ABSTRACT
This chapter will discuss imprisonment as the negation of citizenship in relation to the loss of the right to vote. While the UK position on the voting rights of prisoners is less draconian than many other states, sentenced prisoners are currently still not permitted to vote. Despite a successful challenge to the UK’s denial of prisoners’ voting rights in the Strasbourg Court in 2005 and the recommendations of a Joint Parliamentary Committee in 2013 for limited change, the vote has still not been restored. In fact the UK government has announced that it would rather withdraw from the Convention than comply. The most it is prepared to concede is to allow prisoners released on temporary licence to vote. This chapter will consider whether condemning prisoners to civil death is appropriate in modern democratic societies. The issue of prisoners’ right to vote in recent years has focused more attention on prisons and received much more attention than other aspects of imprisonment. It is also interesting because it raises questions regarding the purpose of punishment and the social exclusion of prisoners and the meaning of citizenship, as well as the role of public opinion in penal policy and the disparate impact of the ban on specific groups.
