3 - General

Question 1

What is Punishment?

Answer 1

Referred to as ‘crime handling’ (Fatić, 1995)

Often used when we talk about sentencing (Daly, 2000) although its meaning is often restricted to measures which are unpleasant and intended to inflict pain on an offender (Christie, 1982) in response to an offence they have committed.

‘the deliberate use of public power to inflict pain on offenders’ (Andrews, 2003:128)

Question 2

Why Punish?

Answer 2

Punishments are invasive harm-creating practices contradicting many of our moral values.

Punishment is opposed to the belief that harming others is wrong but is still widely seen as the normal response to crime?

States power to punish therefore requires legitimising.

It has often been said that the way we deal with wrongdoers is a reflection of our society.

Punitive responses (inflicting/aiming to inflict punishment) to wrongdoing generate profound moral and political dilemmas as punishments are invasive harm-creating practices contradicting many of our most highly regarded moral values.

Most notably, punishment is opposed to the belief that harming others is wrong.

It is therefore surprising that punishment is widely seen as the normal response to crime.

It would be much more logical to assume that it is not automatically correct to hurt someone when they have done a wrong.

Given that the states power to punish is out of kilter with many other human values it requires legitimising.

Criminologists have therefore attempted to assess the legitimacy of state punishment on three grounds: pragmatic, political and moral.

Question 3

Is Punishment Justifiable?

Answer 3

Pragmatic evaluations consider whether punishment actually reduces future wrongdoing - Current recidivism rates do not back this up

Political - evaluations consider the rightfulness of the current distribution and application of power - “current system is aimed at disciplining and controlling certain identifiable subgroups within the population” (Mathieson, 2006).

Moral/abolitionism - concerns the moral rightfulness of governing authorities to deliberately hurt someone for breaking the law. Argued that the normal response to wrongdoing should be non-punitive sanctions which do not intend to harm the offender (Boonin, 2008) - Abolitionism growing trend

Question 4

Reoffending by Prison Sentence

Answer 4

Less than 12 months - 59%

1-4 years - 36%

4-10 years - 27%

More than 10 years - 18%

Question 5

Frightened of What?

Answer 5

“One man may be deterred by the thought that his action will cause another some pain, another by the fear of doing wrong, another by the fear of public rebuke, and another only because of some adverse affect on his own interests.” John Lucas (quoted Sue Rex: 130)

Question 6

Retribution / punishment…

Answer 6

The offender harmed society; therefore society is entitled to inflict harm in return

Question 7

Deterrence

Answer 7

The threat of punishment to deter people from offending or reoffending

Question 8

Rehabilitation

Answer 8

The punishment changes the offender in order to make him a better citizen afterwards

Question 9

Protection of the public

Answer 9

Incapacitate the offender from inflicting further harm to their victim or society

Question 10

Reparation

Answer 10

The offender compensates for their crime, or makes amends for wrong doing

Question 11

Denunciation

Answer 11

Using commensurate punishment to show society’s disapproval of grave crime committed by someone