These programs vary in intent and implementation and are based on the idea that female offenders differ from their male counterparts in their personal histories and pathways to crime.
[7] The history of the contemporary gender-responsiveness movement can be traced back to a selection of works written by Barbara Bloom and Stephanie Covington in the early 2000s.
The rationale behind this stemmed from the fact that female offenders were often economically marginalized, less violent than men, and more likely to experience childhood and adult victimization, substance abuse, and diagnoses of mental illness.
Within gender-responsive programs, abused girls are given the chance to talk about challenges and safety issues, while they are promoting self-cultivation and accepting personal responsibility.
[16] There are a variety of gender-informed assessment tools that aim at providing information about the risk level and needs of women in the criminal justice system.
Gender-responsive tools were created to highlight the most pertinent needs and risk factors faced by women regarding the criminal justice system.
By recognizing and addressing these needs, it is possible to better inform factors like case management, service delivery, release decisions, and condition setting (same NPCR.
[12][13] Moreover, female offenders tend to score higher than men on the family and marital status domain of the Level of Service Inventory.
[23][24] Marital status, alongside poverty, child care, and low support may reinforce female economic marginality and financial dependence on others.
[36] The pathways theory has been evaluated as the unique circumstances that women are involved with, differing from those related to male offenders because of their gender, race, and class that result in criminal activity.
[9] Although it has been reviewed as a series of generalizations and criticized for its dismissal of the complex and heterogeneous circumstances that influence female offenders, Kristy Holtfreter and Katelyn Wattanaporn describe the pathways approach has been widely adopted in the field of criminology and prison reform.
[37] The pathways approach to gender-responsive treatment has been criticized by others in the field of criminology and prison reform, because it classifies female offenders as either victims of trauma, [physical and substance] abuse or mental illness; or as caretakers, mothers, and wives.
It is hypothesized that a multi-dimensional program oriented towards female behaviors is crucial for rehabilitation and a general improvement of all criminal justice phases.
They are as follows: (1) acknowledge that gender makes a difference; (2) create an environment based on safety, dignity and respect; (3) address substance abuse, trauma and mental health issues through comprehensive, integrated, and culturally relevant services and appropriate supervision; (4) develop policies, practices and programs that are relational and promote healthy connections to children, family and significant others; (5) provide women with opportunities to improve their socio-economic conditions; (6) establish a system of community supervision and re-entry with comprehensive, collaborative services.
[38] The study involved a focus group of males and females that measured cognitive skills such as impulsivity, decision-making, interpersonal problem-solving, and influence in others.
In reality, the racialized nature of the prison industrial complex results in relatively high incarceration rates of women of color.
Thus, theory of intersectionality in prison reform highlights the need to become aware of and accommodating to the experiences of oppressed individuals rather than create a punitive system of disproportionate structural disadvantage.
The physical, emotional, and mental separation enacts an intergenerational trauma known as natal alienation, which serves to interrupt the stability of families and their reproduction.
Another potential explanation is, because queer, trans, and gender non-conforming people face stigmatization, they are more likely to experience discrimination and violence that places them proximate to illicit activity and poverty.
Once placed, that person may encounter traumatic experiences from strip searches by a police officer of an alternate gender, or increased rates of rape and assault.
[51] In the fight for Queer & Trans Politics, the Sylvia Rivera Law Project works with people regardless of their racial and gender background in ensuring a discrimination-free environment.
Furthermore, GR penal policies coerce women to adhere to parenting and motherhood ideals belonging to the normative, white middle-class values.
[54] GR penal codes are also argued to be punitive rather than rehabilitative; thus, a possible solution may include collaboration between state institutions as well as the local community.
[9] Studies have shown that women tend to use drugs as a form of self-medication for depression and anxiety, which result from traumatic childhood and adolescent experiences.
Mendoza, a professor at the National Autonomous University, presents how social structures evident within gender-responsive prisons have limited the access and resources women are given in dealing with alcohol addiction.
[56] Gender-responsive treatment (GRT) calls for clinically trained workers to establish a women-focused program where the aim is to facilitate rehabilitation and prevent drug relapse.
Calhoun, Messina, Cartier, and Torres, members of Integrated Substance Abuse Programs (ISAP) at UCLA, discovered that incarcerated women expressed interest in learning the reasons for their drug use, specifically how their familial relationships and childhood traumas impacted their substance abuse, as they feel this allows them to understand and better control the root of their addiction.
[59] Studies have shown that women tend to use drugs as a form of self-medication for depression and anxiety, which result from traumatic childhood and adolescent experiences.
By sanitizing the appearance and rhetoric of the prison, gender-responsiveness programs allow the carceral state to achieve greater sustainability by supporting violence, criminalization, and deportation.
Therefore, abolitionists affirm using transformative justice to reimagine a world that does not support incarceration including surveillance, deportation and detention centers, criminalization, and violence.