The French Criminal Policy and Reform in the 19th Century

Michel Foucault’s Surveillance and Punishment(1975) examines the changes of the punishment system and the birth of prisons in France from the 17th to 19th centuries. Foucault can be said to be a pioneer of the study of the history of criminal policy. However, Foucault’s oeuvre written in the 1970s do not fully explain the modern French criminal policy. This is because times have changed a lot. Today’s criminal policy is different from that of the 1970s, and this change also affects our view of the past. What was not seen in the 1970s can now be seen. This paper attempts to examine French criminal policy in the 19th century from a different perspective of Foucault. This is to help better understanding the criminal policy of France in the 19th century and further fully grasp that times.