Crime, Criminal Justice and Criminology in Greece

Abstract

The article describes the political and social reaction to crime and the response of the criminal justice system. Between 1980 and 1999, there was only a modest increase (of around 27 percent) in all recorded crimes in Greece, although there was a five-fold increase in the most serious crimes (felonies), which however accounted for a very small proportion of the total (1.4 percent in 1999). In formal terms, the sentences of the courts are often severe, but in practice most of these sentences are not carried out: lenient rules, adopted to control prison overcrowding, mean that many prison sentences are converted to fines, and those who are sent to prison are usually released early. Law and order politics, which previously focused on political ‘extremists’, has recently achieved more general legitimacy in Greece. Nevertheless, new laws providing for severe sentences mostly derive from Greece’s international and European commitments. A review of the varied writings of Greek criminologists in recent years suggests that criminology in Greece is at an early stage in attempting to engage systematically and productively with political and public discourse on crime and criminal justice.