The Utilitarian Theory of Punishment

Philosophy 338 Professor Hubin THE UTILITARIAN THEORY OF PUNISHMENT I. Utilitarian Theories of penalisation: Utilitarian justifications are forward-looking (consequentialistic) in nature. All of the questions closely the justification of penalization (general justification, title and severity) will be answered by appeal to the utility (value) of the consequences of an action. A. The General Justification: All punishment is, according to the utilitarian, essentialally bad, because it involves the infliction of pain or nigh other consequence normally considered unpleasant. Nevertheless, punishment may be justified because of its effectsâ€"that is, its extrinsic (instrumental) benefits may outweigh the intrinsic badness. Thus, a system of punishment is justified only by its consequences. The good consequences of punishment are usually said to be the promotion of utility (happiness/pleasure/desire satisfaction) through the simplification in annoyance. (The justification will only work for systems where reducing behavior classified as criminal will shape up utility. Societies that criminalize behavior that is non harmful will come in difficulty establishing that reducing the incidence of these sorts of be actions will break utility). Systems of punishment are usually claimed to reduce criminal offence by three means: 1.

Deterrence: Deterrence refers to the reduction in crime as a result of making crime too costly to the would-be criminalâ€"pricing crime too high. The individual deterred may still desire to commit the crime in question but will not do so given the likelihood and severity of punishment. a) b) 2. 3. special: The tendency of the punishment to deter the somebody punished from proximo criminal acts. General: The tendency of the punishment of one person to deter others from committing criminal acts. Incapacitation: Incapacitation refers to removal of the opportunity or baron of the potential criminal to commit criminal acts (sometimes only of a certain sort). Rehabilitation... If you want to get a full essay, parade it on our website: Orderessay

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