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GAUTAM BUDDHA UNIVERSITY

(SCHOOL OF LAW JUSTICE AND GOVERNANCE)
GREATER NOIDA

ASSIGNMENT TOPIC : FEMINIST

CRIMINOLOGY

SUBMITTED TO : ASST. PROFESSOR UDIT PANDIT

YEAR : 2018-2020

SUBMITTED BY : DISHA BHATI

ROLL NO. : 18/LL.M/009
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ABSTRACT
In this assignment, the argument is that there is no orthodox methodology in feminist criminology.
Rather, there are a number of methodological preferences that feminists adopt as a means of pursuing
research questions inspired by: insights into gender theory; the need for social change; advances in post-
positivist epistemologies; the importance of experience in understanding crime and justice and the
commitment to break down the power relationships inherent in research through process. We provide an
overview of research approaches favored by feminist criminologists. In order to highlight ongoing
discussions and emerging themes in the feminist methodology, we are focusing on research into
violence against women.There are four themes: intersectionality; victim/agent dichotomy; integrity and
analysis; and 'textual turn' in research. I flesh out these themes through wide mention of legal provisions
and case laws in India and various scholar’s studies based on my own research into violence against
women in India and domestic violence against women.

INTRODUCTION
In the late 1960s and into the 1970s, the Feminist School of Criminology formed as a response to
the inequalities of gender and stereotyping within conventional crime. It was closely associated
with the rise of feminism's Second Wave and it speaks to different perspectives produced by
numerous feminist authors. Politically, there is a variation from Marxist and Revolutionary to
Liberal feminism that tackles the issue of the "gender ratio" (i.e. why women are less likely to
commit crime than men) or the question of generalizability (i.e. "adding" women to male
awareness, generalizing the results of men study to women).
There is no orthodoxy of the methods of feminist research in criminology. Rather than adhering to
particular methods, feminist research is better characterized as a result of methodological and ethical
concerns related to theory, ontology (the belief in the nature of the world) and epistemology (theories of
knowledge) and political engagement. Feminist work has been deeply concerned from the outset with
methodological issues. It has been open to innovative approaches to research and to the use of
established methods in new ways.Feminist criminological approaches commonly concern the production
and empowerment of knowledge, and questions such as: who can know, what counts as knowledge, and
whose knowledge counts? While some of these concerns may be shared by other critical approaches to
criminology, feminist research is typically characterized by concern for social relations as organized by
reference to sex / gender. These issues have implications for the choice of methods, but there is no
necessary link between a feminist approach and a specific method.

Theoretical developments in feminist criminology have begun to permeate mainstream criminology (the
concept of intersectionality is a good example) and the benefits of research methodologies favored by
feminist criminologists are gradually being recognized by other streams of criminology; for example,
feminist approaches have reshaped the evolution of victimology (Walklate, 2007). With regard to
sociology, Carol Smart (2009) argues that feminist methodologies have come to provide the foundation
for innovative research and to emphasize the importance of theoretically informed research. Feminist
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research, however, continues to receive little attention in many methodological texts within the
framework of Criminology. Feminist criminology is committed to an interdisciplinary approach that
employs blended research methods. Like all feminist research, feminist criminology is ‘in a
state of constant challenge and continual reformulation’ that makes it ‘its own most trenchant critic’
(Smart 2009).

Identify selected methodological features that are characteristics of a feminist approach to research.
We're flagging key debates and emerging issues related to feminist research on violent victimization. I
selected four themes for a more detailed examination: the challenge of intersectional work; moving
beyond victim/accused dichotomy; the integrity of the research process in interpreting and analyzing
research data; and the implications of the so-called 'textual turn.' I demonstrate the challenges of dealing
with these issues through case studies based on our own research.

