Rejecting retributivism : free will, punishment, and criminal justice

Author(s)

• Caruso, Gregg D.

Bibliographic Information

Rejecting retributivism : free will, punishment, and criminal justice

Gregg D. Caruso

（Law and the cognitive sciences / general editors, Bartosz Brożek ... [et al.]）

Cambridge University Press, 2021

• : pbk

Note

Includes bibliographical references (p. 329-383) and index

Summary: "Within the criminal justice system one of the most prominent justifications for legal punishment, both historically and currently, is retributivism. The retributive justification of legal punishment maintains that, absent any excusing conditions, wrongdoers are morally responsible for their actions and deserve to be punished in proportion to their wrongdoing. Unlike theories of punishment that aim at deterrence, rehabilitation, or incapacitation, retributivism grounds punishment in the blameworthiness and desert of offenders. It holds that punishing wrongdoers is intrinsically good. For the retributivist, wrongdoers deserve a punitive response proportional to their wrongdoing, even if their punishment serves no further purpose. This means that the retributivist position is not reducible to consequentialist considerations nor in justifying punishment does it appeal to wider goods such as the safety of society or the moral improvement of those being punished"-- Provided by publisher

Description and Table of Contents

Description

Within the criminal justice system, one of the most prominent justifications for legal punishment is retributivism. The retributive justification of legal punishment maintains that wrongdoers are morally responsible for their actions and deserve to be punished in proportion to their wrongdoing. This book argues against retributivism and develops a viable alternative that is both ethically defensible and practical. Introducing six distinct reasons for rejecting retributivism, Gregg D. Caruso contends that it is unclear that agents possess the kind of free will and moral responsibility needed to justify this view of punishment. While a number of alternatives to retributivism exist - including consequentialist deterrence, educational, and communicative theories - they have ethical problems of their own. Moving beyond existing theories, Caruso presents a new non-retributive approach called the public health-quarantine model. In stark contrast to retributivism, the public health-quarantine model provides a more human, holistic, and effective approach to dealing with criminal behavior.

Table of Contents

• Acknowledgments
• 1. Free will, legal punishment, and retributivism
• 2. Free will skepticism: hard incompatibilism and hard luck
• 3. The epistemic argument against retributivism
• 4. Additional reasons for rejecting retributivism
• 5. Consequentialist, educational, and mixed theories of punishment
• 6. Public health-quarantine model I: a non-retributive approach to criminal behavior
• 7. Public health-quarantine model II: the social determinants of health & criminal behavior
• 8. Public health-quarantine model iii: human dignity, victims' rights, rehabilitation, and preemptive incapacitation
• 9. Public health-quarantine model IV: funishment, deterrence, evidentiary standards, and indefinite detention
• References
• Index.

by "Nielsen BookData"

Details

• NCID: BC03490469
• ISBN:
  • 9781108723480
• LCCN: 2020046886
• Country Code: uk
• Title Language Code: eng
• Text Language Code: eng
• Place of Publication: Cambridge
• Pages/Volumes: ix, 389 p.
• Size: 23 cm
• Classification:
  • LCC : K5103
  • DC23 : 345/.077301
  • DC23 : 345.077301
• Subject Headings:
  • LCSH : Lex talionis
  • LCSH : Punishment -- Philosophy
  • LCSH : Criminal justice, Administration of -- Philosophy
  • LCSH : Free will and determinism -- Philosophy
  • LCSH : Free will and determinism
• Parent Bibliography ID:
  • BC10592265