This article outlines the features of penal populism, emphasizing its impact on criminal justice dynamics.
A populist fever appears to be spreading through several Western democracies. Focusing more specifically on its inflection within the field of criminal justice, this article outlines the defining features of a populist penal approach. It explores how appeals to the popular will are mobilized and manipulated, how expert knowledge and criminological evidence are selectively ignored or dismissed, and how victims’ rights discourses are strategically instrumentalize. In their interplay, these dynamics compose the blueprint of penal populism.
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Alexandre Audesse (2026) studied this question.
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