Engendering Policewomen’s Interests and Identities

Abstract

From the inception of the first women’s police station, feminists in São Paulo have been challenging the legal ideology of neutrality and the masculinist police culture. They maintain that the work of the women’s police stations must be informed by the women’s movement. Feminists have further demanded from the state that policewomen receive gender-based training. But are policewomen interested in this type of training? Do they favor continuous contact with feminists? How have policewomen related to feminists and feminism since the creation of the first women’s police station in 1985? Have their gender identities and interests as women and police officers been influenced by feminists?

During the first days of work, journalists would ask me: “Are you a feminist?” I would reply assertively: “No, I’m not. I’m a police officer?” I feared the sound of the word “feminist.”

—Delegada Rosmary Corrêa (Interview, São Paulo, June 16, 1994).