While previous research has examined gender disparities in sentencing, most explanations focus on individual-level differences. We argue that structural gender equality has an important influence on gender disparities as well. Drawing from previous research on victimization, we provide a test of the ameliorative and backlash hypotheses. Using federal sentencing data from 1999-2003, we demonstrate how measures of structural gender equality contextualize the relationship between gender and sentencing. Our analyses suggest that structural gender equality is important for understanding the relationship between gender and sentencing, but different measures of gender equality lead to distinct patterns.
