Concepts and conditions of penal moderation: Penal policy, public philosophy, and political ideologies. Theoretical reflections from Italy (2010–2018)

This article analyses the meaning and conditions of penal moderation, conceptualizing it as a spectrum between non-punitiveness and a public penal philosophy. It explores two examples of Italian penal policy—the decarceration provisions of 2010–2015, and the Stati Generali sull’Esecuzione Penale and 2017 Orlando Law—elaborating upon them to enrich the theoretical debate on penal parsimony and its relationship to democratic politics. The article explores the implications of ‘democratic disfigurements’ for penal moderation, explaining how they can stimulate short-term forms of non-punitiveness but militate against moderation as a public philosophy. It also discusses whether the ascendancy of these ‘democratic disfigurements’ signals an impoverishment of contemporary western politics that casts doubt on the possibility of a ‘better politics of crime’ in the absence of ‘better politics’.