Amanda Nelund
Public criminology has emerged as a type of criminology committed to making change. This is a sentiment strongly shared by feminist criminology. There is nothing in the public criminology literature, however, that would guarantee that the type of change made would be transformative or critical. A feminist analysis of public criminology reveals an erasure of power relations in the production of knowledge, the concept of the public, and the reception of knowledge claims. This paper argues that it is only by addressing these feminist critiques and paying attention to power that we can build a transformative public criminology.
The idea of public criminology, of engaging the public with criminologists’ work and making practical change, has generated a lively discussion amongst academics. Yet the voice of feminist criminologists has, thus far, been relatively silent on the subject. This is simultaneously surprising and understandable. While feminist criminology has a rich history of engaging different publics, its work does not take on or conform exactly to public criminology as so far conceptualized. A feminist analysis of the concept of public criminology reveals a troubling lack of attention to power and power relations. Feminism can contribute to the public criminology conversation by highlighting the role of power and, in so doing, assist in the practice of a critical public criminology.
This paper begins with an outline of the public criminology literature. I argue that this literature shares with feminism a commitment to change making. Despite this affinity there is no guarantee that the type of change addressed in the public criminology literature will be satisfying to feminist criminologists. I look at the erasure of power relations in the epistemological assumptions of public criminology, the ways in which it conceptualizes the public and our relationship as academics to that public, and in the ways that our work as feminists is received. Throughout the paper I argue that one alternative way to think about the same types of issues raised by public criminology, one that may serve us better as critical scholars, is Patricia Hill Collins’ concept of intellectual activism.
Public criminology is a relatively new term that grapples with an old issue. How do we use academic research outside of the academy? Supporters of public criminology argue that academics should hold an active and engaged role in making social change. Currie (2007) describes public criminology as a criminology that “takes as part of its defining mission a more vigorous, systematic and effective intervention in the world of social policy and social action” (176). A key goal of this approach is to impact both public policy and the public mind (Uggen & Inderbitzin, 2010). This can be done in a variety of ways but a commonly discussed strategy is the dissemination of criminological knowledge through mass media engagement (Uggen & Inderbitzin, 2010; Currie, 2007; Feilzer, 2009). A closely related concept, then, is Barak’s notion of newsmaking criminology. Newsmaking criminology strives, similarly to public criminology, “to affect public attitudes, thoughts and discourses about crime and justice” (Barak, 2007: 192). The overall spirit of this literature is to engage with and change public ideas and around and responses to crime (Loader & Sparks, 2011).
Feminist approaches to criminology are similar to public criminology in regards to this focus on change making. Feminism is a large and diverse perspective, but it is the coupling of the recognition of and a commitment to the ending of the oppression of women in society that unifies the many disparate positions (McLaren, 2002). Feminism involves theory about oppression and strategies for change (Daly & Chesney-Lind, 1988). Risman (2006) argues that feminist sociology has always been public “if by ‘public sociology’ we mean sociology engaged with an audience outside the academy, with an intent to create and use knowledge for the public good” (281). Creese, McLaren and Pulkingham (2009) point out that academic feminists in Canada have been and continue to be in contact with activist feminists, government officials and members of other publics. This is, of course, not only a feminist ideal. Engaging with different publics has also been essential to the work of Indigenous, postcolonial, queer and other critical perspectives. Feminist approaches to criminology thus share with public criminology a spirit of engaging and influencing the public.
Feminism reminds us of the centrality of making change and also stands as a particularly vivid example of doing that type of work. We have a rich history of this in Canada, both from the feminist movement generally and from feminist criminology in particular. Feminist criminologists have worked, in a variety of capacities, to bring attention to various forms of victimization, including intimate partner violence and sexual assault (Comack 2006; Doe, 2003; Levan 1996; Gotell, 2012). They have been integral in facilitating changes to prisons for women and our understanding and treatment of criminalized women (Comack 1996; see Hannah-Moffat & Shaw 2000; Hayman 2006). Feminist criminologists have changed laws, worked with governments, brought violence against women into the public spotlight and mobilized with feminist organizations, such as Women’s Legal Education and Action Fund and Canadian Association of Elizabeth Fry Societies, across the country to make change occur on the ground.