OVERVIEW
Mainstream criminology around the globe focuses on the development of an etiological, predictive
approach to crime, the tracking of crime trends and the analysis of police, court and correctional
procedures in order to increase the quality and efficacy of criminal justice (Gelsthorpe, 2002).
Criminology has primarily tried to do so through analytical analysis and the creation of theoretical
concepts underpinning so investigation. Feminist criminology of the 1970s and 1980s sought to resolve
two key issues with this criminological undertaking: suppression of women in the study of crime; and
skewed, simplistic and one-dimensional accounts of female offending and related problems in the
management of female crimes within the criminal justice system . Under-representation of women and
girls in official crime statistics has made it possible to exclude them from conventional criminological
hypotheses, focused primarily on observational studies on male subjects and crime patterns. As Daly,
points out, feminist criminology recognized a 'generalizability problem': so-called general explanations
of crime were, in fact, hypotheses about male criminals that were insufficient and insufficient to explain
criminal activity (or lack thereof) between women and children. Distorted accounts of women's
perceptions of crime were the product of misconceptions about women's psychology and actions and
conventional gender-based expectations that contributed to assumptions about 'natural' and 'deviant'
conduct for women (Gelsthorpe, 2002). Early feminist criminology sought to reveal the effect of these
assumptions on criminal justice policy and procedure, and to clarify the crimes committed by and
against women. It has also been associated with calls for research beyond the boundaries of criminology
(Cain, 1990). Building on this criticism, feminist criminology has started to examine the absence of
gender theory in the study of crime as a whole. Too frequently, male criminality was examined without
thorough examination of the relationship between crime and masculinity. This has grown into a
emphasis on crime as a means of 'doing masculinity' (Messerschmidt, 1993). Since criticism emerged
(Collier, 1998), 'doing gender' has grown into more complex accounts of 'situated/structured practice'
(Miller, 2002) and the concept of 'gender identity' influencing offending and non-offensive actions .
After the 1980s, there have been further incidents of disparities not just between women and men, but
also between women of different situations and cultures. Daly, points out that the recognition, led by
Black feminists, of the intersectionality of gender, class and race has contributed to a more complex and
divergent view of female crime experiences as victims and perpetrators or women in the Indian society
has been more outspoken about their rights and equality in several aspects . In the 1990s, some feminist
criminologists began to draw on the postmodern phenomenon of a broader feminist theory of
'deconstructing' the conventional sex/gender distinction with a view to illustrating the discursively
constructed and performative essence of gender identity (Daly). Along with four postmodern
skepticisms regarding 'grand theories' and conclusive, linear and causal explanations for human actions,
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with no exception to crime, this led some feminist theorists to conclude that the notion of a single
feminist criminology is neither theoretically feasible nor politically desirable. In summary, feminist
criminological approaches have sought: to focus on the unique perspectives and roles of women as
perpetrators, suspects and agents in the criminal justice system, while at the same time keeping in line
with various and often conflicting ways in which gender interacts with other forms of identity; to
critique and change the treatment of women in the criminal justice system. This research would not have
been possible without the leadership of the early feminists, who criticized both traditional and emerging
radical criminological ideologies for lack of gender representation and engaged in debates that led to
feminist changes in criminology and beyond (Carlen 1983; Chesney-Lind 1986; Heidensohn 1985;
Klein 1973; Smart 1976). Nor would it have been feasible if some criminologists had not taken up the
feminist task of creating new research methodologies. The methods used, the questions posed, the topics
examined and the data collected forced feminist criminologists to look beyond the institutional
boundaries of criminology for inspiration and practical advice. Initially, they find guidance in the
emerging field of feminist theory and epistemology that has affected other disciplines across sciences
and humanities (Harding, 1987; Stanley and Wise, 1983). As fault lines started to emerge in
methodological practice, feminist criminologists began to draw from a broader pool of methodological
tools, including the re-inventing of techniques preferred by different types of conventional criminology
such as ethnography, qualitative interviews or crime victimization surveys, and the more systematic use
of quantitative methods (Kelly, 1990; Gelsthorpe, 1990). Given the complex and multi-faceted nature of
xenophobia, it should come as no surprise that there is little consensus on epistemological issues as to
how and what kind of feminist information should be generated. Over the last forty years, debates on
how to build information and perform research have created a range of methodological loyalties and
choices. With a view to these methodological problems, Sandra Harding (1987) grouped feminist theory
in the social sciences in three broad epistemological directions: feminist empiricism, xenophobia and
post-modern xenophobia. Within criminology, feminist empiricism describes work that focuses on the
development of women's data in order to examine the victimization, violence and participation of
women in the criminal justice system. The presumption is that such awareness would add greater
objectivity to the criminological theory and study that prioritizes people. Empirical work of this type
aims to strengthen criminology as a discipline by introducing women, but without challenging the
fundamental principles of positivism and the hypothetic-deductive model of discipline that it supports
(Naffine, 1997). Such empiric research continues to make a significant contribution to the understanding
of feminist criminology, and recent study has also been sensitive to the critique of previous empiricism.
One of the most important obstacles to this interpretation of knowledge has been the growth of feminist
epistemology (Harding, 1987). Borrowing from Marx and Hegel, this approach gives preference to
women's views of the world and was soon applied to the notion of a woman's point of view (Harding,
1987) or a Black feminist point of view (Collins, 1990). The prodigious output that has marked the
decade has also led to an intensification of the debates internal to Indian feminism (Rochona
Majumdar,2007). Standpoint distinction between justified belief and opinion views women's
perspectives as the cornerstone of feminist awareness. In some variants of epistemology work that starts
with this disadvantaged social status is 'scientifically preferred' because it originates in, and is being
evaluated against, 'a more full and less distorting kind of social experience' (Harding 1987). Critics
argue that this epistemological position reduces women's experience to a universal and essential
benchmark that is unable to deconstruct the power relations embodied in criminology's claims to the
truth or to adequately account for differences in race, ethnicity, sexuality and the like (Cain, 1990;
Naffine, 1987). Feminist postmodernism is a broad concept that encompasses feminist approaches that
are inspired by postmodern or poststructural theory (such as Derrida or Foucault). This rejects the
positivist claim that study can provide a consistent, unbiased and definite account of the social world
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and the assumption that experience is the chosen basis for the creation of knowledge. Instead, it argues
that 'reality,' subjectivity and 'fact' are constructed and created by discourse, power and knowledge (such
as legal, criminological, science or artistic discourse). This often focuses on deconstructing binary
oppositions that profoundly form human awareness (mind / body, male / female, masculinity /
femininity, black / white, heterosexual / homosexual, accused / victim, etc.). This powerful version of
constructionism has been used by an influential body of feminist thinkers to reinvent sex / gender
differentiation as a matter of corporeality and success (Butler, 1990). This has been identified by a
number of female crime researchers (Howe, 1994; Mason, 2002; Naffine, 1997; Young, 1996). Carol
Smart, for example, suggested the concept of a 'woman of legal discourse,' arguing that 'woman is a
gendered subject category brought into being by legal discourse' (1992). It is important to recognize
variations between these epistemological positions, but we should not see them as either temporal or
mutually exclusive. Feminist criminological work has become so complex and flexible-with
individual researchers frequently using a variety of various methodological methods within and
between studies-that it is difficult for these classifications to do justice to the diversity of this
scholarship. It is more useful to think of feminist research in criminology as involving a set of core
methodological priorities or imperatives that form how work is planned, applied and evaluated. Feminist
work has few basic ingredients, but rather deals with the epistemological problems discussed above, but
is not decided by them.Although some of these interests are specific to feminist research (such as
adherence to gender analysis), others are shared by similar criminological methods (such as analytical
criminology) or adapted from fields beyond criminology.

GENDER THEORY
One distinguishing characteristic of feminist criminological work is a dedication to feminist theory.
While there is no universal approach to feminist theorizing, and studies differ in how much focus they
put on feminist theory, it is difficult to see how work can be feminist without any commitment to
feminist thought. However, the fact that a project has an analysis of gender disparities is not enough to
make it feminist. The subject matter and research issues of a feminist approach are told and sympathized
with feminist theory as an account of sex / gender as an organizational concept and a power relationship
in social life. This does not mean that feminist work only uses feminist theory; it brings a feminist
sensibility to bear on a range of ideas from inside and outside criminology. Feminist theorizing advances
have had important consequences for research methods, and research findings and political advocacy
have also influenced feminist theorizing.
Over time, feminist philosophy has established a deeper and more nuanced relationship with gender
relations, moving beyond a concentration on patriarchy to a more comprehensive view of power and
beyond a dichotomous gender definition, and also pursuing a critical masculinity review (Daly,
Gelsthorpe, 2002). Contemporary feminist projects typically explore and interpret sex / gender as a
power relationship functioning across multiple levels and sites including human, institutional and
discursive levels and intersecting with other power axes (see Intersectionality below). Kathy Daly points
out that ' few feminist academics are interested in creating a grand crime theory' because they
understand that criminal behavior is a social construct formed by multiple, changing, and context-
dependent variables. More complex sex / gender conceptions have posed challenges for researchers, and
perhaps more so for researchers who rely solely on quantitative methods; sex / gender can not be
appropriately captured as a trait or variable, and researchers need to engage with the meanings of social
processes and interactions (Daly). Mixed methodological approaches, based on both qualitative and
quantitative methods, that address these concerns although care must be taken to try to incorporate
approaches with conflicting epistemological foundations.
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Patriarchal studies aim to look at everything from female participation in male-dominated occupations to
"rape culture" of female victimization being encouraged. The patriarchal study has also helped feminists
to expose secret forms of violence against women. For example, feminist criticism of pedagogy (how
teachers teach) has become very popular, as education, particularly education in criminal justice,
becomes the domain for discovering examples of male-dominated thought and examples of the thesis of
marginalization (women being reminded that they are just women, o rmen being reminded that they are
poor-only because they are not people).

