Analysis of the Number of Explanations for the Significant Growth in Female Imprisonment - Research Paper Example

Introduction This paper focuses and analyses the number of explanations for the significant growth in female imprisonment. There are many policies aimed at addressing the increase of female imprisonment, Crime has forever been a major problem for society at large. It has presented itself as a challenge to every authority and government in the world. Since historical times, sociologists and criminologists have been the principal contributors to crime research, which has led to an extensive research literature on the general topic of the role of incentives in the determination of criminal behaviour. In this regard, a notable feature is the increase of crime among women. With approximately 52% of the population of UK being formed by women (in 2005 there were 30.7 million females compared with 29.5 million males in the UK population), male offenders outnumbered female offenders by more than four to one in 2006. Despite this fact, the irony is that today more women are locked up in England and Wales than in any EEA nation other than Ukraine and Spain1. The number of women serving custodial sentences has increased substantially. Recent statistics indicate an increase of 30% in female prison population during 2001. The table below shows the number of women sentenced to immediate custody by offence group and year2: The figures above indicate an increase of over 60% in the total number of women sentenced to custody. Furthermore, various studies demonstrate a 15% increment in the number of women incarcerated between 2001 and 2002, compared to an increase of 6% for men3. This might lead one to believe that women are becoming more prone to committing crimes or according to Box (1983);4 there is a serious problem with the system that was so far seen to be lenient in prosecuting women offenders. Crime in Switzerland is also becoming a cause of major concern with a 27% climb in the rate of female crime, in the past five years5. Part 1: Reasons for the increase in levels of Female Incarceration With the support of well-documented theoretical explanations for women’s crime as well as accounts of early contributions portraying women as sexual beings the focus on women has been in context of their supposed inferiority to men. This has in turn, led to explanations that revolve around the sex role socialization, as well as the emergence of the women’s movement. Thus, attention has shifted to the possibility that women may be gaining more opportunity to commit crime because of their changing role in society. Later work introduced the so-called ‘power-control theory’, in which gender differences in crime rates is seen to be determined by parents’ social status and parenting style.6 Furthermore, there are a number of ‘common sense’ explanations that will also be discussed. Before moving forward, it would be imperative to discuss why the accepted notion is that women are less inclined than men towards committing crimes. There may be various reasons behind this. The first of these has to do with the fact that biologically women have been seen as weaker beings who are more home and family bound. Apart from this there are sociological explanations as well as feminist theories that support the general perception of women as a wife or mother – but most unlikely to fit the role of a criminal. Further, explanations of crime inevitable revolve around masculinity and therefore, the idea of a woman committing a crime goes against the “laws of nature”7. A. Psychological and Physiological explanations Recent authors have based their arguments on socialist feminist theories, in which female crime is linked to patriarchal subordination and to inequities with respect to race and social status. While early studies of female criminality were limited by the quality and extent of the available data, there have been few instances of female criminal activity that many have interpreted as reflecting a low crime rate for this group. Some of these studies drew attention to evidence of both biological and psychological abnormality among these few female offenders. Subsequently, female criminality was explained largely in terms of psychological and physiological factors. In contrast to this, there have been scholars who have argued that women’s lower criminality (as compared with males) is only a myth. Further, they believe that the impression that women commit less crime depends largely on the types of crimes involved. Crimes such as shoplifting are less likely to be detected or even reported if these crimes are detected. Moreover, it has been argued that women tend to receive better treatment from police officers than men do. Based on this fact, researchers have felt the need to pose an important question: “Has there been convergence in male and female crime rates?” It may be noted that in those fields that have been predominantly occupied by men, women will come to be judged at par with men. This also gives us sufficient reason to believe that they will also commit the crimes that men commit, apart from serving the appropriate time in penitentiaries and jails. The empirical literature on this convergence theory can be divided essentially into two parts: 1. consider whether or not the theory is supported empirically 2. and if so, for which crimes; while the other seeks to isolate the causes of any such convergence8. B. Impact of Girl Gangs Girl gangs have an important role to play. Female gang-members have not had explicit attention either