Feminist criminology, in the main, is focused on making a particular type of change. The focus is on ameliorating the oppressive discourses and social conditions of patriarchy, capitalism, colonialism and other structures. That is to say, it shares with other strands of critical criminology a focus on transformative change. The goal is not to contribute to the better management of “criminal” populations or evaluate criminal justice policy better, but to critique criminal and social justice realities and attempt to push the bounds of possibility and thought (Hogeveen & Woolford, 2006). Although similarly focused on making change, there is nothing inherent in the idea of public criminology that would ensure critical or radical change making. For example, James Q. Wilson, author and advocate of Broken Windows theory, and Ronald Clarke and Marcus Felson, authors of Routine Activities Theory, are identified as successful public criminologists (Tonry, 2010). These individuals have used their scholarship, theory and empirical work, to change policy and inform the public. They have successfully inserted their ideas in to the public realm and helped shape public perception of what crime is and what the response to crime should be. The criteria for being a public criminologist includes engaging the public, it does not include a commitment to doing so from a critical perspective. In order to be acceptable for those working from a feminist or other critical standpoint public criminology must be committed to making not only to social change but to social justice. Snider reminds us that making change is not difficult, but rather that the difficult task is “making change that matters to disempowered, marginalized people, change that provides tools they can use to lessen oppression, challenge repressions, and change the relations of power” (2006: 323). Feminism alerts us to the importance of power relations in how we think about and practice public criminology and how it is received. In this way it can both help identify some of the limits of the current public criminology conversation and offer some ideas for practicing a critical approach to change.
Public criminology is defined differently by different authors but a general tendency in this literature, as Sparks and Loader (2010) point out, is to import Michael Burawoy’s (2005) schema of types of sociology and sociologists. He identified four types of sociology: professional, critical, policy and public. Professional sociology is at the centre of the discipline; it provides the methods, research questions, and major findings and theories of sociology. Critical sociology interrogates the foundations of professional sociology. Both of these are directed towards an academic audience. Public and policy sociology are done for extra academic audiences; policy sociology is done at the behest of a specific client while public sociology is done in order to create a conversation with the public (Burawoy, 2005). Uggen and Inderbitzin (2010) utilize this schema and describe public criminology as helping to “evaluate and reframe cultural images of crime, criminals and justice by conducting research in dialogue with communities and in disseminating knowledge about crime and punishment” (733). Although they note the research role of the public criminologists, the most highlighted task of pubic criminology is translation and dissemination of professional criminological scholarship. Though some who use Burawoy’s schema, such as Uggen and Inderbitzen (2010), recognize the limits of such rigid distinctions, they continue to bring Burawoy’s work into the public criminology conversation. Newsmaking criminology outlines a slightly different role for criminologists; while the goal is still to bring knowledge to the public, Barak calls upon her to take a side (Barak, 2007). The newsmaking criminologist should “interpret, influence or shape the representation of ‘newsworthy’ items about crime and justice” (Barak, 2007: 191-2). This conceptualization of public criminology, particularly the use of Burawoy’s schema but also Barak’s identification of a discrete type of criminology that is newsmaking, limits the transformative potential of this type of work. Feminist theory contains a number of concepts that could enable the more critical practice of public criminology.
