Abstract
The chapter looks at the gendered nature of offending and victimisation by examining the profiles of female victims and offenders and their experiences within the criminal justice system. It re-examines the victim vs offender dichotomy through a vicious pathway of victimisation and offending. In reviewing gender disparities in criminal justice processing and sentencing, and the challenges of meeting gender based needs in custodial and non-custodial settings, it calls for a radical reform of current policies and practices for revisiting and subverting patriarchal justice. The analysis is placed within the context of gender stereotyping dichotomised by the madonna-whore myth. A mythical stereotype which, like all other stereotypes, needs deconstruction!
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
References
Adler, F. (1975). Sisters in crime: The rise of the new female criminal. McGraw-Hill.
Alozie, N. O., & Johnston, C. W. (2000). Probing the limits of the female advantage in criminal processing: Pretrial diversion of drug offenders in an urban county. Justice System Journal, 21(3), 239–259. https://doi.org/10.1080/23277556.2000.10871288
Anderson, T., & Kavanaugh, P. (2018). Women’s evolving roles in drug trafficking in the United States: New conceptualizations needed for 21st-century markets. Contemporary Drug Problems, 44(4), 339–355.
Ask, K., & Landström, S. (2010). Why emotions matter: Expectancy violation and affective response mediate the emotional victim effect. Law and Human Behavior, 34(5), 392–401. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10979-009-9208-6
Balfour, G. (2020). Women in custody. In M. Weinrath & J. A. Winterdyk (Eds.), Adult corrections in Canada (pp. 147–166). de Sitter Publications.
Bareket, O., Kahalon, R., Shanbel, N., & Glick, P. (2018). The Madonna-whore dichotomy: Men who perceive women’s nurturance and sexuality as mutually exclusive endorse patriarchy and show lower relationship satisfaction. Sex Roles, 79, 519–532. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11199-018-0895-7
Beichner, D., & Hagemann, O. (2022). A Gloal view of women, prison, and aftercare: A call for reform. Violence Against Women, 28(8), 1788–1808. https://doi.org/10.1177/10778012221085997
Belknap, J. (2020). The invisible woman: Gender, crime, and justice. SAGE.
Bloom, B., Owen, B. A., & Covington, S. (2003). Gender-responsive strategies: Research, practice, and guiding principles for women offenders. National Institute of Corrections. https://s3.amazonaws.com/static.nicic.gov/Library/018017.pdf
Bongiorno, R., Langbroek, C., Bain, P. G., Ting, M., & Ryan, M. K. (2019). Why women are blamed for being sexually harassed: The effects of empathy for female victims and male perpetrators. Psychology of Women Quarterly, 44(1), 11–27. https://doi.org/10.1177/0361684319868730
Bonthuys, E. (2008). Putting gender into the definition of rape or taking it out? Feminist Legal Studies, 16, 249–260. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10691-008-9091-4
Bose, N. (2022, January 11). Feminist criminology: Madonna whore duality in the criminal justice system. Centre for Criminology, Criminal Justice & Victimology. https://www.ccvrgnul.com/post/feminist-criminology-madonna-whore-duality-in-the-criminal-justice-system
Bosma, A. K., Mulder, E., Pemberton, A., & Vingerhoets, A. J. J. M. (2018). Observer reactions to emotional victims of serious crimes: Stereotypes and expectancy violations. Psychology, Crime & Law, 24(9), 957–977. https://doi.org/10.1080/1068316X.2018.1467910
Bowman, R., Oramas Mora, D., Mitchell, O., & Spohn, C. (2023). Gender in the courtroom workgroup: Understanding the relationship between the composition of workgroups and the gender gap in punishment. Criminal Justice and Behavior, 50(3), 410–428. https://doi.org/10.1177/00938548221140362
Brown, M. (2006). Gender, ethnicity, and offending over the life course: Women’s pathways to prison in the aloha state. Critical Criminology, 14, 137–158. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10612-006-9001-5
Brown, V., Melchior, L., & Huba, G. (1999). Level of burden among women diagnosed with several mental illness and substance abuse. Journal of Psychoactive Drugs, 31(1), 31–40.
