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Chapter 2 - Justifying Social Punishment

from Part I - The Descartes Lectures 2018

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 October 2020

Linda Radzik ,
Christopher Bennett ,
Glen Pettigrove  and
George Sher
By
Linda Radzik
Linda Radzik
Affiliation:
Texas A & M University
Christopher Bennett
Affiliation:
University of Sheffield
Glen Pettigrove
Affiliation:
University of Glasgow
George Sher
Affiliation:
Rice University, Houston
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Summary

What is the proper aim of socially punitive responses to wrongdoing? The usual contenders in the debates about the justification of criminal punishment – retributivist, utilitarian, expressivist, and communicative theories – all encounter problems as accounts of social punishment. This chapter argues that the general justifying aim of social punishment is to pressure wrongdoers to make amends for their own transgressions. The view combines both desert and instrumental conditions for punishment but develops distinctive accounts of each.

Keywords

punishmentsocial punishmentretributivismexpressivist theories of punishmentcommunicative theories of punishmentreactive attitudesboycottatonementmaking amendsdesert
Type
Chapter
Information
The Ethics of Social Punishment
The Enforcement of Morality in Everyday Life
 , pp. 24 - 46
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2020

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