How Much Police, How Much Women? A Queer Perspective on the First Female Police Force in Poland, 1925–39

These were women carefully selected and rigorously trained for an important political role in the newly created nation-state. They were expected to represent it by demonstrating not only the modernity and progressiveness of Poland but also by embodying the nation’s physical beauty. The first Polish policewomen understood that their superiors wanted them to become role models for all Polish women on how to serve their Fatherland. As combating sex work and trafficking was among their central duties, it is evident that they were meant to be both an antidote and the antithesis to what the founder of this police unit called the “women of light conduct.” This paper examines the operational and training documents, visual materials, and personal writings left behind by the Warsaw female vice brigade created in 1925, from gender and queer perspectives, analyzing the discourses that shaped the force. I will discuss the realities of these women’s lives, interrogating how the unit’s creators’ ideas were experienced by those tasked with executing them. While the policewomen represented the state’s authority and enforced the government’s monopoly on violence, they were also expected to remain caring, sensitive, and even delicate. How did these women navigate such conflicting expectations? What were their personal gains once they secured those jobs? Did they also have to accept some losses or compromises in certain spheres of their personal lives? How did they perceive their social role as a female police force, and what did they expect from the state? Finally, when they donned their new, shiny, navy blue uniforms to embark on a street patrol, what kind of gender roles did they desire to perform? After all, they continuously navigated that blurry line between butch and femme gender expressions, oscillating between exerting domination over some men and practicing submission towards others.