Date of Award

2022

Degree Type

Open Access Thesis

Document Type

Master Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Science (MS)

Department

Justice Studies

First Advisor

Victoria E. Collins

Department Affiliation

Justice Studies

Second Advisor

William McClanahan

Department Affiliation

Justice Studies

Third Advisor

Kristie R. Blevins

Department Affiliation

Justice Studies

Abstract

While recent decades have seen an expansion of state crime literature, the scholarship has been slow to integrate new criminological perspectives. The field is aware of state-perpetrated harms committed against queer and gender non-conforming individuals, yet there are limited works that explicitly frame the state as a criminal actor. This paper argues for the integration of queer criminology into the field of state crime to elevate harms against the LGBTQ+ community into academic awareness. Case studies demonstrating direct state violence in Russia’s Chechen Republic and indirect state violence against trans women in the United States are included to highlight the state’s role in perpetrating harm. Sexuality and gender identity will be introduced as tools to provide a holistic understanding of the harms that impact the LGBTQ+ community. In addition, the concepts of biopower and necropolitics are used as an analytical framework to demonstrate the ways in which states and their actors decide which populations of people are worthy of life.

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