Rethinking Punishment

Download or read book Rethinking Punishment written by Leo Zaibert and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2018-04-19 with total page 278 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The age-old debate about what constitutes just punishment has become deadlocked. Retributivists continue to privilege desert over all else, and consequentialists continue to privilege punishment's expected positive consequences, such as deterrence or rehabilitation, over all else. In this important intervention into the debate, Leo Zaibert argues that despite some obvious differences, these traditional positions are structurally very similar, and that the deadlock between them stems from the fact they both oversimplify the problem of punishment. Proponents of these positions pay insufficient attention to the conflicts of values that punishment, even when justified, generates. Mobilizing recent developments in moral philosophy, Zaibert offers a properly pluralistic justification of punishment that is necessarily more complex than its traditional counterparts. An understanding of this complexity should promote a more cautious approach to inflicting punishment on individual wrongdoers and to developing punitive policies and institutions.

Download or read book The Limits of Blame written by Erin I. Kelly and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2018-11-12 with total page 241 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Faith in the power and righteousness of retribution has taken over the American criminal justice system. Approaching punishment and responsibility from a philosophical perspective, Erin Kelly challenges the moralism behind harsh treatment of criminal offenders and calls into question our society’s commitment to mass incarceration. The Limits of Blame takes issue with a criminal justice system that aligns legal criteria of guilt with moral criteria of blameworthiness. Many incarcerated people do not meet the criteria of blameworthiness, even when they are guilty of crimes. Kelly underscores the problems of exaggerating what criminal guilt indicates, particularly when it is tied to the illusion that we know how long and in what ways criminals should suffer. Our practice of assigning blame has gone beyond a pragmatic need for protection and a moral need to repudiate harmful acts publicly. It represents a desire for retribution that normalizes excessive punishment. Appreciating the limits of moral blame critically undermines a commonplace rationale for long and brutal punishment practices. Kelly proposes that we abandon our culture of blame and aim at reducing serious crime rather than imposing retribution. Were we to refocus our perspective to fit the relevant moral circumstances and legal criteria, we could endorse a humane, appropriately limited, and more productive approach to criminal justice.

Download or read book Rethinking Punishment written by Leo Zaibert and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2018-04-19 with total page 277 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Rejecting traditional alternatives, Leo Zaibert offers an original and refreshing approach to the age-old problem of the justification of punishment.

Download or read book Rethinking Punishment written by Karol M Lucken and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 2017-02-10 with total page 179 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: There are visible signs that the "get-tough" era of punishment is finally winding down. A "get-smart" agenda has emerged that aims to reduce costs and crime by reducing the incarceration of non-violent drug offenders, expanding use of community-based corrections, revising sentencing structures, and supporting offender re-entry into the community. This change in policy affords an opportunity to re-examine and challenge certain other conventions in the study and practice of punishment. Each chapter of Rethinking Punishment examines a convention and posits arguments that challenge that convention and expand the conversation. These arguments are based on the prior literature, existing and original data, and historical documents. These conventions and arguments for rethinking punishment are framed accordingly: Justifying Penal Policy Defining the Attributes of Punishment Measuring the Scope and Severity of Punishment Evaluating Effectiveness in Punishment Finally, the author provides specific recommendations for research and policy based on these original arguments. Drawing on underlying philosophical, empirical and political issues and offering a critical discussion of the relationship between research, policy and practice, this book makes compelling and instructive reading for students taking courses in criminal justice, corrections, philosophy of punishment, the sociology of punishment, and law and justice.

Download or read book Rethinking Incarceration written by Dominique DuBois Gilliard and published by InterVarsity Press. This book was released on 2018-03-02 with total page 246 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The United States has more people locked up in jails, prisons, and detention centers than any other country in the history of the world. Exploring the history and foundations of mass incarceration, Dominique Gilliard examines Christianity’s role in its evolution and expansion, assessing justice in light of Scripture, and showing how Christians can pursue justice that restores and reconciles.

Download or read book Rethinking Punishment in the Era of Mass Incarceration written by Chris Surprenant and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 2017-07-06 with total page 344 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book offers a philosophical examination of incarceration as a form of punishment. A diverse group of contributors engages with research in criminology, economics, law, and sociology to help contextualize the philosophical issues.

Download or read book Rethinking Hell written by Christopher M. Date and published by Wipf and Stock Publishers. This book was released on 2014-04-15 with total page 344 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Most evangelical Christians believe that those people who are not saved before they die will be punished in hell forever. But is this what the Bible truly teaches? Do Christians need to rethink their understanding of hell? In the late twentieth century, a growing number of evangelical theologians, biblical scholars, and philosophers began to reject the traditional doctrine of eternal conscious torment in hell in favor of a minority theological perspective called conditional immortality. This view contends that the unsaved are resurrected to face divine judgment, just as Christians have always believed, but due to the fact that immortality is only given to those who are in Christ, the unsaved do not exist forever in hell. Instead, they face the punishment of the "second death"--an end to their conscious existence. This volume brings together excerpts from a variety of well-respected evangelical thinkers, including John Stott, John Wenham, and E. Earl Ellis, as they articulate the biblical, theological, and philosophical arguments for conditionalism. These readings will give thoughtful Christians strong evidence that there are indeed compelling reasons for rethinking hell.