He is an inescapable thinker to understand the relationship between crime and punishment in modern and contemporary society. Graduated in Law from the University of Bologna, he immediately began to investigate the links between Marxism and criminal law. In collaboration with Massimo Pavarini, he published the fundamental Prison and Factory (1977; published in Spanish by Siglo XXI). Then he published The State of Social Control (edited by Siglo XXI). He is currently part of the management of magazines such as Studi sulla Questione Criminale, Theoretical Criminology and is editor in chief of the European Journal of Criminology.