Does feminism conflict with progressive critiques of the criminal justice system?

Aaron Freiwald, Managing Partner of Freiwald Law and host of the weekly podcast, Good Law | Bad Law, is joined by author and law professor, Aya Gruber, to discuss her new book, The Feminist War on Crime: The Unexpected Role of Women’s Liberation in Mass Incarceration, as well as the broader issues and trendlines of today.

In today’s episode, Aaron and Aya talk about the issues of gendered crimes and gender justice, law reform and policing, feminist progress, harm and social problems, issues of race, oppression and inequality, crime control, prison abolishment and more. Discussing justice in society, Aya and Aaron question where and how society should apply its resources, the institutions of prisons, punishment in this country, and how these relate to the origins of the criminal justice system.

The Feminist War on Crime documents the failure of the state to combat sexual and domestic violence through law and punishment. Throughout her book and today’s conversation, Aya contends the importance of abandoning conventional feminist wisdom, of fighting violence against women without reinforcing the American prison state, and of using criminalization as a technique of last – not first – resort. Aya asserts that many feminists grapple with the problem of hyper-incarceration in the United States, and yet that commentators on gender crime continue to assert that criminal law is not tough enough. This punitive impulse, Aya explains, is dangerous and counterproductive. Professor Gruber argues that in the quest to secure women’s protection from domestic violence and rape, American feminists have become soldiers in the war on crime by emphasizing white female victimhood, expanding the power of police and prosecutors, touting the problem-solving power of incarceration, and diverting resources toward law enforcement and away from marginalized communities. Throughout today’s discussion, Aya elaborates on these concepts and others.

Professor Gruber received her B.A. in philosophy from U.C. Berkeley and her J.D. from Harvard Law. At Harvard, Aya was an editor on the Harvard Women’s Law Journal as well as the Harvard International Law journal and founded the Interracial Law Students’ Association. After law school, Professor Gruber clerked for U.S. District Court judge James L. King in Miami and then served as a felony trial attorney with the Public Defender Service in Washington, D.C. and the Federal Public Defender in Miami. Aya joined the University of Colorado faculty in 2010. She currently teaches and writes in the areas of criminal law and procedure, critical theory, feminism, and comparative/international law; her scholarship focuses primarily on feminist efforts to strengthen criminal law responses to crimes against women.

To learn more about Aya, please visit her bio page here.

To learn more about Aya’s new book, The Feminist War on Crime: The Unexpected Role of Women’s Liberation in Mass Incarceration, please click here.

Host: Aaron Freiwald

Guest: Aya Gruber

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