Crime and Deviance - Social Distribution of crime; Gender Flashcards
Statistics around gender in crime
- Men are 60 times more likely to commit sexual crimes
- Men are 14 times more likely to commit robbery
- Men are 13 times more likely to possess a weapon
- 4x more likely to commit theft
- In 2014, 95% of the prison population as male in England and Wales
- There are only 12 female prisons in England and none in Wales
- 48% of women have committed an offence in order to support drug use
- 53% of women in prison have survived emotional, physical or sexual abuse during childhood
- Men have much higher rates of crime than women do
- Fraud and forgery are the most common types of female crime, with males dominating sexual and violent crime - issues of underreporting of women for these crimes and socialisation of compassion etc
Reasons for a lack of female perpetrators in crime statistics - Sex Role Theory
- Parsons - Sex Role Theory explains gender differences in offending in terms of the differences in gender socialisation, gender roles and gendered identities
- The norms and values associated with traditional femininity are not conducive to crime, while the norms and values associated with traditional masculinity are more likely to lead to crime
- Female socialisation, traditional roles and low female crime rates - Parsons argued that because females carry out the expressive role in the family which involved them caring for their children and looking after the emotional needs of their husbands, and that girls grew up to internalise values such as caring and empathy which both reduce the likelihood of offending and committing crime simply because a caring and empathetic attitude towards others means you are less likely to harm others
- Links to Hirschi’s bonds of attachment theory and Miller’s focal concerns theory
Sex Role Theory cont.
- The child caring role also means that women are also effectively more attached to their families and wider communities than men – It is traditionally women who keep in touch with relatives and get to know their children’s friends families and thus bond local communities together. In terms of bonds of attachment theory, women are thus more attached to wider society and thus less likely to commit crime. Part of differential socialisation - girls are raised differently to boys.
- Similarly, because traditional female gender roles involve women being busier than men, especially since they have taken on the ‘dual burden’ and ‘triple shift’ in recent decades, this reduces the opportunities for women to commit crime
Sex Role Theory - Sutherland
- It has long been theorized that the early socialization of boys into traditional masculine identities is at least partly responsible for the higher male crime rate.
- Sociologist Sutherland (1960) stated this very simply by saying that ‘boys are taught to be “rough and tough,” which makes them more likely to become delinquent’.
- Talcott Parsons (1964) purported that masculinity was then internalized during adolescence, which led to boys engaging in more delinquent behavior than girls, and subcultural theorists Cloward and Ohlin (1960) proposed that in gangs, younger members learn through contact with older males that traits such as toughness and dominance are necessary in order to assert a strong masculine reputation. Cohen - male status frustration (more likely to act out) and pursuit of status (crime)
Reasons for a lack of female perpetrators in crime statistics - Chivalry Theory
- Pollak - Men expect that women cannot fend for themselves and the criminal justice system is dominated by men, leading to women being viewed as more moral and in need of protection and safety - it is a patriarchal system
- Women are perceived as less of a threat and so crime detection is much lower - it is much more likely that men will want to protect women than punish them
- Walklate - this isn’t the case; if a woman is prosecuted and is goes to court on some crimes such as sexual violence, they are punished twice - women have fallen from their esteem perch (double deviancy) and so they have let down women morally, and have also let down society legally - women are therefore not treated with chivalry after a certain point in the system
- Crime rates in women is also rising, and so chivalry is fading in the justice system
- Self report studies - female crime is higher, as they admit to more than they are convicted
Reasons for a lack of female perpetrators in crime statistics - New Right
Murray -
Underclass, welfare dependency, women are not able to discipline their children
Reasons for a lack of female perpetrators in crime statistics - The Class and Gender deal
Carlen -
- The reward must be greater than the risk
Class deal - women work hard in exchange for pay which they can then use to pay for consumer goods; women in prison often come from poor backgrounds, leave prison with no employment and are therefore no worse of than they were before - those who commit crime do so as the risk is worth it
- Therefore, W/C women are more likely to commit crime
Gender deal - the gender deal was that they should do domestic labour and give love and companionship to their husbands in exchange for love and financial support - women who comply to gender norms and stereotypes are rewarded with a happy family, are emotionally supported and enjoy the benefits of a stable home
- Both deals exploit women, and are not equally applied to all women - those who do not have these deals turn to crime as they have nothing to risk
Reasons for a lack of female perpetrators in crime statistics - Control Theory
Heidensohn - Men are controlled less than women are in the home - therefore, men have more opportunity to commit crime as they are less supervised and controlled by expectations
Three ways this happens -