in scholastic research or as the locus of media concentration. If female gang members do ever find any mention in studies or reports, they are generally described as merely adjunct to male gang members or the more disorganized youth gangs. Formal academic research in crime and delinquency focusing on young women has been more or less erratic and a subject that very few have chosen to delve deep into9. C. Media Misogyny It is important to discuss the exact dimensions of the relationship between media and social control in context of the interaction between the mass media, law enforcement bureaucracies, and popular culture. Further, one needs to appreciate how the news media in particular construct and reconstruct criminal events between crime waves and moral panics, regarding the various themes revolving around the crime news business that have evolved in the our world during the 20th century. With the depiction of sexually violent crimes against women, and the portrayals of high-profile police-citizen encounters, scholars insist that the rise of crime amongst women must not surprise us. In this context, it has been believed that these news staples of reporting on crime are not meant to be exhaustive, but rather as representative of a crime drama/discourse that both focuses on the "randomness" and "impersonal" nature of criminal action and increasingly emphasizes the "violent" responses by criminals and crime fighters alike10. In the arena of modern day news reporting, the portrayals of "criminal predators," "sexual victims," and "police-citizen" conflicts serve to frame, signify, map, and converge ordinary news images into what has come to be understood as the meaning of crime and punishment in everyday life and popular culture. When there are no contemporary "crime waves" or "moral panics" (i.e., drug wars, wars on crime, cultism, serial killers, etc.) to be established and contextualized, along with a lull in "claims-making/news-making" stories about a new trend in crime and violence, it is the mass media that fills this void by merely providing a steady diet of the growing and omnipotent danger of impersonal crime. Moreover Heidensohn (1996) states that ‘moral panics’ about female offending are not new and have been linked to female emancipation and liberation. This constant bombardment by the mass media requires almost no explanation or contextualization of crime and criminals per se. Rather, in a casual way, it seeks to reduce the primary responses of "crime control" to those activities carried out by the legal order and the formal agencies of law enforcement and criminal justice. In the context of the role that the media plays in sensationalizing stories like women in crime and even fuelling the rise of the same, further research contends that many of the existing theories on crime and delinquency can be adapted to explain female behaviour. These theories have indeed been adapted, sometimes in the most outrageous, if not senseless methods. D. Gender Gap While Criminologists agree that the gender gap in crime is universal, one must accept the fact that women are always and everywhere less likely than men to commit criminal acts. However, the experts disagree, owing to a number of key issues: Is the gender gap stable or variant over time and across space? If there is variance, how may it best be explained? Are the causes of female crime distinct from or similar to those of male crime? Can traditional sociological theories of crime explain female crime and the gender gap in crime? Do gender-neutral or gender-specific theories hold the most explanatory promise? These are questions that demonstrate a shift in a society that had always considered women as inferior. The answer to all these questions are similar – women have broken all societal as well as biological barriers to make a foray into every field that previously only men have dominated11. Possibly use the research conducted by Victoria and clare if u av word count space. E. Serious female offending and fast track to prison An argument by Jo Deakin is that women are now committing more serious and violent crimes and therefore ‘rightly’ receiving custodial punishments. From 1999 to 2000 there was a substantial rise in the percentage of women imprisoned for sexual offences and robbery. Thus, offences of violence and burglary are significant as they can contribute to the increase in the number of females in prison. An alternative explanation is that women offenders are being escalated up the sentencing ladder thus fast tracked to prison. Ann Worrall (2000) has argued that placing women on probation at an early stage in her criminal career tended to prelude to imprisonment. The following table illustrates the number of previous convictions held by women in 1993 to 1999: F. Additional explanations for female offending Another explanation for an increase in female prisoners is that the sentences females receive are of an increased length, resulting in retention of women in the system for longer, which increases the population over time. From 1995 to 1999, the average sentence length for female offenders in the crown court has risen by 2.8 months to 21.6 months. Furthermore, custodial sentences may be seen as an appropriate intervention than a community penalty. As Loraine Gelsthorpe has suggested changes in the nature and seriousness of women’s crime, moves towards dealing with male and female offenders more ‘equally’, changes in sentencing patterns, changes in the type of women being sentenced to imprisonment, increases in the length of women’s sentences, more