Feminist Theories of Crime

This collection re-imagines the field of criminology with insights gleaned from feminist theory. Works included here illustrate that gender is a key organizing principle of social life. This means that men and women have gender, that patriarchy as well as gender must be theorized, and that other systems of oppression such as race and class must also be studied to fully understand the crime problem and the criminal justice system. Finally, the articles collected here exemplify the feminist concern for thinking consciously about how and why we do our research with the crucial goal of producing knowledge that will promote social justice.

Meda Chesney-Lind, Ph.D. is Professor of Women's Studies at the University of Hawaii at Manoa. Nationally recognized for her work on women and crime, her books include Girls, Delinquency and Juvenile Justice (Wadsworth, 1992), The Female Offender: Girls, Women and Crime (Sage, 1997), Female Gangs in America (Lakeview Press, 1999), Invisible Punishment (New Press, 2002), Girls, Women and Crime (Sage, 2004), Beyond Bad Girls: Gender Violence and Hype (Routledge, 2008) and Fighting for Girls: Critical Perspectives on Gender and Violence (SUNY Press, 2010). Merry Morash, Ph.D., is Professor at the School of Criminal Justice, Michigan State University. Her books include Understanding Gender, Crime, and Justice (Sage, 2006) and Women on Probation and Parole: A Feminist Critique of Community Programs and Services (Northeastern University Press, 2010). She has published on a wide range of topics that include domestic violence among immigrant groups, gender as it pertains to police stress and coping, community oriented policing, and juvenile delinquency causation in numerous different journals and edited books. She directs the Michigan Victim Assistance Academy, which for over a decade has trained professionals who work with crime victims.