NCJ Number
130424
Date Published
1991
Length
56 pages
Annotation
This review of the handling of female offenders by the criminal justice system in the 19th and 20th centuries concludes that biological explanations of crime have dominated penal policies toward women.
Abstract
In the 18th and 19th centuries, women were more often convicted of crimes than they are today; the crimes appear to have been determined more by socioeconomic situation than by any innate sex differences. However, female offenders were handled differently from male offenders. Male prisons emphasized discipline and deterrence, while female prisons developed individualized programs of "moral regeneration." In the latter years of the 19th century, biological explanations of crime grew increasingly popular and were found particularly plausible in explaining female crime long after they had been discredited for males. In the early years of the 20th century the growing influence of psychiatry focused attention on mental inadequacy as a cause of crime, and many female offenders were reassessed as mentally ill rather than evil. For mainly historical reasons, penal policy is still dominated by the belief that female inmates are likely to be mentally disturbed or inadequate. 207 references (Author abstract modified)