Women and Crime

The book is split into two volumes, the first volume describes the type of women which become criminals and how they feel about their stigmatisation and treatment and the process women go through within the criminal justice system.  The second volume concentrates on the criticisms and limitations of both conventional and feminist approaches to the understanding of female criminality and suggests some new perspectives to traditional and modern theories.  

The book at first demonstrates case studies of various women both high profile (e.g. suffragettes and the green ham women) and unknown and gives the reader an opportunity to perceive the problems that women face when being dealt with by the criminal justice system.  The problems range from the differential treatment between men and women in prison to the neglect of female criminals by male criminologists.  The second section of the book attempts to explain some of these problems which is the initial aim of the book.  However, Heidensohn gives non-definitive answers which leaves the reader to mentally construct questions such as, have changes been made? Is there room for further improvement? And are there solutions?  This in turn leaves the reader to develop their own conclusions.

Heidensohn’s conclusion is settled in the final chapter which gives an overview of developments during the past decade by outlining the amendments that have taken place in social research and crime concerns and although this partially answers the previously mentioned questions it still leaves the reader to develop their own assumptions.  However, although Heidensohn’s questions appear unresolved and no answers appear full proof the book still covers a substantial amount of what is seemingly a broad topic and the book is definitely both a knowledgeable and interesting read.

The book is aimed at female criminals, feminists, students, professionals and those interested in the study of crime.  The layout of this book is very well structured and the way in which the case studies are introduced at an early point gives the reader a taste and a better understanding to the theoretical approaches that are discussed in the later chapters.   Some chapters are lengthy in content, however, in the conclusion Heidensohn states how the reader must understand how necessary all the information is in order to get her views across.  This is considered as accurate as although Heidensohn may not fulfil the requirements of answering her own questions in the book.  The information is most certainly significant to area of female criminality.