“I Think It’s Still a Male-Dominated World”: Detachment Services Assistants’ Perceptions and Experiences of a Gendered Police Organization

• Published date: 01 July 2023
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1177/15570851231153713
• Author: Mark Norman,Rosemary Ricciardelli
• Date: 01 July 2023
• Subject Matter: Articles

Article

Feminist Criminology

2023, Vol. 18(3) 183–204

© The Author(s) 2023

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DOI: 10.1177/15570851231153713

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“I Think It’s Still a

Male-Dominated World”:

Detachment Services

Assistants’Perceptions and

Experiences of a Gendered

Police Organization

Mark Norman

1

and Rosemary Ricciardelli

2



Abstract

Police organizations, typically considered masculine paramilitary organizations, are

employing increasing numbers of women in non-sworn roles. We investigate the

experiences and perceptions of a specif‌ic group of non-sworn personnel, Detachment

Services Assistants (DSAs) working with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, un-

packing their perceptions of a slowly-changing gendered organizational culture. We

analyze how their f‌luid performances of femininities allow them to navigate a gendered

workplace environment that, at times, can marginalize them based on their gender and

occupational status. The study makes a novel contribution to the policing literature on

gender and the role of non-sworn personnel in policing.

Keywords

police, gender, detachment services assistants, public servants, civilianization

1

Health, Aging and Society, McMaster University, Hamilton, ON, Canada

2

School of Marine Studies, Memorial University of Newfoundland, St. John’s, NL, Canada

Corresponding Author:

Rosemary Ricciardelli, School of Maritime Studies, Memorial University of Newfoundland, 155 Ridge Road, St

John’s, NL A1C 5R3, Canada.

Email: rricciardell@mun.ca

Introduction

Police organizations are typically considered masculine paramilitary organizations that

prize and reward displays of toughness, stoicism, and adherence to hierarchical

leadership structures (Boogaard & Roggeband, 2010;Garcia, 2003;Loftus, 2008;

Miller et al., 2003;O’Connor Shelley et al., 2011;Prokos & Padavic, 2002;Rabe-

Hemp, 2008;2009). As police services have increasingly relied on employees who are

not sworn off‌icers (usually, but not always, referred to as “civilian personnel”)to

perform a variety of specialist roles (Crank, 1989;Dick & Metcalfe, 2001;Forst, 2000),

divisions have emerged between these staff and sworn personnel—divisions that, in

Canada at least, are exacerbated by the fact that, in contrast to the male-dominated ranks

of sworn off‌icers, most non-sworn personnel are women (Conor et al., 2020;Murray,

2021;Royal Canadian Mounted Police, 2022). Researchers have examined the ex-

periences of women sworn personnel, including how they perform gender in response

to the masculine organizational culture in which they work (Garcia, 2003;Haarr &

Morash, 2013;Murray, 2021;O’Connor Shelley et al., 2011;Rabe-Hemp, 2008;2009).

However, few studies have considered the relationship between gender and non-sworn

status in the occupational experiences of women working in non-sworn roles in police

services (Boogaard & Roggeband, 2010;Loftus, 2008). In the current study, we address

this lacunae in knowledge by examining the experiences and perceptions of a specif‌ic

group of non-sworn personnel who work with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police

(RCMP): women Detachment Services Assistants (DSAs), who are hired as federal

public servants (rather than civilian members) and perform a wide variety of roles

within RCMP detachments or specialized units in support of police operations. Due to

the fact that DSAs are not categorized as civilian members within the RCMP, in the

current article we identify their employment status as “non-sworn personnel”rather

than “civilian personnel;”however, given the nature of their work and their non-sworn

status, we situate DSAs’occupational duties and statuses within the broader context of

police civilianization.

Our f‌indings highlight how DSAs understand the culture of the RCMP to be

gendered in ways that privilege performances of masculinities by sworn personnel,

while marginalizing the workplace experiences and well-being of women public

servants. Further, we show how DSAs perform femininities in response to these

understandings in their workplace, and the negative workplace experiences it creates

for them, which both reaff‌irm and challenge the gendered organizational culture. We

pay particular attention to DSAs’statements of ambiguity or ambivalence, highlighting

how DSAs describe both a gendered RCMP culture that can be interpreted as harming

some women DSAs and a slow shift within the organization toward more equitable

treatment of women employees: civilian, public servant, and sworn. Few researchers

have studied gender as experienced by non-sworn personnel in police services, and, to

our knowledge, to date none have investigated this topic with public servants within the

RCMP,despi tethese staff being instrumental to the functioning of the organization. As

such, our study offers a unique insight into how women in this occupational group

184 Feminist Criminology 18(3)