Towards new sentencing and penal decision-making research agendas

Tools

Tata, Cyrus; Snacken, Sonja and Cliquennois, Gaëtan and Durnescu, Ioan and Humblet, Diete and Larrauri, Elena, eds. (2026) Towards new sentencing and penal decision-making research agendas. In: The Routledge Handbook of European Penology. Routledge, Abingdon, Oxon, pp. 210-226. ISBN 9781003367888 (https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003367888)

[thumbnail of Tata-Routledge-2025-Towards-new-sentencing-and-penal-decision-making-research-agendas] Text. Filename: Tata-Routledge-2025-Towards-new-sentencing-and-penal-decision-making-research-agendas.pdf
Accepted Author Manuscript
Restricted to Repository staff only until 5 June 2027.
License: Strathprints license 1.0
Download (1MB) | Request a copy

Abstract

How should sentencing and penal decision-making be studied? After explaining why it brackets sentencing and penal decision-making together, the chapter excavates tacit assumptions about how sentencing and penal decision-making does (and should) operate. In particular, a paradigm presuming property-owning autonomous individualism has limited research. The chapter shows how two key taken for granted ideas, (discretion versus official rules; and individual case ‘factors’), are projected with the characteristics of property-owning autonomous individualism. Instead, it is proposed that the study of the empirical reality of sentencing and penal decision-making should be conceived as a social process, including the use of ‘typified whole case stories’. Armed with this understanding, the chapter opens possible future research agendas.

ORCID iDs

Tata, Cyrus ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1033-478X; Snacken, Sonja, Cliquennois, Gaëtan, Durnescu, Ioan, Humblet, Diete and Larrauri, Elena
CORE (COnnecting REpositories)