Community Orders and the Assessment of Punishment Severity

Cambridge. The 1980s saw an international movement towards the use of desert-based principles in the sentencing of offenders.1 However, attempts in England to accommodate non-custodial penalties within a desert-based sentencing framework have shown that it is far from easy consistently to apply principles of proportionality to a range of community orders which look very different from each other. This paper steps back from the specific English context, which is explored in George Mair's paper in this Issue. Its purpose is to review some of the considerations involved in translating desert theory into practice in relation to non-custodial options, and to examine one particular solution which has been offered.