This is an essay on the purpose that retribution plays in the contemporary society as well as the disadvantages that it has. Also discussed is how the justice system coordinates the various forms of retribution. The reactions of various countries to some forms of retribution. The death penalty as a retribution measure has been picked on and further discussed.
¶ … Retribution
Corrections and Retribution
Retribution is considered as the penalty that is imposed on an individual or a group of people for the crimes they committed with an aim of making them experience the same amount of pain or loss as the victim of their crimes.
Retribution programs are set up to correct people who go against the law of justice. It is normally set for individuals who do something that is illegal. For this case, the offenders suffer for the wrong-doing; the aim of retribution is to take action on people who infringed the rights of other individuals. This paper analyzes the purpose of retribution programs conversely to the appropriate ways of how those purposes can be accomplished; it also illustrates some methods of retributive justice models which are applied to the offenders.
Various philosophers have come up with contested arguments on the value for or arguments against retributive punishment with each side domesticating its ideology in many ways.
There is a group of philosophers and scholars on criminology who argue that, retribution is a form of logical components of punishments. However, other philosophers combine retribution and punishment as one thing, for this reason there are various rules that logically bound retribution. All those arguments from different philosophers contribute to the justification of punishment as they contrast to the people who try to rationalize it on various kinds of consequentiality grounds whilst regarding punishment as, because it sometimes involves pains and unpleasantness, although it is justified as being a deterrent. Therefore, for this case, some arguments of the philosophers allowed retribution to be the purpose. In most cases, retribution is seen as unpleasant infliction of emotional and at time physical pain to the wicked. The logical idea here is that, the guilty have to offer something to the person who is injured (Shoham, 2007).
Retribution program is important since it satisfies the community sense of justice. However, it may be of disadvantage to the affected members in terms of how expensive it is, for example, there are tough prisons which are costly to the individual as well as inhibits the individual's change or improvement.
Retribution also tends to make the offenders more dangerous given that there is severe and harsh punishment ascribed this kind of justice system.
Methods of retribution using the justice model
Retribution is pegged on the principle that people should always receive all that they deserve. In short, they deserve the fruits of the labor if they work hard, while those people breaking the law deserve punishment. It emphasizes that people should be treated the same way they choose to treat others. Retribution using the justice model for this case aims at restoring both the victim and the offender so as to remain in their suitable positions relative to one another. Punishment is acceptable as an answer to the past event of wrongdoing. It acts to emphasize the broken rules and balances the justice scales.
The existing methods of retribution that have far reaching impacts are death penalties, life imprisonment as well as long-term jail sentences. These are common among civilized governments including the U.S.A. justice system. There are however other systems where more irrational retributive systems are applied like the stoning to death, dismemberment or casting away of offenders depending on the offence committed.
According to Michelle, retributive justice is important because it gives those people who violate the law as well as, committing the crimes which is against humanity the sense of responsibility for the acts committed. Retribution is mainly concerned with the reinstatement of the victims along with offenders to their lawful position. However retributive justice is sometimes detrimental since it places emphasis on revenge which can ultimately lead to anger and hatred between the offender and the victim.
Methods of retribution using the justice model is a theory that tries to consider the punishment if it is proportionate so as to be the finest response to the crime. When someone breaks any law, the person should therefore forfeit something which is of equal value, furthermore the forfeiture must be enacted as required by the justice. This at times is taken to imply that, the justice is involved in seeking in favor of the distressed party, or the society (Michelle, 2004).
The methods of retribution involve the execution of the convicted offenders or criminals, as a technique for various crimes, such as the capital crimes. This kind of punishment has been a controversial issue for a long time. It is true that having death penalty which is written with strict rules in some country's legislation can deter the crime rates. Research taken from different countries show that, violent crimes in addition to aggravated assaults have increased in countries where execution is used as a means of retributive punishment.
To discourage this method of retribution, the countries' legislation should legalize death penalty since it is effective for some reasons. Death penalty works best as it sets a good example to people living in a community. Retribution punishment is effective technique which has been used for controlling crime rates for many years. Hence, putting the law back to the system might increase the high chances of a peaceful living atmosphere. However, death penalty is known to be unusual punishment, because it is harsh to an individual who might be falsely convicted in the court (Redekop, 2008).
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