foreign national women being imprisoned for drug offences, and even the idea that prison reforms have attracted prison sentences have all contributed to the reasons why there is an increase in female imprisonment. Furthermore, it has been argued that imprisonment appears to be increasingly used as a ready resort rather than a last resort. Female offending is commonly explained as individual women failing to conform to their innate biological tendencies. It is important to note that the behavior of many women may be influenced by financial problems, poor educational and employment opportunities, drug dependency, mental health problems, victimization or any combination of these. A survey of mothers in prison asked the women for the reasons behind their offending. Just over half (54%) said it was because they had no money. Another 38% said it was because they needed to support their children and 33% because they had no job.12 Offenders may find their everyday options limited by the fact that they are in poverty or lack a stable job. Women often commit acquisitive crimes, meaning for the purpose of gaining something material such as money or clothes. Increases in female imprisonment has a number of significant implications including financial and overcrowding pressures in female prisons, women’s social exclusion together with erosion of family ties and resettlement needs. Part II: Carceral Clawback – Is enough being done? The concept of mobilizing forms the basis of the explanation of the differences between the various models used for studying the rise of female carceral clawback. The fundamental assumption made was that sentences of imprisonment are for punishment. While these prisons are said to have a variety of other functions, the only characteristic sentenced prisoners have in common is that they have been convicted of a crime for which the sentence of the court was punishment, either by a term of immediate imprisonment, or by one of those ‘alternatives’ to custody which are backed-up by threat of incarceration for non-compliance with sentencing conditions. The second part of this paper will analyse the current sentencing reforms introduced in the Criminal Justice Act 2003 and assess if they are effective in tackling the “carceral clawback”. Furthermore, one will also discuss what should be done further to reduce the increase of female imprisonment. It is also important to understand the new penology with regards to sentencing of males and females. A. The New Penology The development of the ‘new penology’ has seen a transition within the probation service from traditional welfare and rehabilitative goals towards new aims as ‘an agency of crime control concerned with accurate prediction and effective management of offender risk’13. Freely and Simon state: “The new penology is neither about punishing nor about rehabilitating individuals. It is about identifying and managing unruly groups”14 A problem with the new penology is that women have been categorised using male risk prediction techniques, which are not suitable for their low risk status. Consequently, guidelines for sentencing do not consider the pattern of female offending. The result of this practice is that often women are falsely represented as a significant risk. Naffine (2003) proposes that criminal law and its enforcement is about male patterns of behaviour and about male standards of acceptable conduct. Furthermore, McIntosh (1978) suggests that there are more laws concerning male behaviour than female behaviour. Therefore, techniques of control and surveillance may differ for males and females. Feminist argue that females are treated harshly and subject to the ‘double–deviance theses’. The new penology presents crime as an issue of technocratic interventions.15 Thus, punitive sentencing is dominate. Moreover newspaper articles assert that crime is going to rise further and cause further population spills in prison16. Feely and Simon advocate that the new penology in fact does not address the relationship of crime and punishment to essential tasks of government.17 B. Impact of the Criminal Justice Act (CJA) The Criminal Justice Act 2003 was introduced to help reduce the rise in female sentencing and created a custody threshold in which custody should be used as a last resort, however it has become clear that this is not the case. The CJA 2003 brings in new style custodial sentences which are significant as they relate to short sentences, however it has become evident that criminal justice policies convey contradictory messages about the use of custody for women. Furthermore, the commissioning of two new women’s prisons and the sentencing reforms contained in the Criminal Justice Act 2003 fail to apply a brake on the courts’ increasing use of imprisonment. The Women’s Offending Reduction Programme was created in order to co-ordinate ‘efforts across the criminal justice system to reduce women’s offending, as well as efforts in other areas of government to tackle criminogenic factors for women, relating to family ties, health, housing, employment and training’18. Furthermore, in 2004 the Government introduced the National Offender Management Service (NOMS), which has the responsibility for the development, co-ordination and delivery of all correctional services and facilities, in prisons and in the community, working in partnerships across government departments and with the private and voluntary sectors. Current examples of their work include Women’s Acquisitve Crime programme, women only hostel provision and raising sentencers’ awareness. The priority of this programme is the reduction of custodial sentences. C. Alternatives to custody It is clear from above that sentencing reforms are not very effective thus alternatives to custody is imperative: “We need alternatives to custodial sentences, not least because many families are torn apart, to the detriment of society as a whole, when a mother is sent to prison’19. Women in Prison educate the public and policy makers about women in the criminal justice system and promote alternatives to custody. They believe that prison causes damage and disruption to the lives of vulnerable women, most of whom pose no risk to the public. Regarding women’s imprisonment Chris Tchaikovsky believes that ‘taking hurt people out of society and punishing them to teach them how to live within society is futile’.20 In order to deal with the carceral clawback further action is needed. The prison reform trust has suggested that a network of Women’s Supervision, Rehabilitation and Support Centres should be established. Moreover, the report of the Learmont Inquiry, suggests: “In principle women should be held in small self-contained units…former local authority hostels or other buildings, capable of being run as self-contained houses are likely to provide the best model.” The effects of imprisonment are significant and thus reinforce the need for alternatives. Imprisonment is intended to punish an offender, protect the public and rehabilitate the offender however 65% of women released from prison in 2002 were reconvicted within two years, furthermore, many women lose their homes. the effects of custody can also lead to self inflicted harm or even death. The government should work on policies that could help bring changes, better still change attitudes towards women. Margaret Gossa, chair of the women’s national commission, UK admitted in the 2006 report, Making the Grade that there has been little change in the way departments act to help women. She noted, “Services are not joined up; funding is piecemeal and often lasts only for one or two years at a time and women are still falling through the gaps in provision. The gaps are even more pronounced for ethnic minority women, disabled, for those who live in rural areas and women living on low incomes.” In Making the Grade report it was deduced that women are ‘seen’ by the police and other official departments but not ‘heard’. Steps have to been taken to close the communication gap that exists between the two. Because this comes even as there are reports that criminal activities in England are bound to escalate drastically in 2007 and ahead. (Mail and Guardian, 2006). According to the document leaked to a newspaper from Downing Street “the prison population was expected to rise by 25% in the next five years from 80 000 to more than 100 000”and “a slowdown in economic growth was set to trigger a rise in crime rates for the first time in 12 years.” The warning notes; “unless action is taken, economic and social pressures are expected to put recent falls in crime under threat." Evidently , a lot needs to be done. Both at the ground level and in the prison as “…the personal and social costs to these women and their families of being imprisoned, and the economic costs to society, can be immense.”21 The Prison Reform Trust states that “two out of every three women in prison suffer from a mental disorder A record number of women have committed suicide in prison this year, according to a report. In the first six months of 2003, 10 female inmates of prisons in England killed themselves”22 (BBC, 2003) Laishes notes “Programs and services must be holistic insofar as they need to address the social context of womens lives and target those areas that have contributed to their criminal behaviour. Therefore, gender appropriate mental health services must respond to the experiences and related mental health needs of incarcerated women.” According to Young Women in Custody, they have “now succeeded in completely separating young women from adults in custody.” government is also trying to do in small ways to take care of women offenders. Home Secretary Charles Clarke has allotted £9m to build two new female rehabilitation centres, following two pioneering schemes in Glasgow and Worcester. “The new "community and support centres" will offer non-violent female offenders "one-stop shop" services for help with issues such as drug abuse, mental health, housing, childcare and domestic violence.” (BBC, 2006) Conclusion Understanding the minds of women offenders is the key to hitting out at the root of the problem. Cosmetic changes in policies are not going to either curb or eliminate the rate of crimes. There still remain tremendous gaps that need to be addressed to create a platform that seeks to enable a lowering of the numbers of women offenders. Solutions like the “Time Out” are needed to be utilized. Crime is a function of criminality (propensity to commit crime) and external factors (opportunities and constraints) (Hirschi and Gottfredson, 1986)23. As the routine activity approach (Cohen and Felson 1979)24 demonstrates, whether someone with criminal propensities actually commits a crime depends largely on the circumstances. Even after they have gone through the agony of a prison most inmates ultimately return to society and there is reason to believe that ex-convicts who were brutalized in prison are more likely to commit acts of violence on the outside (Gilligan, 2002)25. In addition, studies show that increasing the certainty of detection is critical to deterring wrong-doing. Read More