Blue First and Foremost: Female Descriptive Representation, Rape, and the Justice Gap

Abstract

The degree to which female political actors influence policy is hotly debated in political science. However, relatively little research considers how women’s representation in the police influences policing outcomes. We argue that increasing women’s representation should be associated with increases in rape report rates but should not be associated with changes in rape arrest rates. We expect public perceptions of female police to affect victims’ willingness to report and cooperate with the police, but the masculine, hierarchical, and complex nature of police investigations of rape will make it difficult for those increases in reporting to translate into increases in arrests for those crimes. We leverage unique police administrative data from 1987 to 2016 and find that although women’s representation is associated with increased rape report rates, there is no relationship with rape arrest rates, highlighting an important justice gap. Our article has implications not only for the study of female representation and representative bureaucracy but also provides insights into how descriptive representation may be limited by institutional culture, norms, practices, and procedures.

The Association between the Percentage of Female Law Enforcement Officers and Rape Report, Clearance, and Arrest Rates: A Spatiotemporal Analysis of California

“…These findings on rape reporting are congruent with existing research (Gunderson & Huber, 2022;Meier & Nicholson-Crotty, 2006;A. R. Miller & Segal, 2019), which found that greater female representation in law enforcement is associated with greater rates of rape reporting.…”

“…Rape arrests rates show similar inconsistencies. Meier & Nicholson-Crotty (2006) found a positive association between female officer representation and population rape arrest rate whereas Gunderson & Huber (2022) found no association.…”

“…This theory supports the hypothesis that greater representation of women in law enforcement would be associated with improved rates of rape and sexual assault reporting and clearances. (Gunderson & Huber, 2022;Meier & Nicholson-Crotty, 2006;A. R. Miller & Segal, 2019;Schuck, 2018).…”

“…Past research has largely indicated a positive relationship between female officer representation (as the percentage of officers in a department who are female or ratio of male to female officers) and sexual violence reporting and clearance. Using a national representative sample, a study by Gunderson and Huber (2022) found that female officer representation was associated with increased rape report rates (Gunderson & Huber, 2022). A. R. Miller and Segal (2019) examined violent crimes against women in U.S. metropolitan statistical areas and found that reporting increased when female officer representation increased (A. R. Miller & Segal, 2019).…”

Putting A Fresh Face Forward: Does the Gender of a Police Chief Affect Public Perceptions?

“…6.See Rabe-Hemp (2008), Sun (2007), Schuck and Rabe-Hemp (2005), Ba et al (2021), Shoub et al (2021), Poteyeva and Sun (2009), Gunderson and Huber (2022).…”