ABSTRACT
Sentencing guidelines first emerged in the United States in the late 1970s. Sentencing commissions now exist in many states and at the federal level. Other common law jurisdictions have been much slower introducing greater structure for courts at sentencing. In recent years, however, a number of countries have now created definitive sentencing guidelines. This chapter explores the structure and impact of sentencing guidelines in the jurisdiction outside the US that has the most developed guidelines. Sentencing guidelines were first introduced in England and Wales in 1998 with the creation of the Sentencing Advisory Panel. Statutorily binding guidelines now exist for most common offenses in this jurisdiction. The grid-based approach exemplified by the Minnesota guidelines has been rejected in all other countries. In light of this, the English guidelines, which take a quite different approach to guiding sentencers, are the only developed alternative. Indeed, the English guidelines have been adapted and implemented in a number of other jurisdictions including South Korea, Scotland, Macedonia, and several gulf states. This chapter compares the English guidelines to the US grid-based systems, and summarizes the latest research exploring the impact of the guidelines on sentencing practices and other key indicators including public confidence.
