Retributivism and the inadvertent punishment of the innocent

Law and Philosophy 2 (2):233 - 246 (1983)
  Copy   BIBTEX

Abstract

Retributivism is generally thought to forbid the punishment of the innocent, even if such punishment would produce otherwise good results, such as deterrence. It has recently been argued that because capital punishment always entails the risk of executing an innocent person, instituting capital punishment is tantamount to intentionally taking innocent lives and therefore cannot be justified on retributive grounds. I argue that there are several versions of retributivism, only one of which might categorically forbid risking punishing innocent persons. I also argue that our moral practices reveal either that we do not hold this particular version of retributivism, or that we reject equating risking punishing the innocent with intentionally doing so. *** DIRECT SUPPORT *** A9102008 00005.

Links

PhilArchive



    Upload a copy of this work     Papers currently archived: 90,221

External links

Setup an account with your affiliations in order to access resources via your University's proxy server

Through your library

Similar books and articles

Making sense of retributivism.J. Angelo Corlett - 2001 - Philosophy 76 (1):77-110.
The Failure of Trust-Based Retributivism.Daniel Korman - 2003 - Law and Philosophy 22 (6):561-575.
Punishing the innocent — unintentionally.Alan Wertheimer - 1977 - Inquiry: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Philosophy 20 (1-4):45 – 65.
Punishing the Guilty, Not Punishing the Innocent.Richard Lippke - 2010 - Journal of Moral Philosophy 7 (4):462-488.
Retributivist arguments against capital punishment.Thom Brooks - 2004 - Journal of Social Philosophy 35 (2):188–197.
Fallibility and retribution.Göran Duus-Otterström - 2010 - Law and Philosophy 29 (3):337-369.
Retributivism and Fallible Systems of Punishment.George Schedler - 2011 - Criminal Justice Ethics 30 (3):240-266.

Analytics

Added to PP
2009-01-28

Downloads
263 (#69,636)

6 months
2 (#658,980)

Historical graph of downloads
How can I increase my downloads?

Author's Profile

References found in this work

No references found.

Add more references