Sex Stratification in Criminal Enterprise: Crimes against the Environment

• In Event: 126 - Section on Environment and Technology Paper Session. Open Topic 2

Abstract

Crimes against the environment pose significant threats to human health and the natural world. Studies of who commits such harms, why, and what can prevent these acts is important. We extend such work in law/criminology, white-collar crime, and environmental sociology by focusing on the broad sociological interest in gender stratification. We examine sex segregation in environmental crime conspiracy groups and the gendered division of labor within these crime groups utilizing a unique dataset of 1100+ federally-prosecuted environmental-crime cases, representing the most serious violations since 1985. We address the questions: To what extent have women and men been involved in environmental crime? What similarities and differences were there in women’s and men’s participation in conspiracies to commit crimes against the environment? Results demonstrated that women had very low and often marginalized participation in environmental crime, particularly in white-collar environmental offenses. When women were involved, their culpability tended to be lesser than men’s, they usually occupied lower-ranking organizational positions compared to men’s predominantly executive/management positions, and their pathways to involvement more often involved family members or spouses. Further investigation of gendered opportunity structures in small businesses seems warranted, though, because a substantial share of female environmental offenders were owners/operators.

Authors

• Jennifer Schwartz, Washington State University

• Erik W. Johnson, Washington State University