La política criminal y el punitivismo estatal en la aplicabilidad del régimen penitenciario

Abstract

In the face of Ecuador's prison crisis this research argues that criminal policy suffers from a punitive approach that has instrumentalized penal populism as a solution to the public outcry for security. This has transformed harsher sentences and limited access to prison benefits into a quick and low-cost solution that merely secludes crime in so-called "people storage centers" (prisons). The main objective of this research is to analyze the impact of criminal policy on the punitive configuration of prison systems. To this end, the legal mechanisms and parameters of this policy were identified, and the consequences of state punitivism on the progressive nature of the prison system were examined. Methodologically, a mixed-methods approach was adopted, combining bibliographic and field research. Furthermore, the research employed an exploratory and descriptive level. The aim was to acquire empirical information through interviews with judges of the Criminal Guarantees Court in the Ambato canton and surveys of inmates at the Tungurahua Prison No. 1. The above shows the general concepts and trends applied by Ecuadorian criminal policy and by the power to punish (ius puniendi) in normative reforms. Furthermore, the results demonstrated that the penal system, under the precept of abstract dangerousness, has generated normative limitations that discourage prisoners from rehabilitation, since there is no incentive to leave the self-governance of the prison system in which they find themselves.