Punishment and democracy appear to exacerbate each other’s worst features. The institutions and moral intuitions used to punish those that break the law can hollow out civic participation, distort the electorate, and undermine core democratic values. Likewise, many have argued the decentralized character of democracy is a key, albeit indirect, cause of increasingly punitive public policies that are divorced from any reasonable penological purpose. Given the effects of electoral politics, many have called for the separation, or general insulation, of state punishment from public influence. However, recent empirical work on punitive attitudes and institutional design has begun to chip away at this common sense. This article contextualizes and qualifies the various mechanisms of policy feedback and public opinion formation thought by political theorists to undermine democratic participation in penal institutions and makes a normative case that insulating the public from penal law actively sustains injustice.

中文翻译：

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刑法必须不受公众影响吗？

惩罚和民主似乎加剧了彼此最坏的特征。用于惩罚违法者的制度和道德直觉会削弱公民参与、扭曲选民并破坏核心民主价值观。同样，许多人认为，民主的分散特征是导致惩罚性公共政策越来越多的关键（尽管是间接的）原因，这些政策与任何合理的刑罚目的脱节。鉴于选举政治的影响，许多人呼吁将国家惩罚与公众影响分开或普遍隔离。然而，最近关于惩罚态度和制度设计的实证研究已经开始削弱这种常识。