SOCIETAL/SOCIAL CHANGES
Feminism describes a contribution to social change in women's interests (Gelsthorpe, 2002). Feminist
work is widely perceived as having political value, educating social change and social justice. Together,
however, concentrating on women's experiences and preference for political engagement poses
traditional ideas regarding value-neutral analysis and objectivity a profound challenge (Harding, 1987).
Such characteristics are compatible with other post-positivist research trends (Tashakkori and Tedlie,
2008; Mertens, 2008) and critical criminological approaches. A feminist preference for explicitly
selective and purposeful research projects does not signal a deviation from robust and sound methods
but may be entirely consistent with incorporating theoretical, legal, epistemological and methodological
issues effectively.
This dedication to reform appears to promote certain research questions and topics: the application of
feminist theory to the chosen subject of feminism, women's and girls' experiences, creates research
questions characterizing feminist methodology. Leading concerns regarding women's harassment
experiences was one of the main contributions of feminism to criminal justice reform. A dedication to
social change can also be related to allowing women, children or other marginalized groups to be heard
through research and connecting research with practitioners. The feminist dedication to social change is
sometimes integrated directly into a proposal for 'action studies.' Haviland, Frye, and Rajah's research
(2008) on the impact of involuntary arrest was expressly designed to promote reform and influence
domestic violence policy. The advocacy-researcher collaboration approach they introduced sought to
move away from traditional observer approaches in this field. Their project approaches data collection
and analysis as an aspect of social practice, not social study

POST POSITIVISM
Feminists' skepticism about criminology's ability to deliver neutral or universal accounts of crime has
led to a disavowal of positivist epistemology that includes: a belief in the existence of a single reality; a
belief that value-free and independent research is possible; a search for cause-and-effect relationships;
and a belief in the ability of research to generalize to the crime. Like other post-positivists, feminists
accept that work is affected by the researcher's beliefs and the theory he / she uses, and may expect to
reflect only a constructed version of truth (Tashakkori and Teddlie, 2008). That has methodological
consequences for the practice of science. Instead of carrying out quantitative analyzes on massive
databases to test hypotheses originating from great crime theories, feminists have preferred small-scale,
qualitative research and inductive analytical modes. This choice is clear from review of the Feminist
Criminology journal's papers. Many of the papers published since its inception using comparable
qualitative research designs including: (i)collecting samples from volunteers;
(ii) using semi-structured interviews; and
(iii) coding patterns in hand-held interview transcripts or using qualitative software.
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In seeking to capture the dynamic, contradictory nature of the experience, feminist criminologists also
used a range of qualitative methods from other disciplines (such as oral history and ethnography) and
engaged with objects of analysis (fiction, media or photographic images) and/or methods of analysis
(literary analysis or psychoanalysis) providing alternative cultural or experiential. For example, taking a
psychoanalytic perspective, Robinson (2007) uses a single-subject clinical case study to examine a
'delinquent' adolescent mother's subjective experiences through a theoretical paradigm that sees gender,
race, trauma and power as dynamic and interwoven constructs. Treatment (Including emotional
interaction between client and therapist) and treatment results from this single case study are given
policy consequences by extrapolation to 'a wider population displaying similar constellations of thoughts,
emotions, and behaviors'. Yet, assuming that feminist criminology is wedded to qualitative research
alone would be a mistake. To be sure, the need to create a solid epistemological basis for feminist
inquiry in the beginning meant that quantitative work was always treated with skepticism or followed by
an apology. Nevertheless, the issue was never quantitative analysis itself, but rather 'insensitive
quantification'. While the collection of qualitative data still dominates feminist criminology, we are
increasingly seeing the use of groundbreaking and thorough statistical analysis to address feminist-
inspired crime questions (Griffiths and Hanmer, 2005). Latest examples include studies on sexual
harassment turnover levels (Kelly, Lovett and Regan, 2005) and calculation of the cost of domestic
abuse (Stanko, 2001).

