This book provides an important, critical, feminist perspective on desistance theory and practice. It is built around 23 original, narrative interviews with women and the staff of the community projects they attended, as well as a year of observations at Northshire Women’s Centres. The book is concerned with outlining a feminist approach to desistance which recognises that the majority of women in the criminal justice system come from backgrounds of abuse, economic disadvantage and have alcohol, drug and mental health issues. The book is also be concerned with challenging the dichotomy of narratives of victimisation and survival while recognising that women have agency. In doing so, Desisting Sisters contests the neoliberal and patriarchal approach to desistance which promotes women's role as care givers and unpaid volunteer workers. Ultimately, Barr contends that women's desistance can resist neo-liberal, patriarchal constructs, much in the same way that feminist criminology has contended that women's offending more generally, often does. This book will be of particular use and interest to those studying modules on both traditional and critical criminology, criminal justice, psychology, sociology and social work courses.

Women, Trauma, and Journeys towards Desistance: Navigating the Labyrinth provides an examination of women’s desistance from crime from a gender-responsive, trauma-informed perspective. The book is based on the reflections of fifty-six women over a three-year period as they transition from custody to the community. With the women, the author examines how experiences of trauma, victimisation, and intersectional oppression constrain access to traditional desistance supporting processes, including supportive relationships, identity construction, the exercise of agency, and engagement with treatment and interventions, reframing these processes from trauma-informed perspective. The book joins together the women’s insights and experiences with principles of gender-responsive, trauma-informed principles in a framework through which criminal justice practitioners can support women in their efforts to leave crime behind. The framework for practice is a fusion of concepts from desistance theory, principles of gender-responsivity, and trauma-informed practice designed to help women understand the root causes of the problems they face in the present whilst building on their resilience and strengths to achieve their goals for their futures. This book is ideal reading for scholars and students of criminology and criminal justice, particularly rehabilitation, gender and crime, and feminist criminology. It will also be of interest to academics and practitioners of forensic psychology and social work, as well as probation officers, social workers and prison officers.

From the denial of abortion rights in Ireland to sexual violence against British South Asian women in England, the state and its institutions continue to fail women. This book offers a counter-narrative to contemporary injustices and a persistent culture of victim-blaming. The academic and activist contributions to this collection explore contemporary research areas and pursue new discursive directions in order to present a feminist criminology, built on feminist praxis, for the 21st century. Providing a direct challenge to regressive and ineffective theory, policy and practice, this book resists the politics of gendered victimization through extending feminist analyses of the state and documenting interventions into contemporary injustices.

This book is about people who are marginalised in criminology; it is an attempt to make space and amplify voices that are too often overlooked, spoken about, or for. In recognising the deep-seated structural inequalities that exist within criminal justice, higher education, and the field of criminology, we offer this text as a critical pause to the reader and invite you to reflect and consider within your studies and learning experience, your teaching, and your research: whose voices dominate, and whose are marginalised or excluded within criminology and why? This edited collection offers chapters from international criminology scholars, activists, and practitioners to bring together a range of perspectives that have been marginalised or excluded from criminological discourse. It considers both obscured and marginalised criminological theorists and schools of thought, presents alternative viewpoints on ‘traditional’ criminal justice themes, and considers how marginalisation is perpetuated through criminological research and criminological teaching. Engaging with debates on power, colonialism, identity, hegemony and privilege, and bringing together perspectives on gender, race and ethnicity, indigenous knowledge (s), queer and LGBTQ+ issues, disabilities, and class, this concise collection brings together key thinkers and ideas around concerns about epistemological supremacy. Marginalised Voices in Criminology is crucial reading for courses on criminological theory and concerns, diversity, gender, race, and identity.

This volume takes stock of contemporary perspectives on gender and crime. In 1975, Freda Adler published her pathbreaking book, Sisters in Crime: The Rise of the New Female Criminal. She made the bold claim that changes in American society—including changing attitudes and opportunities—would allow for greater participation of women in criminal enterprises. Beyond her substantive thesis, which turned out to be partially accurate, Adler opened up a vibrant new area within criminology: the study of gender and crime. Now nearly a half‐century later, the field of criminology is replete with women scholars who are making plentiful and important contributions. As a result, this volume explores cutting‐edge issues. Part I starts by laying out a theoretical foundation, focusing on the origins of theories of female criminality, and then providing an overview of more contemporary perspectives. Part II explores the role of race in shaping women’s criminality, drawing on the novel approaches of “Black Criminology” and the study of intersectionality. Part III gives attention to issues that heretofore were male‐centric, illuminating female desistance from crime, the effects of peer groups, and gender differences in attitudes toward criminal justice policies. Finally, Part IV considers the explanation of three important realms of criminality—risky lifestyles, white‐collar crime, and terrorism. This volume will be of interest to a wide range of criminologists and is an ideal choice for use in graduate seminars and upper‐level undergraduate courses.