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These materials are printed inThe Philosophy Guidebook: Complete with Maps copyright 1997 by David Felder and available for $10.

The Criminal Justice System

Is punishment of criminals ever justified?

Challenge: We should give up the idea of punishment.

 

Positions and Definitions

 

Views that reject the idea of punishment (01)

 

Hard determinism (02) Our actions have causes just like the motions of objects in nature have causes. It is unscientific to blame people.

 

Medical Model (03) What criminals do is a symptom of a condition they are suffering. The problem is to cure the condition.

 

Moral Instruction Model (04) Morality has to be learned and is similar to other cognitive skills. The problem of correcting criminals is one of filling in missing stages of moral development.

 

Views that accept the concept of punishment (05)

 

Deterrence (06)

Specific Deterrence argues that we punish individuals to deter those individuals from committing crimes.

General Deterrence argues that we punish individuals to deter others from committing crimes.

Classical Utilitarianism argues that punishment is a necessary evil that serves to deter others from committing crimes.

 

Retribution (07) argues that criminals deserve to be punished.

 

Teleological Retributionists believe that the goal of punishment is have the criminal acknowledge guilt and repent.

Non teleological Retributionists believe punishment for wrongdoing is good for its own sake and not for any other purpose.

 

John Rawls' Combined view (08)

 

The judge takes a retributionist view. "Why was Mr. H put in jail yesterday? Because he robbed a bank.

Legislatures take a deterrence view. "Why do we put bank robbers in jail? Because we want to discourage people from robbing banks."

 

 

 

Criminal Justice Simulation 14.01S

 

Why Should We Punish A Murderer?

 

Continue the following conversation. If you desire use as an example a murder case that is in the news.

 

Legalist: A convicted murder must be punished if he or she is found to have committed murder by a jury of their peers.

 

Sociologist: A murder, like everyone else, is a product of an environment they did not choose and should not be blamed for. We should leave the individual alone and change society.

 

Psychologist: What a person does is determined by psychological forces that a person does not control. People should not be blamed for what these forces make them do.

 

Reductionist: It is unscientific to blame people. We know that all events have causes including the actions of humans. If we are scientific we see that people are no more responsible for what they do than rocks are.

 

Pragmatists: The question is not "why did the person do the action?" but rather "why do we punish people? We punish murderers so that others will not murder?

 

Retributionist: We punish people because they deserve to be punished.

 

Deterrence Theorist: That is barbaric. It is no better than revenge. Punishment is unfortunate but needed to deter others.

 

Determinist: Even punishing to deter others is unjust because the person who commits a crime could not help doing the action.

 

Free Will Theorist: We always have a choice of what we do.

 

 

 

 

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© Copyright 1998 by David W. Felder. All rights reserved.