REFLEXES OF A WOMAN AND POWER

The openness of feminism to issues of power and experience stretches beyond the topic of study to the
researcher itself. A characteristic of feminist theory is an effort to identify and break down the power
relationships between the researcher and her participants. Reflexivity defines research that aims to:
(i) de-objectivate research participants by enabling them to have greater insight into a research project;
and
ii) actively introduce the researcher into the research process with a view to creating a more truthful,
ethical and balanced type of information.
Reflexiveness is one of the ways feminist criminologists use it to escape the idea of unbiased and value-
free study. While there are limitations to the degree to which the power imbalance between researcher
and study subject can be neutralized, different (usually qualitative) approaches are thought to be
effective at moderating this disparity and mitigating it. For example, the goals of action research for
social change mean that it is oriented towards involving research subjects in project design and
implementation (Gelsthorpe, 1990). Something as simple as presenting one's research project in the first
person can also remind the writer and the reader that the study findings are influenced by the
researcher's subjective decisions at every step of the way (e.g.: 'I wanted to ask my study participants
questions about their understanding of domestic violence education programs because I had good reason
to believe ...'). The problem of 'who speaks for whom?' was one of the challenges of breaking down
power relations in science. 'Elevated particularly by women of colour: for example, how can a privileged
white, middle-class feminist academic expect to talk in the name of a disenfranchised, working-class,
indigenous woman whose lives have been deeply influenced by criminalisation and/or victimisation?
Although distinctions between speaking 'about,' speaking 'about' and speaking 'with' have consumed
significant feminist attention, the question is addressed more helpfully, as noted by post-colonial theorist
Gayatri Spivak (1988), as less about who is speaking and more about what we are saying, how we say it
and who is listening. In summary, it is the desires mentioned above that make a project or give it a
feminist 'edge' distinctly feminist. Criminological research which takes feminism seriously will most
likely address one or more of these features, or adopt them. We chose Lisa Maher's (1997) study of
women's lives in a drug market in Brooklyn, below, as an example of feminist criminological research.
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PHENOMENOLOGY
Feminist work has stressed the perspectives of women as a research topic and as a source of information
for theoretical, epistemological, and political purposes. It usually ties individual or micro-level
knowledge to macro-level gendered power relations. Giving women a voice has been associated with
democratising research, validating women and recognizing women's agency, redressing their absence
from criminology and criminal analysis, recognizing the private sphere, challenging universal criminal
accounts and providing a more comprehensive account of social relations. Within the perspective of
feminism, experience is given the greatest emphasis which usually privileges qualitative methods.
Attention to women's experience does not preclude men's tests or masculinity, nor does it preclude men
performing feminist work (Collier, 1998). Documenting the interactions of women with offenses such as
domestic abuse and sexual harassment was a subject of feminist studies in the 1970s and 1980s,
generally using approaches such as convenience-based or purpose-based samples interviews and
regional victimization surveys. Most of this work and related political advocacy underscored women's
common experiences. Strategic reflection on the inadequacies of traditional research methodologies and
procedures for these purposes influenced subsequent advances in feminist study and, more broadly,
criminology such as refining crime victimization surveys (Walklate, 2007), assessment strategies
(Griffiths and Hanmer, 2005), and likely moving towards mixed methodologies. Such work has opened
up new areas of investigation and had a profound impact on the administration of criminal justice. The
position of experience, however, and especially the valuation of subjectivity, has become a vexed issue
for feminist researchers and has been debated from several perspectives. Strong forms of feminism faced
criticism for attempting to promote a single point of view, imposing a false consensus and failing to
discuss disparities among people, including but not limited to those of ethnicity, class and sexuality; for
others, the 'Woman' category became unsustainable. For example, research on the experiences of lesbian
(and gay male) victims of intimate partner abuse (Renzetti and Miles, 1996) questioned simplistic
dichotomous sex / gender assumptions, and research on the experiences of Black women revealed
constructs such as Battered Women's Syndrome as primarily based on middle-class white experience
(Allard, 1991). Joan Scott has critically analyzed the argument that experience could provide a
'unassailable' foundation for information from a different viewpoint. She argues in a more nuanced
statement than can be summed up here that when 'context is taken as clear,' experience 'reproduces
political structures rather than contests' (1991: 778). For Scott '*it are not experienced persons, but
objects constituted by experience' (1991: 779); '*what counts as experience is neither self-evident nor
straightforward; it is often disputed, and therefore often political,' and therefore 'the discursive essence
of experience' requires critical examination (1991: 797). These critiques have prompted ongoing debate
on how to use and portray experience. Feminist work has responded by attempting to provide richer
accounts of women's perceptions and inequalities, for example, by using ethnography (Maher, 1997),
life stories (Richie, 1996) and feminist dynamics analysis (Daly, 1994), by discussing gender, social
aspects of violence (Miller, 2008), by employing frameworks such as intersectionality (Maher, 1997),
and by exploring how discouragement can be accomplished. We come back to these issues below.
Documenting the experiences of violence by women and girls continues to be a major concern,
especially in highlighting concerns unique to different groups and in documenting gaps in legislation,
policies and practices.

VIOLENCE AND VICTIMIZATION: A DEBATE

Throughout this segment, we draw some themes that represent recent trends, ongoing debates or
conundrums for feminist research criminologists, with respect to feminist violence research. Women's
violent victimization became a focal point of feminist politics in the 1970s, sparking a major movement
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to expose, question and prevent violence against women and children by men, especially domestic abuse,
rape and child sexual assault. Most of this research was carried out on the 'energy face' of offering
support to women survivors of abuse (e.g., women's shelters and rape crisis centers) by rapidly formed
strong and lasting relations in academia and government agencies with feminists. The policy changes
and improvements in societal perceptions that were pursued called for new theoretical and analytical
insights about the experiences of abuse faced by women and girls. Although this concern was at odds
with the 'new criminology' established by left-leaning critical criminologists (Carrington, 2008), feminist
criminologists focused on the need to establish a robust and critical body of scholarship in this field of
victimology. This work has been highly influential in giving attention and voice to the experiences of
women and girls as victims of crime, their care in the legal system of criminal 14, and our perception of
these systems. This has transformed the face of criminology and criminal justice activities. Also at the
forefront of methodological progress was the feminist research on the violent victimization of women
and children. Ongoing conversations on how best to study and interpret women as victims of abuse have
taken on broader theoretical and epistemological problems. The following selected concepts offer the
idea of the scope of the problems currently leading in this field of methodological discussion. The recent
popular example to be stated is #metoo movements that have been popular around the globe since 2017,
that raised a lot of questions on women actually falsely victimizing themselves for the sole purpose of
revenge, nullifying some of the actual stories of victims.

INTERSECTIONALITY
Burgess-Proctor (2006) and Sokoloff and Dupont (2005) provide valuable reviews of the call for an
intersectional approach within criminology which applies intersectionality to domestic violence.
Intersectionality is a short term that represents the complexity of experience and power relations,
especially but not limited to gender, race (and or ethnicity) and class intersection. It recognizes that these
relations are 'dynamic, historically rooted, socially built relationships of power that function
simultaneously on both micro-structural and macro-structural levels', while 'particular social identities
may be more prevalent in one context than in another' .In part it has evolved out of recognition of the
weaknesses of a unitary account of women's experiences, that the 'Woman/en' category is essentialist,
and in response to critiques, especially from minority women. Feminist law scholar Kimberle Crenshaw
(1991) was very influential; she explored violence against women of color with respect to intersecting
social categories at the economic, political, and representational levels. Intersectionality has, however,
been used in different ways and has no singular sense. In exploring the methodological implications of
intersectionality, Burgess-Proctor (2006) sees qualitative approaches as offering the capacity to analyze
experience, and approaches of mixed methods as having the potential to include both macro and micro
levels as typically expected from an intersectional setting. Some feminist criminal victimization research
(directly or indirectly) used a cross-sectional approach in combination with approaches such as
interview data synthesis and post-structural analysis (Mason, 2002), ethnography (Maher, 1997) and
case studies (Cunneen and Stubbs, 1997; 15 Stubbs and Tolmie, 1995). However, as Daly indicates, few
researchers are currently performing cross-sectional analysis of crime, and it remains complex and
subject to debate to give effect to intersectionality. For example, the differences count, and for whom,
and what are the limits, if any, of taking into account the intersection of social identities? Does
intersectionality mean the use of individual knowledge in a highly limited account? As Snyder points
out, the above can be a valuable method for 'unsettling essentialist myths of dominant men and
subordinate women' , but it does not resolve the difficulties of going beyond narrative to examine and
interpret. Sokoloff and Dupont's (2005) are concerned that recognizing differences among women
experiencing violence should not obscure the need to examine structural oppression captures one part of
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the debate, but ways of thinking about intersectionality are not limited to those emphasizing either the
structure or the multiplicity of identity-shaping factors..

