PUNISHMENT AND ITS ETHICAL OR MORAL JUSTIFICATION

Because punishment entails pain or deprivation that people seek to avoid, the state's deliberate application of it necessitates justification. The belief that punishment is an unavoidable part of a criminal justice system does not eliminate the problem of justification. If punishment is included in the definition of criminal law, the essential question is whether society should have a set of mandatory norms enforced by sanctions. Small groups of like-minded people may be able to operate with norms that aren't backed up by consequences, and a larger society's decision not to enforce legal penalty is theoretically possible. Furthermore, sanction infliction is not intrinsically linked to authorization.  

Threatened consequences are not always meted out to people who have committed crimes in society. The police or prosecution may decide not to proceed, a jury may acquit despite overwhelming proof of guilt, or a judge may opt not to impose a penalty after conviction. Even if punishment is legally needed, the countervailing grounds may be so compelling that the court will not do so.


JUSTIFICATIONS OF PUNISHMENT: 

If threatened punishment was never or only very seldom followed by real punishment, the threat would be meaningless. As a result, punishment is sometimes a practical necessity for any society that takes threats of punishment seriously, and the justification of punishment is inextricably linked to the justification of threats of punishment.

Retributive and utilitarian justifications are the most common. In a nutshell, a retributivist believes that punishment is justifiable because individuals deserve it; a utilitarian believes that punishment is justified because it serves a useful purpose (the latter approach is sometimes also referred to as "consequentialist," or "instrumentalist"). Many actual punishment theories do not fall neatly into either of these two groups. Satisfying both retributive and utilitarian criteria may be considered necessary to justify punishment; or utilitarian criteria may be considered crucial for one question (for example, whether a system of punishment should exist) but retributive criteria for another (for example, who should be punished); or the use of retributive approaches may be considered appropriate on utilitarian grounds. The study begins with very simple versions of retributive and utilitarian theory and progresses to more complicated perspectives.


RETRIBUTIVE JUSTIFICATION: 

Why should wrongdoers be held accountable? Most people will simply say that they deserve it or that they should suffer as a result of their actions. Such attitudes are firmly ingrained in many cultures, and they are frequently bolstered by conceptions of divine punishment for those who break God's laws. A simple retributivist explanation provides a philosophical theory that corresponds to these feelings: someone who violates the rights of others should be punished, and punishment restores the moral order that was disrupted by the original wrongful conduct. Immanuel Kant famously stated that an island society on the verge of disbanding should nonetheless execute its last killer. Society not only has the right, but also the obligation, to punish those who deserve it. Failure to punish those who deserve it, according to Kant, places guilt on society; punishment, according to G. W. F. Hegel, honours the criminal as a rational creature and gives him what is his right to receive.

In simple retributivist theory, punishment is justified because society should punish wrongdoers; only those who commit wrongdoing should be punished; and the severity of punishment should be proportional to the degree of wrongdoing, as exemplified by the phrase "an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth."


UTILITARIANISM JUSTIFICATION: 

Throughout most of the twentieth century, utilitarian views of punishment dominated American law. According to Jeremy Bentham's classical utilitarianism, a morally good act or social practice is one that increases human happiness more than conceivable alternatives. Because punishment entails suffering, it can only be justified if it achieves enough positive outcomes to balance the harm. Without arguing, as Bentham did, that all significant outcomes are reducible to happiness and unhappiness, a theory of punishment might make the balance of expected consequences central to justification. It might even argue that preventing future instances of immoral abuses of rights is an appropriate goal in and of itself, regardless of the impact those violations have on the people involved. In modern usage, the term utilitarianism is typically used to refer to theories in which foreseeable consequences decide the morality of an action, and this is the case here. 


RETRIBUTIVE VIEWPOINTS WITH UTILITARIAN FOUNDATIONS:

The current discussion over sentencing methods poses a broader theoretical question: Can official judgments based on retributive assumptions be socially beneficial? The notion is that because people naturally think in retributive terms, if the law does not acknowledge that offenders should receive the punishment they "deserve," they would become disenchanted and eventually less law-abiding. Although it is a moral ideal to love one's adversaries, most individuals cannot feel passionately committed to a moral system without also desiring to see those who disobey it punished. Utilitarianism and retributivism may merge discreetly if the complex psychological and sociological assumptions that underpin this approach are correct. The ultimate philosophical rationale for punishment would be the promotion of human good, a utilitarian justification; yet, a retributive mindset among citizens would be fostered, and retributive punishment would be the functioning official standard. This apparent paradox is just one example in the context of punishment of an idea that has been frequently discussed in connection with utilitarian theory: the possibility that human welfare will be best served if people subscribe to a more absolutist morality than one that makes the promotion of good consequences the test of an act's rightness.


REFERENCES: 

https://law.jrank.org/pages/1905/Punishment-Moral-justifications-legal-punishment.html

https://academic.oup.com/ajj/article-abstract/22/1/1/156602?redirectedFrom=PDF

https://www.ojp.gov/ncjrs/virtual-library/abstracts/ethical-justification-legal-punishment

https://www.bu.edu/wcp/Papers/TEth/TEthSark.htm#:~:text=According%20to%20the%20utilitarian%20moral%20thinkers%20punishment%20can%20be%20justified,or%20the%20threat%20of%20it.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

CONFLICT OF INTEREST IN APPOINTMENT

INTRODUCTION: When an individual applies for any position in the public/private sector it is a must for him/her to get fully familiar with the ethics and laws of the government, and protect the moral values and principles of the organization at all costs. On the other hand, it is the work of the department to invest in the individual who can serve integrity and meet the probity principle. Because the appointment of individuals in the public sector is always considered a high-risk area for conflict of interest situations. WHAT IS A CONFLICT OF INTEREST SITUATION IN THE APPOINTMENT? An individual who is bounded to serve an organization or any government organization should be able to work on the principles such as selflessness, integrity, objectivity, accountability, openness, honesty, leadership, and commitment to the highest standards of propriety and impartiality. And the individual with such qualities should be considered the ideal candidate for the position. But the involvement of c
Read more

ETHICAL ANALYSIS OF CORPORATE FRAUDS

As many prominent firms continue to be tarnished by a slew of scandals and frauds, business ethics is critical. Corporate fraud results in the loss of a company's market capitalization and brand image. They are disturbingly common in a variety of countries and sectors of the economy. Corporate fraud has a long and tumultuous history in India. For decades, ethics has been a grey area in Indian corporations. As competition has become stronger over time, organizational structures have been increasingly fragmented, resulting in a lack of internal control within organizations. As a result, the number of large and small corporate frauds has increased. To combat this threat, early detection is becoming increasingly vital. According to a PWC survey, internal controls, internal and external audits, compliance programs, and a code of ethics have all been implemented to combat fraud. In India, corporate fraud has increased dramatically in the past few years, and firms, strangely, believe it i
Read more

ETHICS AND TERRORISM

Ethics has a critical, if often unacknowledged, role in the majority, if not all, concerns relating to terrorism and political violence. These are frequently most visible in counterterrorism debates but are frequently lacking from conversations concerning academic research practice. At the very least, ethical questions of terrorism have rarely been publicly addressed directly or thoroughly.    Meaning of terrorism: Terrorism is defined as the unlawful use of force or violence against people or property in order to frighten or coerce a government or its populace into pursuing specific political or social goals. Domestic and international terrorism are usually recognized by law enforcement. Thus, the use of violence, intimidation, or the threat of violence against a person or a (large) group in order to achieve political, ideological, social, or religious goals by putting pressure on or intimidating another group of people or another individual to carry out actions they would otherwise o
Read more