Brown, G. P., Barker, J., McMillian, K., Norman, R., Derkzen, D., Stewart, L. A., & Wardrop, K. (2018). Prevalence of mental disorders among federally sentenced women offenders: In-custody and intake samples. Research Report R-420: Correctional Service of Canada. http://publications.gc.ca/collections/collection_2018/scc-csc/PS83-3-420-eng.pdf
Bucerius, S. M., Jones, D. J., Kohl, A., & Haggerty, K. D. (2021). Addressing the victim–offender overlap: Advancing evidence-based research to better service criminally involved people with victimization histories. Victims & Offenders, 16(1), 148–163. https://doi.org/10.1080/15564886.2020.1787283
Burczycka, M. (2016). Section 1: Trends in self-reported spousal violence in Canada, 2014. Juristat, 85-002-X. https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/85-002-x/2016001/article/14303/01-eng.htm
Burczycka, M. (2019). Section 2: Police-reported intimate partner violence in Canada, 2018. Juristat, 85-002-X. https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/85-002-x/2019001/article/00018/02-eng.htm
Burke, A. (2010). When family matters. The Yale Law Journal, 119(6), 1210–1234. http://www.jstor.org/stable/20698323
Carpenter, R. C. (2003). ‘Women and children first’: Gender, norms, and humanitarian evacuation in the Balkans 1991–95. International Organization, 57(4), 661–694. https://doi.org/10.1017/S002081830357401X
Christie, N. (1986). The ideal victim. In E. A. Fattah (Ed.), From crime policy to victim policy (pp. 17–30). Macmillan.
Clement, M., Schwarzfeld, M., & Thompson, M. (2011). The National Summit on justice reinvestment and public safety: Addressing recidivism, crime, and corrections spending. Council of State Governments Justice Center. https://www.bja.gov/publications/csg_justicereinvestmentsummitreport.pdf
Cotter, A., & Savage, L. (2019). Gender-based violence and unwanted sexual behaviour in Canada, 2018: Initial findings from the Survey of Safety in Public and Private Spaces. Juristat, 85-002-X https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/85-002-x/2019001/article/00017-eng.htm
Coughlan, G. (2020). The victimization of criminalized women and trauma trails: Pathways to criminalization and the dichotomy of the victim/offender continuum. INvoke, 5. https://doi.org/10.29173/invoke48986
Covington, S. S., & Bloom, B. E. (2003). Gendered justice: Women in the criminal justice system. In B. A. Bloom (Ed.), Gendered Justice: Addressing female offenders (pp. 3–24). Academic.
Cusack, S. (2014). Eliminating judicial stereotyping: Equal access for justice to women in gender-based violence cases, final paper. United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. https://www.ohchr.org/Documents/Issues/Women/WRGS/StudyGenderStereotyping.doc
Daly, K. (1996). Gender, crime, and punishment. Yale University Press.
De Lisi, M., Caropreso, D., Drury, A., Elbert, M., Evans, J., Heinrichs, T., & Tahja, K. (2016). The dark figure of sexual offending: New evidence from federal sex offenders. Journal of Criminal Psychology, 6(1), 3–16. https://doi.org/10.1108/JCP-12-2015-0030
Doorewaard, C. (2014). The dark figure of crime and its impact on the criminal justice system. Acta Criminologica: Southern African Journal of Criminology, 27(2), 1–13.
Edwards, L., Jamieson, S. K., Bowman, J., Sungwan, C., Newton, J., & Sullivan, E. (2022). A systematic review of post-release programs for women exiting prison with substance-use disorders: Assessing current programs and weighing the evidence. Health Justice, 10(1). https://doi.org/10.1186/s40352-021-00162-6
Faith, K. (1993). Unruly women: The politics of confinement and resistance. Press Gang.
Fazel, S., Grann, M., & Kling, B. (2011). Prison suicide in 12 countries: An ecological study of 861 suicides during 2003–2007. Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric Epidemiology, 46, 191–195. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00127-010-0184-4
Feinman, C. (1980). Women in the criminal justice system. Praeger Publishers.
Fitzgerald, L. F., & Cortina, L. M. (2018). Sexual harassment in work organizations: A view from the 21st century. In C. B. Travis, J. W. White, A. Rutherford, W. S. Williams, S. L. Cook, & K. F. Wyche (Eds.), APA handbook of the psychology of women: Perspectives on women’s public and private lives (pp. 215–234). American Psychological Association.