An alternative way of thinking about change making, one that addresses power relations, is Patricia Hill Collins concept of intellectual activism. Collins describes intellectual activism as “the myriad ways that people place the power of their ideas in service to social justice” (2013, ix). From the beginning this is an approach which is committed not only to social change of any type as public criminology is, but to social justice and transformative change. Although Collins notes that the mechanisms with which to do this are broad, ranging from creating poetry and other arts based mechanisms, to writing social theory, to practicing critical teaching. She argues that “because ideas and politics are everywhere, the potential for intellectual activism is also possible everywhere” (Collins, 2013, xii). This allows for opportunities for making change through scholarship, be it theoretical, policy oriented, critical or clearly public. It does not hierarchize these types of work or any aspect of the academic endeavour, be it teaching, service, or research. Collins (2013) also provides two broad strategies for engaging in this work: Speaking truth to power, in which we challenge the foundations of existing power relations; and Speaking truth to the people, or bringing our ideas to people who are unlikely to be exposed to them. Whether speaking truth to power or to people Collins argues scholars must be attuned to their own social positioning and how it affects the scholarship they produce. It is important to incorporate an intersectional analysis, one that looks beyond the author’s own identity to account for intersecting structures of oppression. Failure to do so can result in the erasure of some groups’ experience and the construction of policy that neglects or harms some groups of people, as Crenshaw illustrates with the example of violence against women of colour (Crenshaw, 1991). When entering into a conversation with different publics it is crucial that academics be attentive to different identities and social positions.
Public criminology, both as a label and as a literature, sets up a binary: academic work is either public (or newsmaking criminology) or some other version of criminology. This binary is not simply describing two different types of work; instead it is similar to the private/public dichotomy in that it “is best understood as a discursive phenomenon that, once established, can be used to characterize, categorize, organize, and contrast virtually any kind of social fact: spaces, institutions, bodies, groups” (Gal 2004, 264). Naming it public criminology is a discursive move, used to categorize and contrast different types of knowledge and knowledge work. If public criminology is engaged, political, pragmatic and accessible then other criminologies are detached, objective, and aloof. Not only does this set up a binary, it creates a hierarchy based on traditional markers of scientific thought that excludes alternative ways of producing knowledge.
The use of this binary rests on a problematic epistemological assumption that ignores the power inherent in the production of knowledge. It assumes the possibility that you can have detached, objective, non-political knowledge. This is an assumption that underlies much public criminology work. Turner (2013) identifies this position as “fighting for truth” and outlines the positivistic assumptions underlying it, arguing that the “normative ideal implied in the ‘fighting for truth’ perspective on criminology’s public role is that criminology can, and should, be an objective, scientific pursuit that provides conclusive ‘truth’ about crime and criminality” (152). This is a position that has been consistently critiqued by feminist theorists. Creese, McLaren and Pulkingham (2009) argue that feminism has always been shaped by the fundamental assumption that because all knowledge is socially situated, all knowledge is political. Standpoint feminism has long argued that the identity of the producer of knowledge matters (Smith, 1987; 1990). The idea that we can have scholarship that has no political allegiance and comes from no particular position has been critiqued for substituting an idealized liberal and largely masculinist or androcentric perspective, in lieu of material and situated perspectives. In this sense, because it is seen as general and non-specific it is a view from nowhere (Haraway 1988). Alternatively, feminists have long struggled to identify their research as offering a situated knowledge, and thus one that is partial and subjective. This reification of objective knowledge is both inherent in the binary but also stated outright by many advocating for public criminology. Rock (2010), for example, argues that the criminologist should be “the disinterested observer” (757) who simply seeks to understand, not take sides.
Often the practice of public criminology, particularly when engaging with media, pushes us to present our knowledge as objective. Rather than encourage the presentation of partial and situated knowledge, “public interlocutors–be they lawyers, journalists, politicians, or citizens–demand that sociologists tell them the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth” (Stacey 2004, 138). In order to be a credible expert one must present her or his knowledge as the truth. Uggen and Inderbitzin (2010) argue that “it becomes the responsibility of public criminologists to translate their findings and their science into terms that the public and the press can interpret and understand easily” (729). Science, in the public realm and in much of the public criminology literature, is understood to be positivist and objective (Stacey 2004), meaning that scholars risk feeding this misperception through participation in traditional forms of public criminology.
