Dignidade e prisão na experiência constitucional europeia

The following article concerns the effectivity of the penal system in a democratic rule of law, meaning, the guardianship of arrested people in a system based on democratic constitutionalism and human dignity, having the european experience as a model for this study. It is questioned what is the reason for keeping mass encarceration as the main form of punition, seeing that it has low effectivity regarding its possibility of ressocialization. Thus, it can be noted that it is necessary to reaffirm the penal system as a means to guarantee human dignity, through maintenance of procedural and material rights capable of conceiving an humanized system, aiming for social peace and not mere retribution.