British Journal of Criminology Advance Access originally published online on June 14, 2005
British Journal of Criminology 2006 46(2):212-233; doi:10.1093/bjc/azi056
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The British Journal of Criminology 46:212-233 (2006)
© The Author 2005. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Centre for Crime and Justice Studies (ISTD). All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oupjournals.org
Durkheim’s Latent Theory of Gender and Homicide
* Department of Criminal Justice, University of North Dakota, Grand Forks, ND 58202–8050, USA; email: bruce_dicristina{at}und.nodak.edu.
Emile Durkheim usually neglected gender differences in his discussions of law, punishment and crime, but he did provide a few noteworthy comments on the relationship between gender and homicide. He argued that women commit more intentional homicides than is commonly acknowledged, and he offered a partial explanation of why women, nonetheless, tend to commit fewer homicides than men. In this article, I examine Durkheim’s comments on the gender/homicide relationship and explore the ‘conservatism’ of his viewpoint on gender. While some of his comments certainly are controversial and empirically questionable, they are significant in that they provide greater insight into early criminological thought on gender and crime. They also help clarify the scope and content of Durkheim’s overall criminological perspective. Among other things, they indicate that the variables of gender and opportunity have a noteworthy place within his perspective, and that the importance he attributes to anomie as a causal factor has been exaggerated by the literature of criminology.