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Feminist Theories of Crime

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Feminist Theories of Crime ... Dominant theories of crime Rational Choice theory Deterrence theory Social Learning Theory Social Bond Theory Self-Control Theory ... – PowerPoint PPT presentation

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Title: Feminist Theories of Crime


1
Feminist Theories of Crime
  • Girls, Women, and Crime

2
(No Transcript)
3
Shaw and McKay's Model
4
Sampson and Grove (1989)
Residential Mobility Low Economic Status Racial
Heterogeneity Family Disruption Population
Density/Urbanization
Unsupervised teen-age peer groups Low
organizational participation Spare local
friendship networks
Crime
5
Violent crimes included are homicide, rape,
robbery, and both simple and aggravated assault.
6
Males were almost 10 times more likely than
females to commit murder in 2005.The offending
rates for females declined since the early 1980's
but stabilized after 1999.
7
Dominant theories of crime
  • Rational Choice theory
  • Deterrence theory
  • Social Learning Theory
  • Social Bond Theory
  • Self-Control Theory
  • Labeling Theory
  • Social Disorganization
  • Mertons Theory

8
Feminist Theories
  • Criminology has been dominated by males (field is
    flawed by the masculine perspective)
  • Two main issues for Feminist theories of crime
    are Do the theories of mens crime apply to
    women? and Can the theory explain the well
    known gender difference in crime?

9
Women and crime
  • Womens crime was virtually overlooked
  • Female victimization was ignored or minimized
  • Feminist criminology demonstrates how gender
    matters not only in terms of ones trajectory
    into crime but also in terms of how the criminal
    justice system responds to the women-offenders

10
Background Information is important
  • A few facts about the lives of adult women in
    U.S. prisons
  • 60 of women under correctional authority
    reported that they have been sexually and
    physically assaulted at some time in their lives
  • 69 of these women reported the assault happened
    before they were 18 years old

11
National Study
  • In 1990, the American Correctional Association
    published the results from a survey it conducted
    on female offenders Based on the responses of
    female offenders in 400 state and local
    correctional facilities, a very detailed profile
    of the female offender was produced

12
Profile
  • Most are young (25-29)
  • The majority are economically disadvantage
    minorities with children
  • About half ran away from home as youths
  • About a quarter had attempted suicide
  • A sizable number had serious drug problems
  • More than half were victims of physical
    abuse/sexual abuse
  • About a third had never completed high school
  • Over a quarter had been unemployed in the three
    years before going to prison
  • Most of the women were first imprisoned for
    larceny, theft, or drug offenses, and, at the
    time of the survey, they were serving time for
    drug offenses, murder, larceny, theft, or robbery
  • Many of the women convicted of manslaughter or
    murder had killed a boyfriend or husband who
    abused them

13
Homicides committed by women
  • Female-perpetrated homicides account for 10-12
    of the overall homicides
  • Who do women kill?
  • The answer is those closest to them, with whom
    they live (intimate partners, or ex-partners and
    family members)
  • Over the period 1995-2001, intimate partners
    accounted for 32 of female-perpetrated homicides

14
Method of killing
  • Women usually kill their partner with a knife or
    sharp instrument (78)
  • Poisoning (6.2)
  • Blunt instrument (2.6)
  • Arson (2.2)
  • Shooting (2.0)

15
Weapon use in Murder
  • A firearm (handgun) is used in about two-thirds
    of all homicides (predominantly males)
  • Knives or other cutting instruments
    (predominantly females)
  • Personal weapons (hands, fists, and feet)
  • Blunt objects
  • Strangulation

16
Offender characteristics
  • Typical intimate partner killer is one aged b/w
    25 and 40, with below-average level of
    educational attainment, who is likely to
    unemployed and from lower-class background (Mann,
    1996, Goetting, 1987)

17
Explanations of Intimate Partner Homicide
  • Battered Woman Syndrome (Walker, 1989) (women
    who have been physically, psychologically, or
    sexually abused over an extended period of time)
  • Financial gain (financial benefit from the death
    of partner)
  • Sexual Motivation (establish legal relationship
    with another party)

18
Invisible women
  • Every year, girls account for over a quarter of
    all arrests of young people in America (FBI,
    2002, p.239)
  • Despite this, the young women who find themselves
    in the juvenile justice system either by formal
    arrest or referral are almost completely
    invisible
  • Explanations for their delinquency explicitly or
    implicitly avoid addressing girls

19
Liberal feminism
  • Liberation perspective
  • Greater equality in education, politics, economy,
    and military
  • An unintended consequence of this availability to
    women of a wider range of social roles is their
    greater involvement in crime (arena dominated by
    men)

20
Power-Control Theory of Gender and Delinquency
  • John Hagan, 1987
  • The theory explains the difference between male
    and female rates of delinquency
  • Two types of family structures (Patriarchal
    families vs egalitarian families)

21
Patriarchal family
  • Fathers occupy the traditional role of sole
    breadwinner and mothers have only menial jobs or
    remain at home to handle domestic affairs
  • Fathers focus is directed outward towards his
    instrumental responsibilities, while the mother
    is left in charge of the children, especially
    their daughters
  • Sons are granted greater freedom as they are
    prepared for the traditional male role symbolized
    by their fathers
  • Daughters are socialized into the cult of
    domesticity under the close supervision of their
    mothers, preparing them for lives oriented
    towards domestic labor and consumption

22
Patriarchal family
  • Sons are encouraged and allowed to "experiment"
    and take risks
  • Daughters in this scenario are closely monitored
    so that participation in deviant or delinquent
    activity is unlikely.

23
Egalitarian family
  • Is characterized by little difference between the
    mother's and father's work roles, so that
    responsibility for child rearing is shared
  • Neither child receives the close supervision
    present over females in the paternalistic family
  • Middle class aspirations and values dominate
    mobility, success, autonomy, and risk taking
  • Daughter's deviance now mirrors their brother's

24
Middle-class girls
  • ...middle-class girls are the most likely to
    violate the law because they are less closely
    controlled than their lower-class counterparts
  • And in homes where both parents hold positions of
    power, girls are more likely to have the same
    expectations of career success as their brothers
  • Power-control theory, then, implies that
    middle-class youth of both sexes will have higher
    crime rates than their lower-class peers

25
Assessing power-control theory
  • Hagan's theory has been criticized as being
    basically a fairly straightforward adaptation of
    the "liberation hypothesis," as females
    experience upward mobility and status change,
    their access to deviant and illicit behaviors
    expand

26
Assessing power-control theory
  • Female deviance becomes a product of the "sexual
    scripts" within patriarchal families that make it
    more likely for them to become the victims of
    both sexual and physical abuse
  • If they run away, the juvenile court supports
    parental rights and returns them to the home,
    persistent violations lead to incarceration and
    future trouble as official delinquents/deviants
    or life on the street where survival depends on
    involvement in crime
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