Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Ca 1 - Chapter 1
Ca 1 - Chapter 1
HISTORY OF PUNISHMENT
Introduction
Many policies introduced over a century ago remain unquestioned today. Reliance on
imprisonment as the main form of punishment is one of these. Knowing where and why these
practices began can help understand why the system works the way it does today. Each idea
appeared in unique social and political setting in light of both past experience and the current
situation. The main concern is how the needs of society are translated into specific practices that
create both opportunities and problems within the context of the criminal justice system, as the
anti-crime machinery of the government.
Justification for punishment include retribution, deterrence, rehabilitation, and
incapacitation. The last could include such measures as isolation, in order to prevent the
wrongdoers having contact with potential victims, or the removal of a hand in order to make
theft more difficult. This may be judged as fair or unfair in terms of their degree of reciprocity
and proportionality to the offense. It can be an integral part of socialization, and punishing
unwanted behavior is often part of a system, or behavioral modification which also includes the
imposition of punishments or rewards.
The unpleasant imposition may include a fine, penalty, or confinement, or be the removal
or denial of something pleasant or desirable. The authority may be either a group or a single
person, and punishment may be carried out formally under a system of law or informally in other
kinds of social settings. Negative consequences that are not considered as punishments. The
study and practice of the punishment of crimes, particularly as it applies to imprisonment, is
called penology, or often in modern texts, corrections.
What is Punishment?
Punishment is defined as an instrument of the public justice. This involves pain or
suffering produced by design and justified by some values that the suffering assumed to have. It
is also the imposition of something unpleasant on a person in response to behavior deemed
wrong by an individual. It is the imposition of an undesirable or unpleasant outcome upon a
group or individual, meted out by an authority, in context ranging from child discipline to
criminal law, as a response and deterrent to behavior that is deemed undesirable or unacceptable.
The reasoning may be to condition a child to void self-endangerment, to impose social
conformity, in particular, in the contexts of compulsory education or military discipline, to
defend norms, to protect against future harms, in particular, those from violent crimes, and to
maintain the law, and respect for the rule of law, under which the social group is governed.
Punishment may be self-inflicted as with self-flagellation and mortification of the flesh in the
religious settings, but is most often a form of social coercion.
In addition, the word ‘punishment’ is used as a metaphor, as when a boxer experiences
‘punishment’ during a fight. In other situations, breaking a rule may be rewarded, and so
receiving such a reward naturally does not constitute punishment. Finally, the condition of
breaking, or breaching the rules must satisfied for consequences to be considered punishment.
This differ in their degree of severity, and may include sanctions such as deprivations of
privileges or liberty, fines, incarcerations, the infliction of pain, amputation and death penalty.
Perspective on Punishments
The effectiveness of punishment depends upon practices that work in general, and those
that work with specific populations. The effects are not necessarily the same. Psychological
research on punishment has shown that mild punishment can be effective in changing behavior,
but the evidence is less clear about the effectiveness of severe punishment. Effectiveness of
punishment is increased by: (1) frequency of application; (2) immediacy of application; and (3)
punishment used in conjunction with positive reinforcement of pro-social behavior
Corollary to this, the effectiveness of punishment relates to how far it is successful in
suppressing the undesired behavior. Moreover, imposition of punishment, especially in its severe
form has several negative effects, such as follows: (1) avoidance or escape, (2) alienation of
those punished, to the point of inaction; (3) aggressiveness, both targeted and generalized, by
those punished; (4) conditioning of the punishers through rewarding them for behavioral change,
and (5) reproducing punishment behavior in those punished.
Finally, there is no question that prison is seen as a severe punishment for most people.
The critical question is whether it is an effective punishment for potential offenders. Moreover,
this depends on what motivates potential offenders. Therefore, the deterrence argument is based
on the preposition of economic rational choice theory, and the classical assumption that criminal
offenders are self-interested, reasoning, and rational cost-benefit calculators.