VICTIM OR ACCUSED
One ongoing problem is how to study the victimization experiences of women without erasing their
authority or casting them as potential victims. Feminist political campaigns on women's victimization
were very effective, but may have had unintended consequences such as reinforcing an association of
the 'victim' category with the 'woman' category and underplaying the victim agency. Recent research and
activism has attempted to address this issue by, for example, questioning the dichotomy of victim / agent,
identifying the blurry lines between victim and offender, and re-examining the victim (and perpetrator)
category, how it is applied, and what political and other consequences it has (Walklate, 2007). The word
survivor is often used to imply that victimization does not characterize the individual and that its agency
and subjectivity are valued. Common discourses and traditions of criminal justice frequently presume an
idealized victim and as a result some victims of crime are built as worthy of care and assistance and
others as undeserving and complicit in their own victimisation. Important involvement with these topics
is well established in sexual assault research (Estrich, 1987), and has been conducted with respect to
victim accountability in the literature on crime prevention (Stanko, 1997). Jan Jordan's (2008) study of
women's accounts of a serial rapist's surviving assaults reveals gaps in traditional understandings of
active resistance versus passive victims. The women used psychological and other techniques to combat
the domination and control of the rapist; they were 'survivor style victims' (Jordan, 2008: 28). The
blurred distinction between victimization and offense is widely known for incarcerated women (Richie,
1996) and for work concerning battered women who act against perpetrators (Ferraro, 2006; Stubbs and
Tolmie, 1995). This awareness has led to undermining essentialist portrayals of women as perpetrators
and men as criminals (Carrington, 2008: 87). However, this method runs the risk of taking too tidy
account of offending women by referring to their victimization (Daly, 1994), which could remove their
power. Lisa Maher acknowledged that women are 'constrained by sexism, racism and poverty,' but also
the 'active, creative and often contradictory choices, adaptations and resistances that make up the
criminal agencies of these women' . A 'gendered life approach' that begins with women's lives, rather
than offending or victimizing them, may offer one way beyond the conceptual limitations of the
dichotomies of victim / agent and victim / offender.

THE TEXTUAL CONTEXT

Daly and Maher (1998) have established a discrepancy between the 'woman of debate' and the 'real'
woman in feministic criminology. Taking up Smart's articulation of gender identity as a result of
discourse – an idea born from the engagement of feminism with post-structural theories – the former
focuses on the creation of women / femininity and men / masculinity (class) through legal, economic
and social discourse (Smart, 1992). This prioritizes text (such as film, fiction, media, legal documents)
and discourse analysis of deconstructive methods (Howe, 1994; Naffine, 1997; Young, 1996). The latter
emphasizes experiential accounts of the lives of women, victimization and criminalisation, using
approaches such as surveys, interviews and ethnographies to explain these lives (Dobash and Dobash,
1998; Stanko, 1990). In the field of gendered violence, it is the latter approach, particularly from a point
of view, that has had the most impact, advocating contextual, reflexive approaches that use victimization
experiences of women as the starting point for understanding violence. Two issues lie at the core of this
tension between 'women of discourse' and 'real' women in the context of gendered violence: power and
experience. Faced with the realities of men's violence against women, many scholars dealing directly
with experiential accounts of violence have been comfortable studying violence as an instrument of
exploitation within a systemic paradigm of gendered power relations (although an increasingly
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intersectional paradigm). Liz Kelly's (1988) dissertation on the sexual harassment spectrum is a prime
example of informative and powerful study in this style. Centered on alternate power articulations –
such as Foucault's model of disciplinary power as a changing force generating subjectivities – other
feminist scholars have become increasingly interested in how images of violence feed into preserving
defined and necessary gender identities. Sharon Marcus' (1992) dissertation on the 'rape script' is a fine
example of outside criminology scholarship in this field. From an empirical point of view, feminist
criminologists attracted to postmodern theory appear to be wary of privileging personal interpretation as
confirmation of the actual 'reality' of crime, far less a superior means of proof. As noted above, this issue
has much to do with the assumption that individuals are not simply experienced, but rather developed by
experience (Scott, 1991), and thus, experience can not provide a self-evident starting point for
understanding since it is itself a cultural construct that requires clarification. Many feminist
criminologists have dismissed methods of study that use observational accounts of experience as a
framework for understanding crime, instead relying on textual descriptions of such crime. A small
number of projects sought to integrate empirical research into the experiences of violence experienced
by women with a theoretical framework adapted to post-structural thinking about experiences and power.

