Sentencing Policy and Changing Notions of Social Justice

This chapter considers the importance of reflecting social values in the practice of sentencing. It explores this issue in the context of the sentencing policy of England and Wales during the past twenty-five years, focusing on the extent to which social change and value pluralism has damaged the essential connections between penal ideology and sentencing policy. More specifically, it emphasises how the fragmentation of communities and the ensuing breakdown in social cohesion has affected public perceptions of punishment. It also considers how the increasing politicization of penal policy has obfuscated the values justifying state intervention. Thus, the chapter concludes that neo-liberal values have taken priority at the expense of any broader consideration of which social values should inform a more inclusive and socially constructive approach to sentencing. The argument is illustrated by describing how these tensions have impacted the sentencing of so-called ‘irregular’ migrants.

Argument (complex analysis) · Cohesion (chemistry) · Constructive · Criminal justice · Criminology · Epistemology · Ideology · Pluralism (philosophy) · Political science · Politics · Punishment (psychology) · Sociology · Criminal Justice and Corrections Analysis · Law · Psychology · Social Psychology