M. Joan McDermott

When Advocacy for Domestic Violence Victims Backfires: Types and Sources of Victim Disempowerment

This article argues that although victim advocacy in domestic violence has brought significant improvement in victim services, there are instances in which advocacy backfires: The very interventions designed to help and empower victims contain the seeds of disempowerment. After discussing types and sources of victim disempowerment from their own research and that of others, the authors draw attention to some macro issues related to domestic violence victim advocacy.

The attitudes of girls toward the police: differences by race

Purpose – Recent research suggests that there is not widespread support for the police among juveniles. Unfortunately, this research typically involves either examining the attitudes of boys toward the criminal justice system, or includes gender as one of many factors that explains attitudes. The present study, using survey responses from 431 females, examines the differences in the attitudes and experiences of girls as related to the police.Design/methodology/approach – Data for this study were collected using self‐administered surveys distributed to 9th through 12th grade public high school students in the greater Cincinnati (Ohio) area.Findings – The findings suggest that overall attitudes of black and white girls toward the police are significantly different from one another. Moreover, when a regression equation was estimated, race continued to be a significant predictor of less positive attitudes. However, seeing and hearing about police misconduct aimed at a third party (vicarious experiences of mis...

The local is global: third wave feminism, peace, and social justice

We offer an overview of third wave feminist thought and discuss its relationship to movements of peace and social justice on intrapersonal, interpersonal, societal, and global levels. We specifically highlight the possibilities of peace within a ‘personal is political’ ideology, a key aspect of third wave feminism. The sharing of personal narratives and emphasizing relationships within and across culture generates spaces of political awareness, offering opportunities for increased communication. Through understanding the self and becoming aware of multiplicities of experience in an increasingly globalized world, and by advocating justice on a local level, dialogue toward acceptance and peace is more fully realized. While all experiences are valid to participate in the dialogue, we maintain a disavowal of violent action. By embracing an ethos of choice and voice for all human beings through dialogue, social justice becomes an action for bodies of people rather than action upon bodies of people.

The personal is empirical: Feminism, research methods, and criminal justice education

Feminist scholars in criminal justice and other social science disciplines have been critical of conventional or “malestream” theories and methods, and have suggested alternative methods for producing knowledge. This paper examines some themes that have emerged in feminist discussions of research methodology and shows how these ideas might be integrated into criminal justice education. The first part of the paper explains why feminists have become interested in research methodology, and reviews some of the central themes that have been developed: 1) definition of the research question, 2) the research process, 3) the research subject, and 4) issues of action and ethics. The second part of the paper suggests ways in which these themes have implications for the process and the content of criminal justice education.

Joining Punishment and Treatment in Substantive Equality

How can justice and treatment be combined so that the rights of victims are upheld and offenders are rehabilitated? Substantive justice administers punishment proportionate both to the offense and the offender’s condition while also providing treatment according to the offender’s needs. Substantive justice means that similar offenders ought to experience not the same objective punishment but similar degrees of subjective pain. Judges already use distinctive standards in sentencing juveniles and women, and this practice should be extended to all offenders; that is, to men and white collar offenders, not simply with minor fines but with all forms of punishment and treatment. It should be codified in law so that our justice system can provide generally better protection to victims and better treatments to offenders.

Drug Policy and Community Context: The Case of Small Cities and Towns

This article reports findings from a national assessment of drug problems and antidrug initiatives in small cities and towns in the United States. It examines the importance of drug problems in small jurisdictions, compared with other problems, the type of drug problems reported, the “most important” antidrug programs, and certain other issues. Implications for drug policy are discussed.

Adolescence And Juvenile Justice Policy

This paper explores an often overlooked area in the analysis of juvenile justice policy — the influence of changing conceptions of adolescence. It is our view that over time juvenile delinquents have been defined as either victims (and hence, not responsible for their actions) or offenders (and hence, at least in part responsible). This shifting conceptualization has influenced juvenile justice policy. Victims are generally considered deserving of special care and protection, and, more important, treatment; but offenders are usually viewed as deserving of punishment. Therefore, it is important to examine the role of societal perceptions of adolescence over time in determining the designation of these labels, as well as the overall utility of these dichotomous characterizations. Through such an examination insight is gathered into the problems inherent within the task of formulating juvenile justice policy.

Lilith in Myth, Melodrama, and Criminology

Abstract This article illustrates how the social construction of both knowledge and popular culture has been influenced by mythic images of “fair and virginal” good women and “dark and sensual” evil women-what is commonly called the madonna/whore duality. The article examines the myth of Lilith, first wife of Adam, and the images of good and evil women that we can distill from creation myths. We then demonstrate how these images of good and evil women are illustrated in early twentieth century criminology and the 1920s melodrama Lilith.

On Moral Enterprises, Pragmatism, and Feminist Criminology:

This article affirms Richard Quinneys claim that criminology is a moral enterprise. The author examines the intersection of pragmatism and feminism and its links to feminist criminology (undoing the past and looking to the future, goal of liberation, epistemology and methods, and social responsibility). The article links these pragmatist-feminist themes to Richard Quinneys criminology.

Book Reviews : Girls, Delinquency, And Juvenile Justice by Meda Chesney-Lind and Randall G. Shelden. Brooks/Cole, 1992. 249 pp. paper

Girls, Delinquency, and Juvenile Justice by Meda Chesney-Lind and Randall G. Shelden is an outstanding work and a great contribution to criminology. The theoretical framework is feminist; Chesney-lind and Shelden put girls at the center. They write about girls. What is it like for girls? What is it like growing up? getting in trouble? running away? being victimized? being bad? being arrested/handled/treated and programmed for? The book contains a thorough examination of the extent and nature of girls’ delinquency, a very clear review of past and present theories that aim (or don’t) to explain girls’ delinquency, and an in-depth review of historical and current involvement of girls in the juvenile justice system. At a minimum, the book fills an enormous gap in the criminological literature. But it isn’t as an &dquo;add on&dquo; of studies of girls, done to fill a knowledge gap, that the work achieves its significance for criminology. Girls, Delinquency, andJuvenileJustice shows what feminists mean by putting women and girls at the center. As Chesney-Lind and Shelden contend, gender is as important, if not more important, than social class in explanations of delinquency. So why has it been ignored? What happens to theory and research when we consider the role that gender plays? What are the implications for the ways in which girls are handled in and out of the juvenile justice system? As indicated in the review of FeministPerspectives in Criminology, feminist scholars examine very fundamental questions, such as how we know what we know. In the feminist perspective patriarchal power relations are critical in the construction of knowledge. The ideology of sexism has permeated our construction of social knowledge, our theories, our research, and, in criminology,