Flynn, A., Cama, E., Powell, A., & Scott, A. J. (2022). Victim-blaming and image-based sexual abuse. Journal of Criminology. https://doi.org/10.1177/26338076221135327
Fotopoulou, M., & Malloch, M. S. (2022). Responding to problem substance use: Deconstructing structures and politicizing the personal. In S. L. Brown & L. Gelsthorpe (Eds.), The Wiley handbook on what works with girls and women in conflict with the Law: A critical review of theory, practice, and policy (pp. 203–214). Wiley-Blackwell.
Geppert, K. (2022). Explaining the gender gap in the criminal justice system: How family-based gender roles shape perceptions of defendants in criminal court. Inquiries Journal, 14(02).
Goodmark, L. (2018). Restorative justice as feminist practice. The International Journal of Restorative Justice, 1(3), 372–384. https://doi.org/10.5553/IJRJ/258908912018001003003
Gottschalk, P. (2022). Gender and crime: Convenience for pink-collar offenders. Deviant Behavior, 43(2), 213–227. https://doi.org/10.1080/01639625.2020.1794270
Gower, M., Spiranovic, C., Morgan, F., & Saunders, J. (2022). The criminogenic profile of violent female offenders incarcerated in Western Australian prisons as per the Level of Service/Risk, Need, responsivity (LS/RNR) and Violence Risk Scale (VRS). Psychiatry, Psychology and Law. https://doi.org/10.1080/13218719.2021.2006095
Hackett, C. (2013). Transformative visions: Governing through alternative practices and therapeutic interventions at a woman’s re-entry centre. Feminist Criminology, 8(3), 221–242.
Haney, L. (2013). Motherhood as punishment: The case of parenting in prison. Signs, 39(1), 105–130. https://doi.org/10.1086/670815
Hannah-Moffat, K. (2010). Sacrosanct or flawed: Risk, accountability and gender responsive penal politics. Current Issues in Criminal Justice, 22(2), 193–215.
Hannah-Moffat, K. (2017). Women in prison: Who and why? In M. J. Hird & G. Pavlich (Eds.), Questioning sociology: Canadian perspectives (pp. 215–228). Oxford University Press.
Haverkate, D. L., & Wright, K. A. (2020). The differential effects of prison contact on parent–child relationship quality and child behavioral changes. Corrections, 5(3), 222–244. https://doi.org/10.1080/23774657.2018.1485529
Howard, J. A. (1984). The ‘normal’ victim: The effects of gender stereotypes on reactions to victims. Social Psychology Quarterly, 47(3), 270–281. https://doi.org/10.2307/3033824
Hutson-Comeaux, S. L., & Kelly, J. R. (2002). Gender stereotypes of emotional reactions: How we judge an emotion as valid. Sex Roles, 47(1), 1–10. https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1020657301981
Johnson, I. M. (2014). Economic impediments to Women’s success on parole: ‘We need someone on our side’. The Prison Journal, 94, 365–387.
Johnson, B. D., Spohn, C., & Kimchi, A. (2021). Life lessons: Examining sources of racial and ethnic disparity in federal life without parole sentences. Criminology, 59(4), 704–737. https://doi.org/10.1111/1745-9125.12288
Kajstura, A. (2019). Women’s mass incarceration: The whole pie 2019. Prison Policy Initiative. https://www.prisonpolicy.org/reports/pie2019women.html
Kruttschnitt, C. (2010). The paradox of women’s imprisonment. Daedalus, 139, 32–43.
Kruttschnitt, C. (2013). Gender and crime. Annual Review of Sociology, 39, 291–308.
Landström, S., Ask, K., & Sommar, C. (2015). The emotional male victim: Effects of presentation mode on judged credibility. Scandinavian Journal of Psychology, 56(1), 99–104. https://doi.org/10.1111/sjop.12176
Law, V. (2014). Against carceral feminism. Jacobin. www.jacobinmag.com/2014/10/against-carceral-feminism/
Maher, L., & Daly, K. (1996). Women in the street-level drug economy: Continuity or change? Criminology, 34, 465–491.
Mahony, T. H., Jacob, J., & Hobson, H. (2017). Women and the criminal justice system. In Statistics Canada (Ed.), Women in Canada: A gender-based statistical report. https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/en/pub/89-503-x/2015001/article/14785-eng.pdf?st=hNw_MPAY
Martin, D. (1998). Retribution revisited: A reconsideration of feminist criminal law strategies. Osgoode Hall Law Journal, 36(1), 151–188.
