Crime - Feminism Flashcards
Who are the feminists who study crime?
Heidensohn, Walby, Mcrobbie, Carlen, Adler, Jackson, Archer.
What did Heidensohn believe?
Women rarely offend because of social control.
How does domestic control prevent women from offending?
Women are more likely to care and support for children, this limits the opportunity to be involved in crime
Whereas, men go to work, go to the pub, get black-out drunk, and have more involvement in crime.
How does control in public places prevent women from offending?
- Women are more fearful of public spaces where men can hurt them.
- Societies standards for women
- Victim blaming, it’s a women’s fault to “provoke” men
How does employment control prevent women from offending?
- Women are less likely to be in higher positions, and so don’t have the opportunity to commit coorperate crime.
How are courts harsher toward women who commit crime?
DOUBLE DEVIANCE.
- Courts treat women more harshly than males when finding out they deviate from gender norms, eg, courts punish girls for premature/promiscuous activity, but never males.
What are the evaluations of Heidensohn?
- Quite outdated, women and men share household duties in the modern day.
- Pollak argues women are actually treated more leniently by the court justice system, by being stop and searched less, and male judges are less likely to seperate offenders from children
What did Walby believe?
Females are the victims of crime, and not the ones committing it.
Who are the offenders and who are the victims for Walby?
Women commit low levels of crime in society. Walby focuses on how women are generally victims of crimes by male offenders
Believes a patriarchal society does not do enough to help or protect women, women face a matrix of inequalities that lead them to be the victims of crime.
Do women commit much crime?
- 95% of crime is committed by men.
- There are no men in prison for a child’s truancy.
Examples of inequalities that could affect women that could contribute to them being victims of crime.
- Women typically earn less than men, which may lead to some women to feel dependant on an abusive partner, without the finances to escape.
- Women are sexualised by the media, encouraging men to see them as sex objects rather than people.
- There is little education on men and rules about consent. More blame is placed onto women for being attacked or raped.
Why is Walby critical of the crime survey for england and wales?
- The scale of domestic abuse is not accurately captured as the CSEW does not measure repeat offenders.
- Estimated that violent crime is 60% higher than what is recorded
- Estimated an increase of 70% for women, and 50% for men (for being a victim of violent crime)
What are the evaluations of Walby?
- Because the theory is so holistic, it’s hard to decide what actions to take to protect women as essentially all aspects of society are victimising them.
- Walby identified issues with the justice system that are starting to gain more public attention in 2021, we saw a newspaper report claiming that england and wales had essentially “decriminalised” rape as there were so few convictions.
What did Carlen research?
Carlen followed on from Heidensohn’s studies, and asked why women commit less crime.
How did Carlen research this?
- Through the use of unstructured interviews.
- Sample: 39 aged 15-46 working class women who had been convicted for a range of crimes, including theft, fraud, prostitution, drugs, burglary, handling stolen goods, violence and arson.