LEGAL PROVISIONS IN INDIA

To maintain the Constitutional command, the State has established different legislative measures
proposed to guarantee equality with rights, to counter social segregation and different types of savagery
and abominations and to offer help benefits particularly to working ladies. Despite the fact that ladies
might be casualties of any of the violations, for example, 'Murder', 'Theft', 'Bamboozling' and so forth
the wrongdoings, which are coordinated particularly against ladies, are portrayed as 'Wrongdoing
against Women'. These are comprehensively ordered under the accompanying classifications:
CONSTITUTIONAL PROVISIONS AND PRIVILEGES

● The rights and defends revered in the constitution for women in India are recorded beneath:
● The state will not oppress any resident of India on the ground of sex [Article 15(1)].
● The state is enabled to make any unique arrangement for women. As it were, this arrangement
empowers the state to make positive segregation for women [Article 15(3)].
● No national will be oppressed or be ineligible for any business or office under the state on the
ground of sex [Article 16(2)].
● Activity in individuals and constrained work are denied [Article 23(1)].
● The state to anchor for people similarly the privilege to a satisfactory methods for business
[Article 39(a)].
● The state to anchor break even with pay for equivalent work for both Indian people [Article
39(d)].
● The state is required to guarantee that the wellbeing and quality of women laborers are not
manhandled and that they are not constrained by financial need to enter hobbies unsuited to their
quality [Article 39(e)].
● The state will make arrangement for anchoring just and sympathetic states of work and maternity
alleviation [Article 42].
● It will be the obligation of each resident of India to deny homes unfavorable to the nobility of
women [Article 51-A(e)].
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● 33% of the aggregate number of seats to be filled by direct decision in each Panchayat will be
held for women[Article 243-D(3)].
● 33% of the aggregate number of workplaces of chairpersons in the Panchayats at each level will
be held for women [Article 243-D(4)].
● 33% of the aggregate number of seats to be filled by direct decision in each Municipality will be
saved for women [Article 243-T(3)].
● The workplaces of chairpersons in the Municipalities will be saved for women in such way as
the State Legislature may give [Article 243-T(4)]

CRIMINAL LAWS
The Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act (2005) is a complete enactment to shield ladies
in India from all types of aggressive behavior at home. It additionally covers ladies who have been/are
involved with the abuser and are subjected to viciousness of any sort—physical, sexual, mental, verbal
or passionate.
Indian Penal Code (1860) contains arrangements to shield Indian women from settlement demise,
assault, capturing, brutality and different offenses.
Code of Criminal Procedure (1973) has certain protections for women like commitment of a man to
keep up his significant other, capture of female accused by female police et cetera. Serious offences are
classified as cognizable and non-bailable by this code.
The Immoral Traffic (Prevention) Act (1956) is the head enactment for counteractive action of
trafficking for business sexual abuse. At the end of the day, it counteracts trafficking in ladies and young
ladies with the end goal of prostitution as a sorted out methods for living.
The Indecent Representation of Women (Prohibition) Act (1986) restricts revolting portrayal of ladies
through notices or in productions, works, artworks, figures or in some other way.
Commission of Sati (Prevention) Act (1987) accommodates the more viable anticipation of the
commission of sati and its glorification on ladies.
Pre-Conception and Pre-Natal Diagnostic Techniques (Prohibition of Sex Selection) Act (1994) denies
sex choice previously or after origination and keeps the abuse of pre-natal demonstrative strategies for
sex assurance prompting female foeticide.
FAMILY LAWS
Hindu Marriage Act (1955) presented monogamy and permitted separate on certain predetermined
grounds. It gave approach rights to Indian man and lady in regard of marriage and separation.
Dowry Prohibition Act (1961) forbids the giving or taking of endowment at or previously or whenever
after the marriage from ladies.
Maternity Benefit Act (1961) manages the work of women in specific foundations for certain period
when labor and accommodates maternity advantage and certain different advantages.
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Medical Termination of Pregnancy Act (1971) accommodates the end of specific pregnancies by
enlisted medicinal professionals on compassionate and restorative grounds.
Dissolution of Muslim Marriages Act (1939) gifts a Muslim spouse the privilege to look for the
disintegration of her marriage.
Muslim Women (Protection of Rights on Divorce) Act (1986)protects the privileges of Muslim ladies
who have been separated by or have acquired separation from their spouses.
Family Courts Act (1984) accommodates the foundation of Family Courts for quick settlement of family
questions or domestic disputes.
Hindu Succession Act (1956) perceives the privilege of women to acquire parental property similarly
with men.
SPECIAL PROVISIONS
Indian Christian Marriage Act (1872) contain arrangements identifying with marriage and separation
among the Christian people group.
Legal Services Authorities Act (1987) accommodates free lawful administrations to Indian ladies.
Equal Remuneration Act (1976) accommodates installment of equivalent compensation to the two
people laborers for same work or work of a comparative sort. It likewise counteracts segregation on the
ground of sex, against ladies in enrollment and administration conditions.
Minimum Wages Act (1948) does not permit separation among male and female specialists or diverse
least wages for them.
Mines Act (1952) and Factories Act (1948) excludes the work for women between 7 P.M. to 6 A.M. in
mines and processing plants and accommodates their wellbeing and welfare.
Women have the privilege to self-sufficiency, instruction and occupation and employment move timings
decisions.
CASE LAWS : JUDGEMENTS THAT CHANGED THE LIFE OF WOMEN IN INDIA

1.Nirbhaya Rape Case (State v. Ram Singh (2014) 4 DLT (Cri) 337 or 2014 SCC OnLine Del 1138,
affirmed in Mukesh v. State (NCT of Delhi) (2017) 6 SCC 1)

One of the most important cases of violence against women, the Nirbhaya rape case led to many
significant changes in the legal attitude towards rapes, most importantly the amendment to the sections
pertaining to rape in the Indian Penal Code. On March 21, 2013, the rape law in the country was
amended through the Criminal Law (Amendment) Act 2013, which, among other things, redefined rape
and made the punishments more stringent, including death penalty for repeated rape offenders, as well
as when the offenders inflict injury during rape which would lead to death of the victim.
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Six people were arrested in regard to the crime which took place on 16-17 December 2012. However,
one of the convicts, Ram Singh, killed himself in custody. Out of the remaining five convicts, one was
declared a juvenile whom the Juvenile Justice Board remanded to a correction home for three years. The
remaining four offenders were awarded the death penalty by a Fast Track Court, on September 13, 2013.
The trial court convicted all the four accused under section 120-B IPC for the offence of criminal
conspiracy; under section 365/366 IPC read with section 120-B IPC for abducting the victims with and
intention to force the prosecutrix to illicit intercourse; under section 307 IPC read with section 120-B
IPC for attempting to kill the Prosecution Witness 1 (who was accompanying the prosecutrix while the
crime took place); under section 376(2)(g) IPC for committing gang rape on the prosecutrix in
pursuance of their conspiracy; under section 377 IPC read with section 120-B IPC for committing
unnatural offence with the prosecutrix; under section 302 IPC read with section 120-B IPC for
committing murder of the helpless prosecutrix; under section 395 IPC for conjointly committing dacoity
in pursuance of the aforesaid conspiracy;v under section 397 IPC read with section 120-B IPC for the
use of iron rods and for attempting to kill PW-1 at the time of committing robbery; under section 201
IPC read with section 120-B IPC for destroying evidence and under section 412 IPC for the offence of
being individually found in the possession of stolen property which they all knew was stolen booty of
dacoity committed by them, and inter alia they were sentenced to death for the offence punishable under
section 302 of the Indian Penal Code.

