Humanising Imprisonment: A European project?

This paper focuses on the continued significance of human rights in the movement to develop a more comprehensive European framework to improve prison conditions. It identifies the immediate factors that underlie the movement as the successful implementation of the European Convention for the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment and Punishment; the growing number of judgments of the European Court of Human Rights applying the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms to prison matters; the expansion of the number of member states of the Council of Europe; and the increased political interest at European level in penological matters. Attention is also paid to the wider ideological role that a concern for human rights plays in European criminal justice politics. The paper illustrates the reform movement by focussing on recent recommendations of the Council of Europe on various aspects of imprisonment, including the new European Prison Rules. The possible emergence of an international instrument of treaty status that would deal directly with substantive conditions of imprisonment is noted and its potential impact considered. An argument is made for the systemisation of European prison law and for further reform initiatives.