Assessing Overcrowding. Legal Standards and Judicial Perspectives on Prison Space

Abstract

In recent years, the penitentiary crisis, in different countries, has occupied a central place in political, legal and academic discussions. At the center of these debates is the issue of overcrowding and its role as the essential indicator of prison performance. However, despite its prominence, its definition, as well as its use in models of judicial intervention, is not a widely debated issue. In this text, we propose an analysis of overcrowding from two perspectives: on the one hand, a legal dimension that answers the question of how to measure overcrowding and, on the other, a practical one that seeks to show its implementation in the processes of judicialization of life in prison.