After recording the conviction, as aforesaid, the learned trial Judge imposed the sentence, which we
reproduce:

“(a) The convicts, namely, convict Akshay Kumar Singh alias Thakur, convict Mukesh, convict Vinay
Sharma and convict Pawan Gupta alias Kaalu are sentenced to death for offence punishable under
Section 302 of the Penal Code. Accordingly, the convicts to be hanged by neck till they are dead. Fine of
Rs 10,000 to each of the convict is also imposed and in default of payment of fine such convict shall
undergo simple imprisonment for a period of one month;

(b) for the offence under Section 120-B IPC I award the punishment of life imprisonment to each of the
convict and a fine of Rs 5000 to each of them. In default of payment of fine simple imprisonment for
one month to such convict;

(c) for the offence under Section 365 IPC I award the punishment of seven years to each of the convict
and a fine of Rs 5000 to each of them. In default of payment of fine simple imprisonment for one month
to such convict;

(d) for the offence under Section 366 IPC I award the punishment of seven years to each of the convict
person and a fine of Rs 5000 to each of them. In default of payment of fine simple imprisonment for one
month to such convict;

(e) for the offence under Section 376(2)(g) IPC I award the punishment of life imprisonment to each of
the convict person with a fine of Rs 5000 to each of them. In default of payment of fine simple
imprisonment for one month to such convict;
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(f) for the offence under Section 377 IPC I award the punishment of ten years to each of the convict
person and a fine of Rs 5000 to each of them. In default of payment of fine simple imprisonment for one
month to such convict;

(g) for the offence under Section 307 IPC I award the punishment of seven years to each of the convict
person and a fine of Rs 5000 to each of them. In default of payment of fine simple imprisonment for one
month to such convict;

(h) for the offence under Section 201 IPC I award the punishment of seven years to each of the convict
person and a fine of Rs 5000 to each of them. In default of payment of fine simple imprisonment for one
month to such convict;

(i) for the offence under Section 395 read with Section 397 IPC I award the punishment of ten years to
each of the convict person and a fine of Rs 5000 to each of them. In default of payment of fine simple
imprisonment for one month to such convict;

(j) for the offence under Section 412 IPC I award the punishment of ten years to each of the convict
person and a fine of Rs 5000 to each of them. In default of payment of fine simple imprisonment for one
month to such convict;”

The learned trial Judge directed the sentences under Sections 120-
B/365/366/376(2)(g)/377/201/395/397/412 IPC to run concurrently. As death penalty was imposed, he
referred the matter to the High Court for confirmation under Section 366 CrPC.

The High Court, vide judgment dated 13-3-2014 [State v. Ram Singh, 2014 SCC OnLine Del 1138 :
(2014) 212 DLT 99] , affirmed the conviction and confirmed the death penalty imposed upon the
accused by expressing the opinion that under the facts and circumstances of the case, imposition of
death penalty awarded by the trial court deserved to be confirmed in respect of all the four convicts.

The same was upheld by the Hon’ble Supreme Court. All the subsequent review petitions, curative
petitions, etc. filed by the convicts, whether in Delhi High Court of the Supreme Court, were dismissed.
All the convicts were finally hanged on March 20, 2020 at 5.30 am and confirmed dead at 6:00 am.

2.Vishaka Vs State of Rajasthan (1997)

Bhanwari Devi, a social worker from Rajasthan, was brutally gang-raped by five men for preventing a
child marriage. Determined to seek justice, she decided to go to court. In a shocking decision, the trial
court acquitted all five accused. Vishaka, a Group for Women’s Education and Research, took up the
cause of Bhanwari Devi. It joined forces with four other women’s organisations, and filed a petition
before the Supreme Court of India on the issue of sexual harassment at the workplace.

On August 13, 1997, the Supreme Court commissioned the Vishaka guidelines that defined sexual
harassment and put the onus on the employers to provide a safe working environment for women.

3. Mary Roy Vs State of Kerala (1986)

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Women from the Syrian Christian community in Kerala were prevented from inheriting property due to
patriarchal traditions. This decree was challenged by Mary Roy, a woman's right activist and educator.

After the demise of her father, she filed a case against her elder brother when she was denied equal share
in the family's inheritance. Though the plea was rejected by the lower court, the Kerala High Court
overruled the previous judgment.

In 1986, the Supreme Court delivered a landmark judgment that granted Syrian Christian women the
right to seek an equal share in their father's property.

4. Lata Singh Vs State of Uttar Pradesh (2006)

Lata Singh was an adult when she left her family home to be joined in matrimony with a man from a
lower caste. Her brothers, who were unhappy with the alliance, filed a missing person report, and
alleged Lata had been abducted. This resulted in the arrest of three people from her husband's family.

In order to get the charges dropped, Lata Singh filed a petition which resulted in the landmark judgment
by the Supreme Court that allowed an adult woman the right to marry or live with anyone of her choice.

The court further ordered that the police initiate criminal action against people who commit violence
against those who decide on inter-religious or inter-caste marriages.

5. Roxann Sharma Vs Arun Sharma (2015)

Roxann was involved in a bitter child custody battle with her estranged husband. A court in Goa granted
her interim custody of their child, but Arun Sharma whisked their son away and refused to let Roxann
meet the child.

She filed a case against him, which led to the landmark judgment pronounced by the apex court
regarding children caught in a legal battle between parents.

The Supreme Court ruled that when estranged parents are involved in a legal tussle over the custody of a
child who is under the age of five years, the custody of the child will remain with the mother.

6. State of Tamil Nadu Vs Suhas Katti (2004)

This case led to the first conviction under the Information Technology Act, 2000. The victim was being
harassed by the accused, Suhas Katti, when she refused to marry him.

He would send defamatory and obscene messages to her online in a Yahoo message group. To add to
her agony, she began to receive phone calls from unknown people soliciting sex work.

The victim filed a complaint in February 2004, and within seven months the accused was convicted. In
an age of merciless trolls and other forms of online harassment, this judgment acts as a tool that woman
can use to safeguard their dignity.