1) The home; childcare responsibilities, financially and warm bath theory (expectations) and bedroom culture - supervision in the private sphere
2) Public sphere - do not have to walk alone, work with the glass ceiling and expectations about their activities
3) Reputation is paramount for women, and there is a ‘fear of labelling’
- Greater pressure on women to conform and that society is set up in a way that prevents their freedom
- Corporate crime - men supervise men, leading to a hierarchy of crime that is purely male
- Toxic masculinity - changes in employment
- Increases in female crime suggest that this is becoming less relevant, and in a more modern Western society of equal gender roles etc it is reduced in its effect - culturally relative and the issue of media attention
Reasons for a lack of female perpetrators in crime statistics - Liberation Thesis
Adler -
- Women are experiencing more freedom and so are committing more crime - ‘ladette culture’ of the 1990s; women reclaim their freedom and so use their feminist movements as empowering
- This empowerment leads to more crime - more time on the streets, nightlife culture and gangs / drugs / alcohol and violence due to a change in gender roles and more equality
- However - this is also just as much as a reason they are victims than perpetrators, it is labelling that has resulted in an increase of crime, and police are more serious and worried about female crime and so it is more of a concern as the perception of female criminals has changed
Masculinity in explaining the over representation of men in crime statistics - Connell
4 types of masculinity
1) Hegemonic - heterosexual (Gramsci)
2) Subordinate - homosexual
3) Marginalised - crisis of masculinity (Mac an Ghaill)
4) Complicit - ‘new man’ - Young and Wilmott
- Dominant prestigious - the popular and valued type (breadwinner, dominant, powerful, tough, aggressive, provider, heterosexual etc)
- Patriarchal privilege - the advantage men get simply by being men - does not apply equally to all types, with men outnumbering women in the justice system
- This hegemonic masculinity promotes independence, self-sufficiency, tough, physical, strong, aggressive, competitive, assertive, successful, powerful and in control
- This is promoted by the media, and socialised by peer groups, and male crime enables this hegemonic masculinity to be displayed and often criminality overlaps with these ‘Alpha’ values
Masculinity in explaining the over representation of men in crime statistics - Messerschmidt
- Masculinity is a social construct or ‘accomplishment’ - it has to be learned or earned.
- Men have to constantly work at constructing and presenting their masculinity to others.
- Some men have more resources to draw upon than others such as Role models (socialisation), Peer group, Network of male relatives
and Higher level of education - Crime and deviance may be a resource used by lower class / ethnic minority men to achieve the ‘accomplished masculinity’ of their middle class, white counterparts - men are aiming for the ‘dominant prestigious’ or ‘hegemonic’ type.
- Three key elements result in being labelled with ‘hegemonic masculinity’ - Paid work / type of employment, Subordination of women and Heterosexuality
- Subordinated masculinity’s - Gay men, Lower class, Less educated
and Ethnic minority - Men in these subgroups appear to challenge the hegemonic view and therefore can be created as scapegoats and blamed for crime to divert attention from the dominant group - thus, they appear more in the crime statistics.
Masculinity in explaining the over representation of men in crime statistics - Winlow
- To maintain their reputation and employability the men must trade on their bodily capital - they have struggled to keep up with the globalisation of masculinity
- Men must be able to use violence to win fight and they must also look the part to discourage competitors from challenging them, and so they become more involved in the night time economy, gaining jobs such as bouncers and security to find their niche in society - bodily capital as expression of masculinity
- Also, this bodily capital leads to criminal behaviour because fights as an expression of hegemonic masculinity are illegal
Criticisms of the chivalry thesis
- Farrington and Morris (1983) – study of sentencing, women not sentence more leniently
- Buckle and Farrington (1984) – observational study of shoplifting – twice as many males as females
- Hales et al. (2009) – self report study, more likely to have been offenders in all major offence categories
- Home Office research (2004) - Courts are imposing more severe sentences on women for less serious offences
- Hedderman (2010) - the rate of imprisonment for women has been rising since the beginning of the 21st C.
- Heidensohn (1996) Courts unfair, harsh on women who deviate from social norms. ((double deviance)) - they have failed as women and failed as citizens
Messerschmidt - Impact of globalisation on masculinity
Impact of globalisation on masculinity:
- In late modern or postmodern society is deindustrialised and manufacturing has been outsourced
- Loss traditional manual jobs (crisis of masculinity)
- Expansion of night-time leisure economy
- This allowed both legal expression of physicality and masculinity – bouncers, police, business ownership and illegal - fights, drug dealing, use of prostitutes
Criticisms of Messerschmidt
1) He does not explain why all men don’t use crime to accomplish masculinity
2) He does not explain why crime appears in all classes/amongst all types of men
3) He over-uses the idea of hegemonic masculinity as an attempt to explain widely different types of male crime - can one explanation fit all?
4) His argument is unclear; is masculinity a cause of crime or just a description of male offenders?