Collins’s work on black feminist thought and epistemology remain at the heart of her intellectual activism. Collins outlines the contrasting epistemological standards between positivist and black feminist approaches: distance between the knowing subject and known object, the absence of emotion, removal of ethics and values from the research process and adversarial debate versus lived experience as a way of knowing, an ethic of care, personal accountability, and dialogue (Collins, 2000). The overarching difference between the two perspectives is the attention paid to social position and power. This is not to say that in order to engage in intellectual activism one must be working from a black feminist standpoint, instead “the significance of a Black feminist epistemology may lie in its ability to enrich our understanding of how subordinate groups create knowledge that fosters both their empowerment and social justice” (Collins, 2000: 269). By setting up academic work as objective the public criminology literature denies these different standpoints and legitimates only dominant and potentially normative standpoints, epistemologies and truths. Not only has Collins spent years developing a black feminist standpoint but she insists that all intellectuals think through their positioning, how it affects their intellectual work and how it affects the truths that they create. Paying heed to this epistemological critique can assist us in ensuring our work does not reproduce dominant and oppressive relationships or positions. Public criminologists must pay attention to where they are situated and must also pay heed to whom they are trying to address.
One of the weakest aspects of the public criminology literature is its cursory conceptualization of who or what constitutes “the public”. In many cases the idea of the public is left entirely undefined (Barak, 2007; Loader & Sparks, 2010, 2011; Uggen & Inderbitzin, 2010). In some cases quotations are used when talking about “the public,” suggesting that this is not a self-evident concept, but no elaboration is given (Carrabin, Lee & South, 2000; Feilzer, 2009). Currie (2007) alludes to a definition when listing those with whom researchers should engage. His public includes “policy makers, journalists, the general public, community leader and non profit organizations” (Currie, 2007: 187). Kramer (2009) uses Burawoy’s work to define the public as “people who are themselves involved in a conversation” (Burawoy 2007: 28). Throughout the public criminology “the public” is presented as needing no or very little definitional work.
This is a serious limitation of public criminology when it comes to its ability to foster transformative change. The public is sometimes referred to as a space, “the public arena” (Currie, 2007) or “the public sphere” (Barak, 2007), which feminist theorists have shown to be exclusive in nature. Historically the public sphere is a masculine one, where men and their activities reside in contrast to the feminine private sphere (Benhabib 1992; Fraser 1989). Similarly, Fraser (1989) argues the role of citizen is an inherently masculine role. In Canada we must also consider the classed and racialized nature of citizenship, where the western citizen is white and middle class (Razack 2002). Because citizenship is conceptualized in this way, the public sphere and the conversation there is based on norms and meanings that are particular to that citizen and their situated and privileged experiences (Fraser 1989). Thus when scholars enter the public sphere and engage in dialogue with citizens they run the real risk of only engaging with those people who have been marked as citizens and of bolstering a privileged subject position at the direct expense of marginalized others.
The boundaries of the public sphere are not natural or obvious; rather, they are discursively and materially built (Fraser 1989). Where do public criminologists place the boundaries around public space and what types of work do those boundaries allow for? In order to address the large traditional public sphere, public criminology would be limited to newsmaking criminology or other forms that ensure our work would be accessible to the broader public sphere. In retaining the traditional boundaries to their work, scholars reinforce those boundaries. Feminist scholars have also pointed to the malleability of the boundaries between public and private (Gal 2004). Feminist criminologists in particular have worked tirelessly to redraw those boundaries so that intimate partner violence, sexual assault and sexuality are pulled into the public sphere. If scholars retain the traditional borders they risk losing sight of a host of activities, injustices and crimes. Yet it may not be enough to simply redraw the boundaries as Fraser (1989) argues, in order to achieve emancipatory social outcomes we must transform “the content, character, boundaries and relations of the spheres of life” (137). Feminist work has shown the difficulty in achieving justice for gendered violence in a public sphere which maintains traditional ideas about sexuality and still sees the reasonable person as male (Naffine 1987; Smart 1995). This illustrates the problem of redrawing the boundaries without fundamentally changing the content of the public and private. Critical scholars should not be content to enter the public sphere without challenging its make up and assumptions.
