NCJ Number
201988
Journal
Theoretical Criminology Volume: 7 Issue: 3 Dated: August 2003 Pages: 363-387
Date Published
August 2003
Length
25 pages
Annotation
To promote discussion of methodological issues in cross-gender criminological research, notably female researchers studying male behavior, this article focuses on two women's studies of Latin American police.
Abstract
One study (1993) involved interviews with Brazilian police who had been torturers or assassins during Brazil's 21-year military period (1964-85). The other study addressed Guatemala's newly organized Civil Police force (1998). Based on an examination of the methodological and researcher-subject gender issues that emerged in the two studies, this paper developed five working propositions about the circumstance of women researchers studying organizations that are dominated numerically and structurally by men. First, feminist scholarship provides some guidelines for such research, but its application is neither direct or immediate. Second, much cross-gender research requires the negotiation and maintenance of power differences between the researcher and the subjects being researched. Third, inter-gender dynamics can impede the achievement of some research objectives and promote others, particularly in cross-gender research on secrecy and danger. Fourth, inter-gender dynamics can complicate the ethical dilemmas associated with research on powerful agents and agencies of the state. Fifth, the emotional reflexivity associated with inter-gender research is an important subject for exploration, since it has an impact on the interpretation of research outcomes. 6 notes and 38 references