Policing

Policing refers to the enforcement of social norms and expectations through social control. In this context, it does not only mean state police work, but primarily informal control in everyday life, such as comments, exclusion, ridicule, stigmatization, devaluation, threats, or discrimination.

Policing is often directed at people who actually or supposedly transgress norms, for example regarding gender, gender expression, sexual or romantic orientation, bodies, clothing, relationship forms, or sexuality. Gender policing, for instance, can lead to people being sanctioned when they are not perceived as “masculine” or “feminine” enough, or when they do not fit into the gender binary.

Through policing, social orders such as heteronormativity, cisnormativity, the gender binary, or particular ideas of “normal” sexuality are maintained. The term helps describe how norms are stabilized not only through laws, but also through everyday behavior, language, looks, and social expectations.