Mauer, M., Potler, C., & Wolf, R. (1999). Gender and justice: Women, drugs, and sentencing policy. The Sentencing Project.
Mills, A., & Kendall, K. (2016). Mental health in prisons. In Y. Jewkes, B. Crewe, & J. Bennett (Eds.), Handbook on prisons (pp. 187–204). Routledge.
Miltonette, C., & Sailofsky, D. (2022). ‘What happened to me does not define who I am’: Narratives of resilience in survivor victim impact statements. Victims & Offenders. https://doi.org/10.1080/15564886.2022.2116511
Moe, A. M. (2004). Blurring the boundaries: Women’s criminality in the context of abuse. Women’s Studies Quarterly, 32(3/4), 116–138.
Morgan, C. (2022). The fundamental right to be parented and the implications for children with incarcerated mothers. Berkeley Journal of Gender, Law & Justice, 37(1), 111–130. https://doi.org/10.15779/Z38W669925
Mulder, E., Pemberton, A., & Vingerhoets, A. J. J. M. (2020). The feminizing effect of sexual violence in third-party perceptions of male and female victims. Sex Roles, 82, 13–27. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11199-019-01036-w
National Resource Center on Justice Involved Women. (2016). Fact sheet on justice involved women 2016. National Resource Center on Justice Involved Women. https://cjinvolvedwomen.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/Fact-Sheet.pdf
Penal Reform International. (2012). Discrimination against women in criminal justice systems. IPU-briefing_Discrimination-against-women_English-145KB_0%20(1).pdf
Petrillo, M. (2021). ‘We’ve all got a big story’: Experiences of a trauma-informed intervention in prison. The Howard Journal of Crime and Justice, 60(2), 232–250. https://doi.org/10.1111/hojo.12408
Pizzini-Gambetta, V. (2014). Organized crime: The gender constraints of illegal markets. In R. Gartner & B. McCarthy (Eds.), The Oxford handbook gender, sex, and crime (pp. 448–467). Oxford University Press.
Plant, E. A., Hyde, J. S., Keltner, D., & Devine, P. G. (2000). The gender stereotyping of emotions. Psychology of Women Quarterly, 24(1), 81–92. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1471-6402.2000.tb01024.x
Pollock, J. (1998). Counselling women in prison. Sage.
Prost, S. G., McDonald, A., Plassmeyer, M., Middleton, J., & Golder, S. (2022). Not all traumas are equal: Post-traumatic stress and quality of life among women in prison. Women & Criminal Justice, 32(6), 502–519. https://doi.org/10.1080/08974454.2020.1871160
Quarmby, K. (2016, May 30). Why are we shocked when women commit violent crimes? Independent. https://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/archaeology/features/some-women-do-kill-abuse-and-torture-a7056136.html
Randall, M. (2011). Sexual assault Law, credibility, and ‘Ideal Victims’: Consent, resistance, and victim blaming. Canadian Journal of Women and the Law, 22(2), 397–433. https://doi.org/10.3138/cjwl.22.2.397
Rodriguez, N., & Griffin, M. L. (2005). Gender differences in drug market activities: A comparative assessment of men and women’s participation in the drug market. Document No.: 211974 Number: 2004-IJ-CX-0014. https://www.ojp.gov/pdffiles1/nij/grants/211974.pdf
Romain Dagenhardt, D. M., Heideman, A. J., & Freiburger, T. L. (2022). An examination of the direct and interactive effects of race/ethnicity and gender on charge reduction. Journal of Crime and Justice, 45(3), 324–346. https://doi.org/10.1080/0735648X.2021.1936123
Rosenbaum, M. (1981). Women on heroin. Rutgers University Press.
Rosenthal, M. W., Smidt, A. M., & Freyd, J. J. (2016). Still second class: Sexual harassment of graduate students. Psychology of Women Quarterly, 40, 364–377. https://doi.org/10.1177/0361684316644838
Ross, P. H., & Lawrence, J. E. (1998). Health care for women offenders: Specialized services, needs will challenge correctional administrators into the next century. Corrections Today, 60(7), 122–129.
