La resocialización en el derecho penal colombiano

Abstract

This paper is meant to search the origins of the prison crisis that is been experienced in Colombia. This research starts from the concept of the social imbalance, which is provided by the criminality, to which the states responds through laws that reflects the Colombian criminal law. The focus of the Colombian criminal law, as a means to find the wealfare of the country's residents, responds legislatively through excessive punishments to the protagonists of crime who unbalance the state. These sanctions lead to a punitive populism (penal populism) phenomenon that loses the essence of the Colombian criminal law, and, at the same time, it eliminates a depth study about the final purposes of these sanctions. The Re-so- cialization should be considered as the final objective for these sanctions, since the main purpose of the Colombian criminal law is the prevention. However, in Colombia there is not a re-socialization program in the prisions, which results in recidivism of prisoners This recidivism produces a high level of overcrowding in prisons which violates the convicts' rights. When carrying out a legal study we found that the legislator bring in a legal reform of the penal code where issues a mandate for create a re-socialization program. This paper will propose socio-legal criteria that should be included in the above program to fulfill its purpose and generate a social equi- librium in the state