2. Buddhist Attitude to Crime and Punishment
In the literature of Nikayas, there are some Suttas which are related to the subject of crime and punishment such as: Cakkavatti-Sihanada Sutta, Agganna Sutta, Angulimala Sutta?and Kutadanta Sutta. These Suttas supplies some very significant information in the construction of the Buddhist attitude to crime and punishment.
Unlike religions that provide guidelines on punishment as dictated by scripture, Buddhism approaches the idea from a more abstract perspective. Buddhists do not believe in a god that will punish those who commit sins. Instead, Buddhists belief in karma, or the notion that every action has a consequence, holds that punishment comes as a natural result of hurtful acts.
Being ethical
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The first point is that poverty is presented as the root cause of immoral behavior such as theft, violence, and falsehood. According to this sutra, crime, violence, and immorality cannot be separated from broader questions about the justice or injustice of the social order. Much the same point is made in the Kutadanta Sutta, in which a chaplain tells a king that there is much lawlessness and civil disorder in his kingdom, making property insecure. The king is advised to deal with this not by taxation, or by attempting to suppress it forcibly, but by improving the people?s lot …show more content…
The function of punishment is to instruct and rehabilitate, never to gain retribution. In other words, punishments do not make the offender "pay" for his crime. Justice is interpreted in the context of the first noble truth - suffering - and punishments implemented in the way that causes the least amount of pain, stress and conflict for the offender and the community at large.
In line with the fundamental Buddhist principle of selflessness, the premise that victims should take revenge on those who harm them is not accepted in Buddhism. The Khantivada Jataka tells of an instance when, in a previous life of the Buddha, a king ordered an executioner to cut off the Buddha's hands, feet, ears and nose. Despite the brutal treatment, Buddha did not get angry or wish any evil on the
For the meek, vengeance pleasures the soul; however, it is only temporal. Like an addictive drug, revenge soothes anger and tension by sedating the mind with ephemeral comfort. Despite the initial relief, pain ensues and conditions seem worse than before. Mahatma Gandhi, the leader of the non-violence movement in India, stated once that “an eye for an eye only ends up making the whole world blind.” There is no such thing as a sweet revenge.
The first of the five goals of sentencing is retribution. This goal is pretty cut and dry because it states that “we are justified in punishing because and only because offenders deserve it” (Moore 1992: 188). Those who do the crime must ultimately do the time. This punishment should be appropriate to the type and severity of the crime committed. Retributivists look at the
This paper considers the desert arguments raised to support retributivism, or retribution. Retributivism is "the application of the Principle of Desert to the special case of criminal punishment." Russ Shafer-Landau and James Rachels offer very different perspectives on moral desert which ground their differing views on the appropriate response to wrongdoing. In "The Failure of Retributivism," Shafer-Landau contends that retributivism fails to function as a comprehensive theoretical foundation for the legal use of punishment. In contrast, in his article "Punishment and Desert," Rachels uses the four principles of guilt, equal treatment, proportionality and excuses to illustrate the superiority of retribution as the basis for the justice system over two alternatives: deterrence and rehabilitation. Their philosophical treatment of the term leads to divergence on the justification of legal punishment. Ultimately, Rachels offers a more compelling view of desert than Shafer-Landau and, subsequently, better justifies his endorsement of a retributive justice system.
Retribution, is one of the four goals within corrections. It’s the belief that those who committed should have to pay for what they did. Such as when someone commits a crime, they should have to pay a certain way. Either those ways being fines, or serving time in jail or prison. Or it could be something along the lines of community service for a certain amount of hours.
Society has long since operated on a system of reward and punishment. That is, when good deeds are done or a person behaves in a desired way they SP are rewarded, or conversely punished when behaviour does not meet the societal norms. Those who defy these norms and commit crime are often punished by organized governmental justice systems through the use of penitentiaries, where prisoners carry out their sentences. The main goals of sentencing include deterrence, safety of the public, retribution, rehabilitation, punishment and respect for the law (Government of Canada, 2013). However, the type of justice system in place within a state or country greatly influences the aims and mandates of prisons and in turn targets different aspects of sentencing goals. Justice systems commonly focus on either rehabilitative or retributive measures.
