The paper is based on the work of the research group led by the Department of Legal Studies of the University of Florence on the topic of "Criminal Justice and Journalistic Activities" and it is aimed at summarizing the main issues related to the many interests involved and their possible balancing. Based on the assumption that it is necessary to overcome the contradiction between the existing, but totally ineffective, laws and a situation of pain for many interests, especially private ones, attempts are made to identify some possible lines in order to reform or to rethink the system.
This article deals with the limits to terroristic hatespeech - in particular, the glorification of Islamic terrorism and incitement to jihad - in the Italian legal system. More precisely, the author describes how, in the case of public terroristic hate-speech, the balance between freedom of speech and prevention of terrorism is struck in criminal law and immigration law, underpinning, on the one side, the divergent assessment of the danger to the public order and state security for a person to be either criminally prosecuted or expelled; while on the other side, underpinning the divergent enjoyment of the right to a fair trial in case of, respectively, criminal prosecutions for public incitement to terrorism and administrative expulsion for terrorism prevention purposes.
The measures developed at the supranational level in order to adequately respond to evolving terrorist threats impose, among other things, the punishability of public provocation and incitement to commit terrorist offenses. However, while there is a legitimate need to fight the acts of proselytism proliferating in some places of worship by means of certain preachers and by way of the internet and social media, increasingly becoming the main channels used by terrorists to spread propaganda, it is likely to affect the constitutionally and conventionally recognized freedom of speech. Therefore, given a possible expansion of the ambit of the criminal action, it is paramount to identify what the tolerable limit of flexibility of such a fundamental right is, in the name of collective security
La previsione (nella proposta approvata in prima lettura dal Senato) del negazionismo come circostanza aggravante del reato di cui all’art. 3 della c.d. legge Mancino, non comporta un’estensione dell’area dell’illecito penale. Sul terreno penalistico è priva di utilità, ma non presenta i rischi connaturati a un’incriminazione autonoma. Risponde a ragioni di opportunità politica: chiuderebbe il problema di dare attuazione alla direttiva quadro europea, e trasmette un messaggio di impegno politico contro l’antisemitismo.