Gender equity approach to policing in Kenya: Lessons, challenges and prospects

Despite ample evidence of women's value, ensuring gender equity–equality is a major challenge for police departments worldwide. Using survey data gathered from a sample of 455 male and female police officers in the Kenya Police Service, this study examines the non-western plights of women in policing and describes a theory change to formulate gender-equity strategies for improved recruitment and retention of women in police service. Findings indicate that women officers can undertake most tasks better than or to the same degree as men, except for a small proportion of line duties, mirroring the literature on women in policing internationally. However, family commitments, an emphasis on physical strength for promotion, performance based on male standards, and male supervisors’ attitudes present severe challenges for women in the police service, reflecting the organizational climate and prevailing cultural norms. Implications for theory, policy and research are discussed.

Negotiating Gender and Police Culture: Exploring the Barriers to Retention and Progression of Female Police Officers in New Zealand

<p>Women officers represent a minority within the New Zealand Police (Police) particularly within the senior ranks. In recent years, Police have made concerted efforts to increase women’s representation as well as improve the working environment. However, recent reviews of the 2007 Commission of Inquiry into Police Conduct have reported that women continue to face barriers to full integration and furthermore, that the changes to the police culture have reached a plateau. New Zealand and international research have established that police culture continues to pose a barrier to women’s full acceptance within policing. This culture is characterised by predominantly white, heterosexual males, who form what has been described as a “cult of masculinity”. Therefore, women find they must adopt the culture in order to “fit in” and be accepted as “one of the boys”. Adopting a qualitative framework, this research involved semi-structured face-to-face interviews with sworn female police officers. Exploring female police officers’ experiences identified five pertinent barriers to women’s retention and progression. These were the emphasis on physical skills and excitement, the police camaraderie and the cult of masculinity, sexual harassment within the workplace, women’s minority status, and balancing motherhood with policing. It was found that the persistence of these barriers came back to core features of police culture. Due to the strong allegiance to the positive aspects of the police culture, such as the camaraderie, negative features such as sexual banter and harassment were subsumed within the wider culture. Negative features were tolerated and accepted as part and parcel of working in the Police. Women’s narratives demonstrated that they adhered to core police culture features and thus contributed to the sustenance of the culture. Furthermore, how women articulated their experiences and perceptions of barriers was complex and nuanced. Many held the belief that there were no longer any barriers for women in the Police, yet such positive views were in contradiction with their own experiences. The tension between “perceptions” and “reality” creates a situation where the Police currently sit at a crossroads between the “old” culture and the new rhetoric of “change”.</p>

Negotiating Gender and Police Culture: Exploring the Barriers to Retention and Progression of Female Police Officers in New Zealand

<p>Women officers represent a minority within the New Zealand Police (Police) particularly within the senior ranks. In recent years, Police have made concerted efforts to increase women’s representation as well as improve the working environment. However, recent reviews of the 2007 Commission of Inquiry into Police Conduct have reported that women continue to face barriers to full integration and furthermore, that the changes to the police culture have reached a plateau. New Zealand and international research have established that police culture continues to pose a barrier to women’s full acceptance within policing. This culture is characterised by predominantly white, heterosexual males, who form what has been described as a “cult of masculinity”. Therefore, women find they must adopt the culture in order to “fit in” and be accepted as “one of the boys”. Adopting a qualitative framework, this research involved semi-structured face-to-face interviews with sworn female police officers. Exploring female police officers’ experiences identified five pertinent barriers to women’s retention and progression. These were the emphasis on physical skills and excitement, the police camaraderie and the cult of masculinity, sexual harassment within the workplace, women’s minority status, and balancing motherhood with policing. It was found that the persistence of these barriers came back to core features of police culture. Due to the strong allegiance to the positive aspects of the police culture, such as the camaraderie, negative features such as sexual banter and harassment were subsumed within the wider culture. Negative features were tolerated and accepted as part and parcel of working in the Police. Women’s narratives demonstrated that they adhered to core police culture features and thus contributed to the sustenance of the culture. Furthermore, how women articulated their experiences and perceptions of barriers was complex and nuanced. Many held the belief that there were no longer any barriers for women in the Police, yet such positive views were in contradiction with their own experiences. The tension between “perceptions” and “reality” creates a situation where the Police currently sit at a crossroads between the “old” culture and the new rhetoric of “change”.</p>