Retribution is the philosophy best explained by the famous saying, “an eye for an eye”. Those that believe in this form of justice hold a strict and harsh view on punishments for crime. The proponents of retribution believe that severe penalties act as deterrence to future crime, however, studies
punishment is an asset to society: it is the only punishment that fits the crime, it deters potential criminals
What is retributive justice? It is a system of criminal justice based on the punishment of offenders rather than rehabilitation. According to our notes, it is the oldest sense of the word justice. Others think of it as “an eye for an eye” or “getting even”. Justice should be more than getting even for crimes and offenses. Retributive justifications of punishments have largely endured the test of time.
Retribution – is a correctional aim which is to hold a person who has committed a crime accountable for committing a crime against another or society in the form of punishment. (Stojkovic and Lovell 2013) What we look at in retribution is when someone is punished there is legitimacy in the punishment of a particular crime that was committed. Some of the pros of retribution are retribution can make a person or society feel safer or a feeling of justice being served when a person is punished for the crime they committed. The con of retribution is during court proceedings the prosecution and the offender’s lawyer may come to a plea agreement which could give the offender a lesser sentence than what he or she would have gotten originally. (Stojkovic and Lovell 2013)
First, crime is harmful to all who are involved (Cullen & Jonson, 2017). Second, the aim of corrections ought to be to reverse the harm that has been done (Cullen & Jonson, 2017). Third, the abovementioned goal is accomplished by restoring all involved to their original state (Cullen & Jonson, 2017). These principles all coalesce to form what we know to be restorative justice.
In order to deter others from committing offenses, a consequence for a persons actions must be implemented. The consequence is better known as a punishment in today’s society. According to Brody and Acker (2010, p.2), punishment can be defined as an essential attribute of the criminal process. Legal philosopher H.L.A. Hart deemed that there were five elements to punishment. A brief description of each element along with my opinion if I agree or disagreewith each element.
Punishing the unlawful, undesirable and deviant members of society is an aspect of criminal justice that has experienced a variety of transformations throughout history. Although the concept of retribution has remained a constant (the idea that the law breaker must somehow pay his/her debt to society), the methods used to enforce and achieve that retribution has changed a great deal. The growth and development of society, along with an underlying, perpetual fear of crime, are heavily linked to the use of vastly different forms of punishment that have ranged from public executions, forced labor, penal welfare and popular punitivism over the course of only a few hundred years. Crime constructs us as a society whilst society, simultaneously determines what is criminal. Since society is always changing, how we see crime and criminal behavior is changing, thus the way in which we punish those criminal behaviors changes.
Provide the justifications for punishment in modern society. Punishment functions as a form of social control and is geared towards “imposing some unwanted burden such as fines, probations, imprisonment, or even death” on a convicted person in return for the crimes they committed (Stohr, Walsh, & Hemmens, 2013, p.6). There are four main justifications for punishment and they are: retribution, deterrence, rehabilitation, and incapacitation. There is also said to be a fifth justification of reintegration as well.
Laws serve several purposes in the criminal justice system. The main purpose of criminal law is to protect, serve, and limit human actions and to help guide human conduct. Also, laws provide penalties and punishment against those who are guilty of committing crimes against property or persons. In the modern world, there are three choices in dealing with criminals’ namely criminal punishment, private action and executive control. Although both private action and executive control are advantageous in terms of costs and speed, they present big dangers that discourage their use unless in exceptional situations. The second purpose of criminal law is to punish the offender. Punishing the offender is the most important purpose of criminal law since by doing so; it discourages him from committing crime again while making him or her pay for their crimes. Retribution does not mean inflicting physical punishment by incarceration only, but it also may include things like rehabilitation and financial retribution among other things. The last purpose of criminal law is to protect the community from criminals. Criminal law acts as the means through which the society protects itself from those who are harmful or dangerous to it. This is achieved through sentences meant to act as a way of deterring the offender from repeating the same crime in the future.
Punishment has been in existence since the early colonial period and has continued throughout history as a method used to deter criminals from committing criminal acts. Philosophers believe that punishment is a necessity in today’s modern society as it is a worldwide response to crime and violence. Friedrich Nietzche’s book “Punishment and Rehabilitation” reiterates that “punishment makes us into who we are; it creates in us a sense of responsibility and the ability to take and release our social obligations” (Blue, Naden, 2001). Immanuel Kant believes that if an individual commits a crime then punishment should be inflicted upon that individual for the crime committed. Cesare Beccaria, also believes that if there is a breach of the law by individuals then that individual should be punished accordingly.