“I’m Going to be Successful Someday”: Women’s Personal Projects to Improve Their Lives, and Implications for Clarifying the Nature of Agency in Criminological Theories of Desistance

• DOI: 10.1177/15570851211064831
• Author: Kayla M. Hoskins
• Date: 01 April 2022
• Published date: 01 April 2022
• Subject Matter: Articles

Article

Feminist Criminology

2022, Vol. 17(2) 185–205

© The Author(s) 2022

Article reuse guidelines:

sagepub.com/journals-permissions

DOI: 10.1177/15570851211064831

journals.sagepub.com/home/fcx

“I’m Going to be Successful

Someday”: Women’s

Personal Projects to Improve

Their Lives, and Implications

for Clarifying the Nature of

Agency in Criminological

Theories of Desistance

Kayla M. Hoskins

1



Abstract

Women’s agency to construct prosocial lives remains understudied in criminology.

This qualitative inquiry explores the nature and outcomes of women’s personal

projects, which reflect their agency. In up to five interviews, 401 women on probation

and parole explained efforts to improve their lives. Psychological theory on personal

projects guided analysis that revealed information on project meaning and facilitators

and barriers to project pursuit. Women shared a motivation to avoid trouble and

establish prosocial lives. Outcomes were improved by social support and prosocial

opportunities. Findings have implications for defining and analyzing agency in desistance

research and for correctional responses to women.

Keywords

women’s desistance, agency, community corrections, probation, parole, qualitative

research

1

Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI, USA

Corresponding Author:

Kayla M. Hoskins, School of Criminal Justice, Michigan State University, 655 Auditorium Road, East Lansing,

MI 48824, USA.

Email: hoskin25@msu.edu

Although there is no universal definition of personal agency in desistance research, the

present study conceptualizes agency as an individual’s power to exercise control the

course of their lives, within specific contextual constraints (see Bottoms, 2006;

Giordano et al., 2002;Paternoster & Pogarsky, 2009). Criminological desistance

theories have been criticized for considering context but not personal agency (Maruna,

2001;Paternoster et al., 2015), and this deficit is especially true for research on women.

Although court-involved women have been historically been framed as victims lacking

agency, feminist criminologists emphasize the importance of women’s agency and

caution that viewing women’s crime primarily through the lens of victimization

minimizes agency and responsibility (Daly, 1992;2010;Maher, 1997). Feminist re-

searchers take a critical approach in studying women’s unique experiences, including

opportunities for change and sociostructural constraints on agency (Daly, 2010). For

instance, in agreement with research documenting women’s high prevalence of

traumatic experiences and the significance of relationships on women’s well-being

(Covington, 1998;Covington & Surrey, 2000;Hoskins & Morash, 2020;Jordan,

1991), Kruttschnitt and Kang (2019) explored narratives of 95 persisters, and found that

women’s agency was influenced by trauma and interpersonal relationships. These

findings signal the importance of internal and situational influences on women’s agency

to persist or desist from crime. However, most existing desistance theories were es-

tablished from analyses with primarily or entirely male samples and fall short in

accounting for agency throughout the desistance process.

To address these deficits, the aims of the present study are twofold: First, it builds on

knowledge of court-involved women’s agency by exploring the nature of women’s

agentic efforts to avoid illegal behavior and improve their lives, including facilitators,

barriers, and outcomes of their agentic efforts. Second, it integrates psychological

theory on personal projects (which reflect agency) to the study of desistance as a novel

solution for defining agency and clarifying how agency functions throughout the

desistance process (Little, 1983).

The Obscurity of Agency in Desistance Theory and Research

Desistance theories consider agency to a greater or lesser extent. Rational choice

theories have been criticized for minimizing agency (Paternoster et al., 2015). In their

identity theory of desistance, Paternoster and Bushway (2009) contend that desistance

is initiated when one sees lawbreaking as “more costly than beneficial,”and desists to

avoid a future “feared self”(Paternoster et al., 2015, pp. 214; Paternoster & Bushway,

2009). They acknowledge that agency is reflexive and intentional (Paternoster et al.,

2015), but do not explain it in the desistance process beyond the initial decision to

desist. Moreover, rational choice perspectives fail to account for sociostructural

constraints on agency (Weaver, 2019). In contrast, the age-graded theory of informal

social control explains that “desistance by default”occurs with sociostructural “turning

points”in the life course (e.g., employment and marriage), which alter one’s choices

and behaviors (Laub & Sampson, 2014, pp. 547). The theorists posit that desistance is

186 Feminist Criminology 17(2)