Bringing about Penal Climate Change: The Role of Social and Political Trust and of Perceptions about the Aims for Punishment in Lowering the Temperature of Punitiveness

AuthorMari-Liis Sööt, Kadri Rootalu
Pages32-42
32 JURIDICA INTERNATIONAL 25/2017
Mari-Liis Sööt Kadri Rootalu
PhD, Director MA, Lecturer
Analysis Division, Crime Policy Department University of Tartu
Ministry of Justice
Bringing about
Penal Climate Change:
The Role of Social and Political Trust and of Perceptions
about the Aims for Punishment in Lowering
the Temperature of Punitiveness
1. Introduction
The purpose for this article is to analyse factors that are related to the public’s punitiveness. Much of the dis-
cussion is based on data from an Estonian public poll, which makes it a novel contribution in several respects.
With few exceptions*1 most studies on public punitiveness have thus far been conducted in Anglo-American
countries where penal populism is a recognised phenomenon. In Estonia, the social environment is dif‌f erent
and penal policy is rarely used to focus attention in election campaigns. At the same time, the importance of
public opinion in penal policy formulation should not be underestimated. In the penal f‌i eld, public opinion
primarily inf‌l uences policy-making by calling for the adoption of legislation that is tough on crime and for
allocation of further resources to law enforcement. In its milder forms of appearance, public opinion makes
politicians averse to initiatives aimed at softening penal laws. Reactionist provisions that more often than
not represent stop-gap solutions due to panic-provoking events (e.g., a murder case with extensive media
coverage) are a good example of public opinion’s inf‌l uence on penal policy-making. Needless to say, harsh
punishments have not proved an ef‌f ective tool against crime, as harsh measures destabilise society*2.
For many years, Estonia has struggled with high incarceration rates*3 and has searched for avenues to
bring the number of inmates down. Imprisonment rates have been shown to depend more on policy choices
than on actual crime rates*4, which means that reduction of the number of prisoners has to be a deliberate
policy choice, unlikely to be achieved as a side-ef‌f ect of the f‌i ght against crime. Changes in the legislation
concerning parole release have allowed Estonia to reduce the number of prisoners by approximately 1,000
E.g., J.C. Cochran, A.R. Piquero. Exploring sources of punitiveness among German citizens. – Crime & Delinquency 
() / , pp. . – DOI: https://doi.org/./; M.-L. Sööt. Trust and punitive attitudes. –
Crime, Law & Social Change  (), pp. . – DOI: https://doi.org/./s---.
B. Bakken. China, a punitive society? – Asian Criminology (), pp. . – DOI: https://doi.org/./s-
--.
According to the International Centre of Prison Studies (), the country’s prisoner population is  per , inhabi-
tants, one of Europe’s highest. See http://www.prisonstudies.org/country/estonia (most recently accessed on  June ).
P.K. Enns. The public’s increasing punitiveness and its inf‌l uence on mass incarceration in the United States. – American
Journal of Political Science  () / , pp. . – DOI: https://doi.org/./ajps.; T. Lappi-Seppälä.
Trust, punitivity and imprisonment. Presentation at the Eurojustis conference Measuring Conf‌i dence and Public Attitudes
to Justice, held in Parma, Italy, in .
https://doi.org/10.12697/JI.2017.25.04

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