7. Laxmi Vs Union Of India (2015)

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In 2006, Laxmi, an acid attack victim, filed a petition seeking measures to regulate the sale of acid and
provide adequate compensation to the victim. Taking cognizance of the number of cases relating to acid
attacks against women on the rise, the Supreme Court imposed stringent regulations on the sale of acid
in 2013.

The ruling banned over the counter sale of acid. Dealers can sell the acid only if the buyer provides a
valid identity proof and states the need for the purchase. It is mandatory for the dealer to submit the
details of the sale within three days to the police. It also made it illegal to sell acid to a person below 18
years.

8. Centre for enquiry into Health and Allied themes (CEHAT) Vs Union of India (2003)

With the advent of pre-natal diagnostic techniques that could determine the sex of a fetus, the growing
trend of aborting female fetuses was observed. In a bid to curtail female feticide, the government of
India issued the PNDT Act in 1996.

The provisions of the PNDT Act, however, were not being effectively implemented by the state and
central government.

The Centre for Enquiry into Health and Allied themes filed a petition which led to the Supreme court
directing the Central and State governments to enact the provisions of the act immediately, and banned
all advertisements relating to pre-natal sex determination techniques.

9. Termination of 24-week old pregnancy permitted on account of abnormal fetus

The petitioner, a rape survivor, who wished to remain unidentified, approached the Supreme Court
seeking permission to abort her 24-week abnormal fetus.

The petition challenged the 46-year-old Maternal Termination of Pregnancy Act that does not permit
abortion of a fetus after 20 weeks.

The Supreme Court ruled in favour of the petitioner after the medical board submitted a report stating
that continuing with the pregnancy would put the mother's life at risk.

10.In Lilly v/s State Of Haryana (2013),

for the first time the agony and trauma of a rape victim was realised who had to go through the two-
finger test to give her character certification. On the basis of various precedents, the court held that the
test is a violation of the victim’s right to privacy and dignity. The court held that rape survivors are
entitled to legal recourse that does not re-traumatise them or violate their physical or mental integrity
and dignity. They are also entitled to medical procedures conducted in a manner that respects their right
to consent. Medical procedures should not be carried out in a manner that constitutes cruel, inhuman, or
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degrading treatment, and health should be of paramount consideration while dealing with gender-based
violence.

11.In Shayara Bano v/s Union of India (2017), the Supreme Court declared the practice of Instant
Triple Talaq (talak-e-biddat) un-Islamic and against the basic tenets of Quran. Shayara Bano had
challenged the practice when her husband of 15 years invoked instant triple talaq. The court questioned
the custom which is theologically sinful and why was it still part of the practice of a community. The
court also directed the government to bring a legislation to this effect within six months.

• The government introduced the Muslim Women (Protection of Rights on Marriage) Act 2019:

– Any pronouncement of talaq by a Muslim husband upon his wife, by words, either spoken or written
or in electronic form or in any other manner whatsoever, shall be void and illegal;

– Any Muslim husband who pronounces talaq upon his wife shall be punished with imprisonment for a
term which may extend to three years, and shall also be liable to fine.

12.The Sabarimala Temple case, 2019 is one of the most important cases that initiated the debate
between Right to Equality and Right to Freedom of Religion.

The temple in Kerala – a shrine of Lord Ayyappa – had an age-old tradition of not allowing women of
menstruating age to enter the premises. The practice was questioned in the court through a petition and
in September 2018, the Supreme Court of India ruled that women of all age groups can enter Sabarimala
Temple. The court initially lifted the ban and termed it as a violation of women’s right to practice
religion before going on to place it for review before a larger bench in November 2019.

The Apex Court said restrictions on women in religious places was not limited to Sabarimala alone and
was prevalent in other religions as well. This was in reference to the review pleas for larger bench
seeking review of its 2018 ruling that allowed menstruating women to enter the Sabarimala Temple in
Kerala.

13. in Dhannulal and ors v/s Ganeshram and Ors (2015). The bench held that continuous
cohabitation of a couple together that is, ‘live-in relationship’ would raise the presumption of marriage
unless otherwise proven. The case was that of a property dispute of a man who lived with a woman, not
legally wedded wife, for 20 years and the bench held that she was eligible to inherit the property.

14. State of Tamil Nadu vs Nalini ( 1999)

RAJIV Gandhi, a former Prime Minister of India was assassinated on 21/5/1991 at a place called
Sriperumpudur in Tamil Nadu. ... The Special Judge who tried the case found all the 26 appellants guilty
of various offences charged, the gravamen of them being Section 302 read with Section 120-B Indian
Penal Code.

CONCLUSION
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It will be promising to be able to conclude a chapter on feminist research in criminology with the
statement that Carol Smart has made about the sociology discipline, namely that feminist methods have
shaped sociological research practice to the extent where they have 'become taken for granted or
standard practice' (Smart, 2009). Given the now positive relationship between feminist criminology and
traditional criminology, it will go too far to say the same about the effect of feminism on crime.
However, just as feminism has shaped the way we think about and analyze crime and the criminal
justice system as a political movement and a theory, so too research approaches favored by feminists
have influenced the methodologies used by many criminologists. As feminist methodologies are
increasingly applied to a wider range of criminal topics (such as terrorism, hate crime and state crime),
the debates we have identified above in the context of gender violence research will continue to
challenge criminologists. People who want to benefit from the methodological innovations and insights
of the young women. You just feel it when you come up against it ... then this big part of who I am takes
over again and says, "Fuck off, I know who I am! "(2002 Mason: 111).

Feminism, whatever its field of study. These include: the complexities of operationalizing
intersectionality in research practice; the issue of how to break down the dichotomy between victim /
agent without ignoring the deeply patterned existence of victimization and criminalization; the need to
identify and address the unequal power dynamics inherent in the research process; and the problem of
how to design research projects that do justice. Feminist methodology doesn't have quick answers to
these knowledge production dilemmas but recognizes the importance of continuing to ask the questions.

I believe there are holes in feminist crime theories. Mainly refering to three main areas of female crime
that feminist ideology can not explain;
(1) That female offenses are underclass offenses, implying class conflict
(2) Female offenses are disproportionate to ethnic groups that indicate race conflict
(3) Women in jail have typically experienced poverty

Did I answer all that is required? Can anyone, ever?