Politica criminale e scelte sanzionatorie. Per un recupero di razionalità nel confronto con il Sentencing System inglese

This Ph.D. thesis investigates changes on the contemporary shape of penal policies, whose trend fluctuate from a rigid punitiveness, which mostly leads to the increase in term of custodial ranges within the criminal code offences, toward “law and order” campaigns that aim to answer to the social needs of safety; on the other hand, to avoid the consequential ‘overcrowding’, policy makers constantly recall the use of clemency measures. These contradictory sides of the same coin have made the recent years of penal policies deeply irrational, as it is shown by the ‘upward lifting’ on the custodial ranges, specially in light of the proportionality principle. Moreover, it will be verified whether the Italian Sentencing System has itself an ‘immune system’ to counteract the irrationality or it has implemented it through the decision-making process at sentencing, that leads to arbitrary and inconsistent sentences. Those data will be compared with the English Sentencing System and its sentencing guidelines in order to evaluate if and how it can offer to the Italian system some clue for a reform base that could enlighten again the proportionality principle at sentencing. [edited by Author]