Addressing the Trajectory of Cultural and Gender Discrimination among Marine Women Officers

Seafaring is openly challenging working circumstances for females. For the last twenty-two years, females in western countries have been interested in joining the fleet, but as the captaincy roles aboard, their numbers are minimal compared to other jobs. In every working place, females always face many unusual problems, which are more in seafaring. The manuscript derives the discrimination factors of marine women officers (MWOs) onboard due to cultural (or racial) or being a woman using the experiences of 149 women officers from 18 different countries. Two experiences such as onboard discrimination due to cultural reasons (DDCR) and not being promoted in the company as being women (NPCW) for MWOs are considered the responses in the present study. It was found out that mean DDCR is positively associated with age (P=0.0313), nationality (P=0.0047), current position onboard (P=0.1051), while it is negatively associated with cohabitation (P=0.0137) and type of contract (P=0.0719). Variance of DDCR is negatively associated with male companions' support (P=0.1432). Also, mean NPCW is negatively associated with her male companions' support (P<0.0001), while its variance is positively associated with professional qualification (P=0.1317). It was found out herein that MWOs from other nations (except Spanish) at older ages, second class officers, staying single with temporary contracts are highly discriminated against based on cultural (or racial) reasons. In addition, MWOs with higher male companions' support are very rarely promoted in the company.

Exploring Gendered Environments in Policing: Workplace Incivilities and Fit Perceptions in Men and Women Officers

Research indicates that women are still underrepresented in policing and that police culture is not fully accepting of its sisters in blue. As police organizations strive toward building an inclusive workforce, we must understand how women, already in the field, view their place and experiences within their jobs, organizations, and workgroups. Thus, in the current research, we use a comparative sample ( n = 832) of male and female officers to examine perceptions of fit in the job, organization, and workgroup, and how these perceptions relate to reports of workplace incivilities. Findings indicate that women "fit in "with the job and the broader agency, but they are less likely than men to feel they belong within their workgroup. This relationship was partially mediated by workplace incivilities, indicating that women’s experience of subtle forms of discrimination partially explains their lower levels of fit in their workgroup.

Policewomen of color: a state-of-the-art review

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to offer a state-of-the-art review of the research on women of color in American policing. Directions for future research are also highlighted. Design/methodology/approach Using several online databases, a literature search was performed to collect all relevant empirical studies on the topic. The review includes only studies that examined research questions about minority women officers in their own right. Findings The review identified 12 studies focused on recruitment, hiring, retention and the on-the-job experiences of this population. Most studies focused on black policewomen. All data analyzed in these studies are at least 20 years old. Originality/value Research on minorities in policing tends to concentrate on either black men or white women. For decades, scholars have called for more research on policewomen of color, yet little progress has been made. The current study takes stock of the existing research and provides a much-needed agenda to fill this research gap.

Twenty-three women officers’ experiences of policing in England: The same old story or a different story?

Our research project was concerned primarily with using a feminist analysis to explore the lived reality of 23 women police officers in England and Wales. We undertook 23 qualitative interviews with our participants and our research straddles four decades of policing practice, which allowed us to explore changes that were seen to have taken place during this period. First, participants discussed their lived reality, which included banter, bullying and harassment for many. Second, and perhaps more surprisingly, at certain times of unrest, riots or threats, some of our participants were provided with opportunities, for example, during the IRA threat, the riot in Toxteth and the miners’ strike. We suggest that examples from our data capture an early disruption of the ‘ideal’ heroic male police officer that Silvestri examines [Silvestri M (2018) Disrupting the ‘heroic’ male within policing: a case of direct entry. Feminist Criminology 13(3): 309–328] whose removal from their normal role during periods of socio-political disorder allowed women officers to leave the gendered division of labour and undertake the heroic police constable role while the men were busy being ‘heroic’ at the source of threat and unrest. We sought to explore changes such as the uniform as a site of protest for some of our officers who challenged an uncomfortable and unfit uniform in the early days, and explained that there were still problems with the kit and design at times. Our findings illustrated that, on the whole, although massive changes had been made, it was a case of the same old story in terms of sexual harassment and banter for female officers and more was required to address these issues, which fits with reviews and studies in both England and Wales and in Australia. Finally, we noted using participants’ words how much many of these women had enjoyed their role within policing in spite of these challenges.