Proximity, pain and State punishment

This article examines the difficulties of calculating the severity of sentences presented by differences in individual penal subjects’ experiences, a key challenge to proportionality-based justifications of punishment. It explores the basic arguments for and against recognising subjective experience, before advancing a model of penal severity based upon the proximity of the pains of punishment to penal State actions. This model could partially resolve foundational problems in giving criminally just sentences. Whilst we cannot wholly reconcile penal subjectivism and objectivism, there are still some opportunities to improve penal policy and sentencing practice by adopting a proximity model for penal severity.