parent families leads to boys turning to criminal street gangs as source of status & identity

How is the sex role theory criticised?

Walklate (2003) - criticised for biological assumptions, Parsons assumes that bc women have the biological capacity to bear children, they are best suited to the expressive role
so although the theory tries to explain gender diff in terms of behaviour learned through socialisation ultimately based on biological assumptions about sex diff

Heidensohn (1996) - control theory

most striking thing about women's behaviour is how conformist it is - commit fewer & less serious crimes
this is bc patriarchal society imposes greater control over women & this reduces their opportunities to offend - operates @ home, in public spaces & work
but patriarchy can push some women into crime e.g. women are more likely to be poor & may turn to theft/prostitution

How are women controlled at home?

women's domestic roles imposes restrictions on their time & movement & confines them to the house for long periods, reducing opps to offend
women who try to reject their domestic role may find that their partners seek to impose it by force, through DV
daughter as less likely to be allowed to come & go as they please/stay out too late - as a result develop 'bedroom culture'
girls required to do more housework than boys so have less opp to engage in deviant behaviour

Dobash and Dobash (1979)

many violent attacks result from men's dissatisfaction w/ their wives' performance of domestic duties
men also exercise control through their financial power e.g. by denying women sufficient funds for leisure activities, restricting time outside the house

How are women controlled in public?

controlled by threat or fear of male violence, esp sexual violence
controlled buy fear of being defined as not respectable, dress, make-up, demeanour & ways of speaking/acting that are defined as inappropriate can gain a woman a 'reputation' e.g. may avoid going into pubs for fear of being regarded as sexually 'loose'

Islington Crime Survey

54% of women avoided going out after dark for fear of being victims of crime vs 14% of men

How are women controlled at work?

controlled by male supervisors & managers - sexual harassment is widespread & helps keep women 'in their place'
women's subordinate position reduces their opps to engage in major criminal activity at work e.g. the 'glass ceiling' prevents many women from rising to senior positions where their is greater opp to commit fraud so less likely to be involved in WCC

Carlen (1988)

study of 39 15-46 yrs old w/c women who had been convicted of range of crimes e.g. theft, fraud, handling stolen goods, prostitution etc
20 were in prison/youth custody at time of interviews
most convicted serious female criminals are w/c, though recognises some are m/c

Hirschi (1969) - Control Theory

humans act rationally & are controlled by being offered a 'deal' or rewards in return for conforming
ppl will turn to crime if they do not believe the rewards will be forthcoming & if rewards of crime appear greater than risks

What are the two types of rewards working class women are promised leading to their conformity according to Carlen?

the class deal - women who work will be offered material rewards, w/ decent standard of living & leisure opps
the gender deal - patriarchal ideology promises women material & emotional rewards from fam life by conforming to norms of conventional domestic gender role

How had the women in Carlen's study not achieved the class deal?

- 32 had always been in poverty
- some found that qualifications gained in jail had been no help in gaining work upon release, others had been on training courses but still couldn't get a job
- many had experienced problems & humiliations in trying to claim benefits

How had the women in Carlen's study no achieved the gender deal?

- some had been abused physically or sexually by their father, or subjected to DV by partners
- 1/2+ had spent time in care, which broke the bonds w/ fam & friends
- those leaving/running away from care often found themselves homeless, unemployed & poor

What are some evaluations of control theory?

- Heidensohn shows the patriarchal controls that help prevent women from deviating
- Carlen shows how the failure of patriarchal society to deliver the promised 'deals' to some women removes the controls that prevents them from offending
- can be accused of seeing women's behaviour as determined by external forces e.g. patriarchal control or class & gender deal - this underplays the importance of free will & choice in offending
- Carlen's sample was small & may be unrepresentative, consisted largely of w/c & serious offenders

Adler (1975) - Liberation Thesis

as women become liberated from patriarchy, their crimes will become as frequent & as serious as men's - women's lib has led to a new type of female criminal & a rise in female crime rate
changes in struc of society have led to women's offending behaviour - opps in ed & work have become more equal, women have begun to adopt trad 'male' roles in legitimate & illegitimate activity
so women no longer just commit trad 'female' crimes also commit typically 'male' offences
bc of women's greater self-confidence & assertiveness & fact that they now have greater opps in legitimate struc e.g. there are more women in senior positions so more opps to commit WCC

What evidence is there is support the liberation thesis?

