According to Hagan, Simpson, and Gillis (1987), boys have more freedom than girls to act as they wish in society, and both boys and girls in the highest socioeconomic classes have the most freedom to do what they please. True
Power-control theory (Hagan, Gillis, and Simpson 1985; Hagan et al. 1987) is predicated on the notion that occupational authority is associated with parental socialization and supervision patterns in rearing boys and girls, resulting in differences in the gender gap for relatively minor forms of delinquent behavior. According to Hagan and colleagues, the positions of the father and mother in the labor force are reflected in the child-rearing practices at home, creating what Hagan and colleagues refer to as an unbalanced or balanced family form. In unbalanced families, which are seen as patriarchal in nature, the father’s occupational and corresponding authority in the family eclipses the mother’s authority. Unbalanced families also include the traditional arrangement of the father being employed in the traditional labor market while the mother is not. In such households, mothers, who are charged with the primary socialization and control of the children, are apt to produce daughters who are like themselves—they are socialized into adherence to feminine, submissive roles that emphasize control and being risk aversive. Boys, on the other hand, are socialized to be like their fathers—to reproduce the male position of authority and (relevant to delinquent propensities) to take risks. Although mothers in such unbalanced homes are the primary “instruments of control” in that they exert primary control over children, it is actually the daughters who are subjected to greater controls and constraints on their lives than the sons. These socialization and social control differences generate predictions of relatively great gender differences in delinquent activity.
Segregation. The Supreme Court's decision in Plessy v. Ferguson (1896) upheld state-mandated discrimination in public transportation under the "separate but equal" doctrine.
