The gendered labour of desistance: Moving beyond imprisonment and monocultural perspectives

Abstract

This article explores the interplay between desistance and gendered forms of labour in community-based settings across England and Sweden. Building on feminist conceptualisations of women's ‘second shift’, the article draws on qualitative data from three research projects to explore how informal, gendered practices, linked to heteronormative ideals and expectations, feature in women's stories of desistance. Our results show that women provide emotional, practical and financial support for the desistance of partners and male family members in ways that not only reflect but also reproduce broader gendered divisions of unpaid labour. Often, this happens while criminalised women are attempting to desist themselves. Framed through the concept of gendered labour of desistance, the key contribution of the paper is to expose hidden gendered dynamics involved in desistance work and to argue for their inclusion in, and resistance within, desistance theory.