In the public criminology literature the public is most often considered a group. We are bringing our work “back to the people” (Carrabine, Lee & South, 2000) by explaining our work to the public (Uggen & Inderbitzin, 2010). Even before critically examining the idea of the general public, this conception is limiting for scholars. If the entire Canadian population makes up the public we cannot possibly engage interactively with them, we must simply transmit knowledge in the most uniform manner possible. If we use the idea of the general public we are limited to forms of engagement wherein the general public is a passive recipient of our expert knowledge.
As I have already argued, not every Canadian citizen constitutes the group known as the public. There is an assumption here that Canadian society has one, democratic public that we all participate in equally. Feminist scholars have consistently found that to be false. Instead the public has been made up of primarily economically and racially privileged men (Fraser 1990). If, as critical scholars, we wish to challenge social inequality rather than reinforce it we would be better served to work with counterpublics. Fraser (1990) argues that throughout history there is evidence of oppressed groups coming together to form subaltern counterpublics, which are “parallel discursive arenas where members of subordinated social groups invent and circulate counter discourses, which in turn permit them to formulate oppositional interpretations of their identities, interests, and needs” (67). As critical scholars committed to social justice these are publics with which we should be engaging. When we do so our strategies for engagement must become more interactive as we work with counterpublics and bring their knowledge into our criminological work. This is not to exclude work with more traditional publics but to point to how counterpublic groups are hidden and silenced when “the public” remains undefined.
There are a number of assumptions about the position of the academic in relation to the public. For example, there is an assumption that academics do not already belong to an identifiable public, that they did not come to the academy as a way to serve that public, or that they do not take their work to their public on a daily basis. When discussing public sociology scholars of colour and working class academics described their connection to their communities as a given (Sprague & Laube 2009). This connection was not something they chose to establish; instead it was a constant in their academic life. The assumption that we can choose to engage with different publics and do not have established ties problematically reinforces the idea of a view and the academic from nowhere.
A related but different assumption is that the privilege accorded to academics will be enough to overcome markers of marginalization, allowing us sufficient credibility to “the public.” Or that the positioning of the academic will allow them to engage with any public they choose. Can I engage with any public and be a credible expert? As a young woman and academic my entry in to the general public is marked in ways that typically do not lend themselves to denoting expert status. However, am I seen as more credible than the actual groups with which I am working? There is a risk that those of us who are working with marginalized groups of which we are not a part begin to speak for those groups. Our privilege will mean that we are taken more seriously and our voices will be the ones invited to speak to the media or in other public forums while the voices of the marginalized continue to be silenced. Alcoff (1990) argues that while it may not be politically effective to completely abandon the practice of speaking for those less privileged it must be done thoughtfully as it can increase the oppression of the group that is spoken for. The problem with these assumptions, and the main problem with the public criminology literature is the erasure of power and power relations that takes place therein. We are not all equally powerful as publics or as academics.
The rigid distinction between public criminology and Buraway’s other three types limits criminology as a discipline. It forces our criminological work to remain untouched by the public by setting up a unidirectional flow of information and influence. Certainly in the public sociology literature, where the professional sociologist does the theoretical and analytic work of sociology and the public sociologist acts as a translator of that work and a messenger of it to different audiences, information can only flow from the discipline down to the public. If public criminology deals with the public then professional, critical and policy criminology does not. This means that we bring our knowledge to the public, but we never bring their knowledge, understandings, concerns, and strategies back to the discipline of criminology. This is not to suggest that academics should uncritically adopt public discourse as their own, but that they engage in dialogue rather than act as translators or messengers. The unidirectional transmission of knowledge implied in the public criminology literature limits its research and theoretical capabilities.
