An enduring sovereign mode of punishment: Post-dictatorial penal policies in Spain

Abstract

When analysing the features of the Spanish criminal justice system from the perspective of the late-democratisation of the Spanish polity, the system's evolution is characterised by an almost uninterrupted penal expansionism and a relatively prominent level of severity. This paper examines those features from the viewpoints of the legal reforms, institutional practices and collective perceptions and expectations experienced since the end of the dictatorial period. In addition, the article explores some reasons which may explain the relatively high punitiveness of the Spanish criminal justice system, before adding a coda on the changes of the penal system fostered by the Great Recession.

Transformaciones en las formas de ejercicio del poder penal en España en el siglo xxi: el caso de los Módulos de Respeto

“…Sobre este punto, conviene mencionar el hecho de que la propia participación en los MdR se asienta sobre el principio de voluntariedad y, por tanto, sobre la idea de que el individuo es libre de escoger entre varias opciones. Este principio de libertad de elegir y de voluntariedad se simboliza en la firma de un contrato entre la institución y la persona privada de libertad mediante el cual se manifiesta la voluntad de participar en el módulo y, en consecuencia, de acatar el conjunto de normas que ello conlleva (Ballesteros, 2017a(Ballesteros, , 2018Brandariz, 2018). Conviene apuntar, en este aspecto, el cuestionamiento que de este principio se hace en el caso de las mujeres presas, como resultado de la generalización de los MdR especialmente en las prisiones con un solo módulo de mujeres, con lo que ello supone de eliminación del principio participación voluntaria (Ballesteros, 2017a).…”

Penal populism: Negotiating the feminist agenda. Evidence from Spain and Poland

“…6 According to Tapio Lappi-Seppälä (2008: 355), social inequality is also a substantial risk factor for punitive penal policies. And finally, following democratic transition, both countries experienced similar penal policy developments -a combination of relatively low crimes rates and prison population increases (Brandariz-Garcia, 2018;Krajewski, 2013). 7 Nevertheless, although these factors may all be useful in explaining the punitiveness of penal regimes, they appear irrelevant in explaining the penal populist agenda and the reasons why VAW is not on it in Poland.…”

La represión de las <em>masas</em>. La prensa y la securitización del disenso juvenil en España

“…Many social movements in Spain and in other countries condemn what is perceived as a gradual restriction against the development of citizen mobilisation that materializes in the form of these soft repression mechanisms. These include not only the very effective administrative fines and bureaucratic impediments to mobilisation (Comisión Legal Sol, 2015; Oliver and Urda, 2015: 77-78); perhaps more daringly, soft repression relates also to the articulation of a generalised environment that is hostile to activism, expressed in excessive surveillance and monitoring, the implementation of new techniques of 'crowd' control, and also in the promotion of a culture of fear and insecurity (Brandariz, 2018).…”