ABSTRACT
Feminist theory in criminology challenges male power and the patriarchal social structure. Feminist criminologists see the major division around which conflict emerges as inequality built on either real or socially constructed differences between men and women. Feminists who take more of a social constructionist perspective argue that the difference in male violence is a result of the gender-structured world and see crime as an outcome of the way males claim, build, and sustain their power. Crime is a manifestation of masculinity and is seen as one way of "doing gender." It goes beyond class and race distinctions and the simplistic black/white distinction within a gender analysis to incorporate different cultural experiences, such as those of Latino women, Asian women, Native American women, and women who are mentally or physically challenged, as part of a broadened feminist analysis.