It also leads to problematic relationships between the public and scholars. Academics, working within the institutional constraints of universities and publishing industries, only allow the public access to and use of their work on terms dictated by that context. What power relations are sustained and bolstered here? The academy remains a privileged site, but does this mean that academics, the privileged, only bring their knowledge down to the less privileged public? If this is the case, then academics also bring their solutions to the problems of others (Acker 2005) rather than working with marginalized communities to generate materially situated and grassroots solutions.
Collins’ approach is an intersectional one that is attentive to issues of power and belonging. Intellectual activism must therefore be an interactive process. Collins (2013) highlights the value and importance of engaging in “a public conversation of knowledge construction” (xix) rather than bringing knowledge to a passive public audience. Attention to power relations is central to the idea of intellectual activism; Collins (2013) argues that “by sharpening our focus on power and developing tools that enable us to see how its domains are organized and can be changed, our engaged scholarship creates space for change” (76). Collins’ discussion of intellectual activism is always attuned to power differentials and one of her main points is to break down the binary between scholarship and activism. Rather than taking our cue from Buroway and the public sociology literature, a better frame for change making and social justice is intellectual activism. Utilizing a feminist approach such as Collins’ can help us remain vigilant about the power relations of public engagement.
Feminist reflections on media engagement, the main practice advocated by public criminology, illustrate these power issues. Feminists have many cautionary tales to share about this form of public engagement. Crocker (2010) analyses the media frenzy that took place around the Dating Violence on Campus study in the 1990s. This survey used a broad definition of abuse, including any “intentional physical, sexual, or psychological assault” on a woman by a male dating partner (Crocker, 2010) resulting in 81% of survey respondents reporting at least one form of abuse. The media frequently reported these results alongside scathing critiques of the definition of abuse and the measures used in the survey. Rather than raising the public’s consciousness regarding the prevalence of violence against women this survey provided the media with an opportunity to dismiss feminist concerns as a moral panic.
A final caution from feminism is the recognition that scholars operate in institutional contexts that do not necessarily support public types of work. Feminist scholars have argued that no matter what type of public work scholars may wish to engage in, there are institutional barriers to doing so within academia (Sprague & Laube 2009). Graduate training, as currently structured, often impedes public work by focusing solely on basic research and training students to write and speak in a prescribed academic style at the expense of skills needed for public engagement. Feminists have pointed out the lack of prestige awarded to public work; if on a curriculum vitae at all, it occupies a more marginal position, which can be a problem for those looking to secure an academic position or who are working towards tenure (Mopas & Moore 2012). This is not an observation made by feminists alone. Currie (2007) identifies the privileging of original empirical research, the low status given to reports or trade publications, and disciplinary isolation as impeding the practice of public criminology. The problems of institutional recognition and support, however, may be heightened for scholars working from alternative and/or critical perspectives. These are institutional issues that cannot be ameliorated through individual action alone. Rather, these concerns are part of the broader context of knowledge production and the power relations therein.
In order to practice a public criminology that is transformative and radical we cannot accept the literature as currently formulated. A feminist analysis of public criminology reveals a glossing over of the many power relations that are present in the production of scholarship, engagement with the public and reception of our ideas. Transformation change making is an integral goal of feminism and we can build a more critical and transformative public criminology by addressing and incorporating some of these criticisms and suggestions.
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Uggen, Christopher, and Michelle Inderbitzin. 2010. “Public Criminologies.” Criminology & Public Policy, 9(4): 725-49.
1 Examples include the de-gendering of the language around violence against women to partner or family violence and mandatory arrest laws which saw increasing numbers of women arrested alongside the men who abused them.
2 They also detail their successful strategy of engaging directly, more as activists than experts, with the community at a vigil held at the university. This supports the contention that we need to conceptualize the change making work we do more broadly as intellectual activism.