- overall rate of female offending & female share of offences rose during 2nd half of 20th century e.g. between 1950s & 1990s share of female offences rose from 1 in 7 to 1 in 6
- media talk of growth in 'girl gangs'
- Denscombe (2001) - Midlands teens' self-images found that females were as likely to engage in risk-taking behaviour & girls were adopting more 'male' stances e.g. desire to be in control & look 'hard'

What are some evaluations of the liberation thesis?

- female crime rate began rising in 1950s long before women's lib movement in late 60s
- most female criminals are w/c - group least likely to be influenced by women's lib
- little evidence that illegitimate opp struc of professional crime has opened up to women
- overest both extent to which women have become liberated & extent to which they now are able to engage in serious crime

Hand and Dodd (2009) - Females and Violent Crime

between 2000 and 2008, police stats show the no. of females arrested for violence rose by avg of 17% each yr

Sharpe and Gelsthorpe (2009) - Criminalisation of Females

the net-widening policies are producing a rise in OS for females' violent crimes - growing trends towards prosecuting females for low-level physical altercations even in some cases for playground fights
most convictions = minor offences

Young (2001) - Criminalisation of Females

trend of 'widening the net' is 'defining deviance up' to catch trivial offences in the net

What is the explanation for the increase in criminalisation of women if participation is not increasing?

it is a social construction resulting from moral panics

Steffensmeier et al (2005)

media-driven moral panics about girls were affecting sentencing decisions

Gender and homicide victims

70% are male
female victims are more likely to know their killer & 60% of cases it was a partner or ex-partner
males are most likely to be killed by a friend or acquaintance

Gender and victims of violence

fewer women than men are victims of violence 2% vs 4%
women are most likely to be victimised by an acquaintance, men by a stranger
more women than men are victims of intimate violence 31% vs 18%
10x more women reported having been sexually assaulted than men
only 8% of females who had experience serious sexual assault reported it to the police & 1/3 who didn't report said they believed the police couldn't do much to help

Messerschmidt (1993) - Masc and Crime

masc is a social construct or 'accomplishment' & men have to constantly work at constructing & presenting it to others
diff masc co-exist within society but hegemonic masc is the dominant, prestigious form that most men wish to accomplish
c+d are resources that diff men may use for accomplishing masc e.g. class & ethnic diff among youths lead to diff forms of rule breaking to demonstrate masc

What is hegemonic masculinity?

work in the paid-labour market, the subordination of women, heterosexism and the driven and uncontrollable sexuality of men

How do white middle class youths demonstrate masculinity?

have to subordinate themselves to teachers in order to achieve a m/c status, leading to accommodating masc in school
outside school, their masc takes an oppositional form e.g. through drinking, pranks & vandalism

How do white working class youths demonstrate masculinity?

have less chance of ed success, so their masc is oppositional both in & out school - constructed around sexist attitudes, being tough & opposing teachers' authority
e.g. the 'lads' in Willis' study

How do black lower working class youth demonstrate masculinity?

may have fewer expectations of a reasonable job & may use gang membership & violence to express their masc, or turn to serious property crime to achieve material success

What are some criticisms of Messerschmidt?

- is masc an explanation of crime or just a desc male offenders? - danger of a circular argument, that masc explains male crimes (e.g. violence) bc crimes are committed by males (who have violent characteristics)
- doesn't explain why not all men use crime to accomplish masc
- over-works the concept of masc to explain virtually all male crimes, from joy riding to embezzlement

Winlow (2001)

study of bouncers in Sunderland, area of de-industrialisation & employment
working as bouncers in pubs & clubs provided young men w/ paid work & opp for illegal business ventures in drugs, duty-free tobacco & alcohol & protection rackets & opp to demonstrate masc through violence
in modern society, there had always been a violent, conflict subculture in Sunderland, in which 'hard men' earned status through ability to use violence however absence of prof criminal subculture meant there was little opp for a career of organised crime
under pm conditions, organised prof subculture has emerged found in night-time economy - in this subculture, ability to use violence is way of displaying masc & commodity w/ which to earn living
to maintain rep & employability, men use their bodily capital e.g. many bouncers seek to develop physical assets by bodybuilding
not just matter of being able to use violence & win fights but maintaining sign value of their bodies 'looking the part' to discourage competitors from challenging them