Roy, J., & Marcellus, S. (2019). Homicide in Canada, 2018. Juristat, 85-002-X. https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/85-002-x/2019001/article/00016-eng.htm.
Savage, L. (2019). Female Offenders in Canada, 2017. Juristat, 85-002-X. https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/en/pub/85-002-x/2019001/article/00001-eng.pdf?st=nrwp13Ao
Saxena, P., Grella, C. E., & Messina, N. P. (2016). Continuing care and trauma in women offenders’ substance use, psychiatric status, and self-efficacy outcomes. Women & Criminal Justice, 26, 99–121.
Servon, L., Esquier, A., & Tiley, G. (2021). Gender and financialization of the criminal justice system. Social Sciences, 10(11), 1–14. https://doi.org/10.3390/socsci10110446
Simon, R. J. (1975). Women and crime. Lexington Books.
Singh, S. B. (2011). The extent of crime in South Africa. In C. Bezuidenhout (Ed.), A southern African perspective on fundamental criminology (pp. 92–121). Pearson.
Sinha, M. (2013). Measuring violence against women: Statistical trend. Juristat, 85-002-X. https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/en/pub/85-002-x/2013001/article/11766-eng.pdf?st=0JEV0Q8F
Smith, G. T. (2014). Long-term trends in female and male involvement in crime. In R. Gartner & B. McCarthy (Eds.), The Oxford handbook of gender, sex, and crime (pp. 139–157). Academic. https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199838707.013.0008
Spjeldnes, S., Jung, H., & Yamatani, H. (2014). Gender differences in jail populations: Factors to consider in reentry strategies. Journal of Offender Rehabilitation, 53(2), 75–94.
Starr, S. B. (2012). Estimating gender disparities in federal criminal cases. SSRN Electronic Journal. https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2144002
Steffensmeier, D., & Schwartz, J. (2004). Trends in female criminality: Is crime still a man’s world? In B. R. Price & N. J. Sokoloff (Eds.), The criminal justice system and women: Offenders, prisoners, victims and workers (pp. 95–111). McGraw-Hill.
Stockdale, R. (2022). Using ethnography to understand the lives of street sex workers. Qualitative Social Work. https://doi.org/10.1177/14733250221131498
Struthers Montford, K., & Hannah-Moffat, K. (2021). The veneers of empiricism: Gender, race and prison classification. Aggression and Violent Behavior, 59. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.avb.2020.101475
Swavola, E., Riley, K., & Subramanian, R. (2016). Overlooked: Women and jails in an era of reform. VERA Institute of Justice.
United Nations. (1990, December 14). UN standard minimum rules for non-custodial measures (The Tokyo Rules). UN.
United Nations. (2010, October 6). UN rules for the treatment of women prisoners and non-custodial measures for women offenders (Bangkok Rules). UN.
United Nations: UN Women, UNDP, UNODC and OHCHR. (2018). A practitioner’s toolkit on women’s access to justice programming. United Nations. https://www.unodc.org/pdf/criminal_justice/WA2J_Consolidated.pdf
UNODC. (2014). Handbook on Women and Imprisonment (Criminal Justice handbook series). UN. https://www.unodc.org/documents/justice-and-prison-reform/women_and_imprisonment_-_2nd_edition.pdf
UNODC and UN Women. (2022). Gender-related killings of women and girls (femicide/feminicide). https://www.unodc.org/documents/data-and-analysis/briefs/Femicide_brief_Nov2022.pdf
Walker, J. R., Baldry, E., & Sullivan, E. A. (2021). Residential programmes for mothers and children in prison: Key themes and concepts. Criminology & Criminal Justice, 21(1), 21–39. https://doi.org/10.1177/1748895819848814
Youngers, C. A., GarcÃa Castro, T., & Manzur, M. (2020). Women behind bars for drug offenses in Latin America: What the numbers make clear. Washington Office on Latin America. https://www.wola.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/Final-Women-Behind-Bars-Report.pdf
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2023 The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Switzerland AG
About this entry
Cite this entry
Vella, M.G. (2023). Madonnas-Whores. In: The Palgrave Handbook of Global Social Problems. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-68127-2_387-1
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-68127-2_387-1
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-030-68127-2
Online ISBN: 978-3-030-68127-2
eBook Packages: Springer Reference Social SciencesReference Module Humanities and Social SciencesReference Module Business, Economics and Social Sciences