NCJ Number
136209
Date Published
1991
Length
19 pages
Annotation
This essay identifies the significant contributions of feminist perspectives to criminological paradigms.
Abstract
Feminist perspectives have increased understanding of some of the fundamental limitations of dominant paradigms in criminology. They have revealed the shortcomings of contract theory, the ground of classical criminology. Contract theory perpetuates the split between the public and private spheres both in legal discourse and in everyday life. It thereby masks gender domination, especially since it leaves the private sphere, the primary workplace of women, largely unregulated. Feminist perspectives have also challenged positivist criminology which conceptualizes people as objects to be studied, but not as fully rational subjects in their own right. This framework continues to be applied more to women offenders than to men. Scholars who use feminist perspectives have not attempted to construct a grand theory to fit women offenders, but rather to challenge basic social categories and their implications for social organization and control: family, civil society, the state, criminal law and other law, deviance, and normality. Perspectives on law, social control, and justice in terms of the mechanisms by which men subordinate women urge reflection on criminology itself. Although there are publication outlets for scholars with feminist perspectives, these continue to be marginalized. 66-item reading list