THE SOCOLIGICAL THERIOES AROUND PUNISHMENT

Sociological Theories around Punishment



Sociological Theories around Punishment

Introduction

Punishment, if legal or divine, needs justification. Because the justification of legal punishment has been granted greater consideration by philosophers than has the justification of divine punishment by theologians, the philosophical concepts and 'theories of punishment', (i.e. the justifications) will be used as a basis for considering divine punishment.

There is a certain adversity in assimilating these two subjects because they have quotation to distinct contexts, namely, in human punishment the penal system and, in divine punishment, theology in general and in particular the afterlife. But there are some basic features which can be considered applicable to both. (Dahlberg, 2009, 403)

Firstly, punishment is imposed because some person has finished wrong. In the legal context this is called a misdeed or infringement and in the theological context it is called a sin. The two terms are by no means interchangeable. As Aquinas says, "the commands of human law cover only those deeds which anxiety the public interest, not every deed of every virtue." However, most crimes are also morally bad and are, thus, also sins. (Davis,1986, 1)

Secondly, another basic presupposition of both categories of punishment is freewill and as a consequence, responsibility. Freewill is admittedly a debated theme among philosophers and theologians and responsibility equally debated among criminologists, but, for the purpose of this investigation, it will be assumed that punishment is only of those who have responsibility for their volitions. One must be cautious at this issue in case of an over-simplification of the causes of misdeed or wrong-doing is allowed to arise. Many factors should be considered: sociological, psychological, inherited etc., but it is possible to say that at least some crimes and all sins are a result of a incorrect alternative between good and evil.

A entire delineation will now be made in such a way as to encompass both legal and divine punishment. The basis of this delineation is A. Flew's, but contributions will be encompassed from other theorists who add points of interest.

Flew, in the tradition of Grotius, first suggests that punishment must be an bad, an unpleasantness to the victim. J. Mabbot objects to the use of the phrase 'evil' in attachment with punishment. He maintains that 'evil' carries too much moral flavour and also that it suggests positive suffering. Moberly states:

The world is a worse place the more bad there is in it and perhaps the more suffering. But it does not seem to me necessarily a worse place when men are deprived of something they would like to retain; and this is the essence of up to date punishment.

While deprivation may be a more appropriate description of up to date punishment this does not necessarily exempt it from being an evil. Nor does the suggestion that 'evil' carries a moral flavour, for in fact the phrase punishment itself carries a moral flavour. (Like 'evil', punishment is not in itself a moral period but it is suggested that it usually occurs in an ...