Abstract
The article examines the development towards a multilayered criminal policy in Europe on the basis of the Finnish experience. Three basic trends are noticeable from that point of view: Scandinavization of Finnish criminal and sanction policy; the influence of human and basic rights on the Finnish legal culture and criminal procedural law; and the effects of constitutional, human rights and EU law obligations on the Finnish criminal law reform. In addition, the challenges arising from Europeanization and internationalization of criminal law and criminal justice are analysed. In the concluding remarks, Finnish and Scandinavian criticism is expressed in relation to the unification of European criminal law, in favour of ‘united in diversity’.
Highlights
In order to understand the development of the Finnish criminal policy and criminal justice, it should be examined in the context of its major ideological tendencies of criminal policy in Finland and Scandinavia
The following different levels of legal orders can be separated: (a) the global – primarily United Nations (UN) – level; (b) the regional (European) level divided into Council of Corresponding author: Raimo Lahti, University of Helsinki, Helsinki, 00014, Finland
There is an intensifying interaction between European and global legal regulatory regimes and the national legal orders. This means among other things an enlargement of legal sources of national criminal laws, for instance: (a) the effect of the supranational criminal law, that is, international criminal law in sensu stricto (‘core crimes’), and transnational criminal law and (b) the effect of European law (European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) and the European Union (EU) law), On the other hand, the national legal orders may reciprocally have an impact on the global and European law
Summary
Keywords Multilayered criminal policy, Europeanization and internationalization of criminal law, Finnish and Scandinavian criminal justice, criminal sanctions, united in diversity In order to understand the development of the Finnish criminal policy and criminal justice, it should be examined in the context of its major ideological tendencies of criminal policy in Finland and Scandinavia.
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