About Punishment

This paper tries to explain the meaning of punishment at first ,and confine the object discussed in the extention of legal punishment apparently.In the analysis of punishment concept,many things should be noticed: fistly, punishment is a kind of evil and voilence, however in fact this evil is supposed; Secondly, punishment must be based on something that includes the wrongdoing , the intent of the offenders and the provisions of law; Thirdly, the law-makers must have right to make the provisions. Besides, whether a measure is punishment or not depends on the lawmakers ,not the one punished.Then I commenced on the elements of punishment to clarify the content and extension of it.At the end of the first part , two differenttheories would be introduced------retributivism and utilitarianism as the preparationfor the second part.At the second part,I pay attention to the justification of punishment from the view of retributivism.Punishment is a legitimate evil ,and how it can be justified? Retributivists answer this questionlike this:first,offenders own a debt to the community because of his wrongdoing,and punishment trys to force him to pay back;second,punishment annulls the crime.If the offenders have been punished , it just like the crime never happen;third, the crime maked the offenders have an unfair advantage,and it is punishment that supposed to rectify it;fourth,Kant thinked the nation have obligation to punish the offenders ,and the obligation is a "categorical imperative",if irresponsible,nation could be assumed as the participant of the crime;fifth,punishment is a spiritual improvement and communication ,which makes the offenders change to be good.At the third part,I try to analyse the aims of punishment from the utilitarianism view. How many results must be received that enough to justify the punishmentmeasures?Firstly,the utilitarianists think that the chief aim of punishment is deterring others. Deterringshouldbedifferredfromreplacement.Onwhatconditionsonecanbedeter redbypunishmentorbyotherelements?theanswersof the question can be used to help us make clear that how punishment deter the potential offenders;Secondly,educating and satisfying others.If the crime should be hated ,punishing the offenders could satisfy or educate others.However, a famous experiment told us that what affect the attitude of the ordinary people is not the sentence of the jugde but other elements;Thirdly, elimination and Incapacitation.Writing this point to the lists of punishment aims has risk to see human as the direct aim of punishment .Here I will takl about the death penalty and the problems arised after the reforms of our court;Forth,correction.To what extent one can correct his behavior after being punished? Fninally,At the forth part , on the ground of the front discussion,we will be back to the moral views as to summarize the whole paper.If punishment could not receive the supposed aim ,does it should be thought as unjustified?Retributists will say"YES",but Utilitarists will have different answer.Punishment have many forms ,and they works in differents ways, therefore get different results. We can not ignore this differences.