TESTING THE NEXUS: CRIME, GENDER, AND UNEMPLOYMENT

Endeavours to connect unemployment with crime, to date, have displayed a clear bias: consistently, it has been assumed that the subject is male. This paper argues the sexism of both empirical and theoretical criminology in this area. A close reading of some Australian statistics reveals that prevailing notions about the effect of unemployment on crime are difficult to sustain when female, not male, figures supply the data base. Clearly, it is from male offending, which dominates the form of crime, that criminologists have developed their theories about the antisocial tendencies of persons excluded from the work-force.