Bentham And Modernization Of Crime Control In England

The British industrial structure and population changes in the 18 th century brought about social problems such as the gap between the rich and the poor.In addition,the industrial age also brings a lot of mental anxiety and confusion to the public.In such circumstances,the number of crime surges and it also presents new characteristics.However,the traditional governance model of crime in Britain can not respond effectively: the display of torture,the harsh prison conditions and the public security prevention and control system under the traditional community are not enough to deal with the crime in the new era.At that time,there were already initial responses to these questions,mainly from Protestants,such as the Protestant Discipline Revolution in the Netherlands and the British prison reform initiated by John Howard.These initiated reforms all point to a clear reform idea,that is,to build a comprehensive,rigorous and efficient criminal governance system through regulatory strategies.Under the discipline strategy,the tame people are thus "created",and the tame people are subordinate to the new social order.The mainstream of Bentham’s previous criminology theory is the theory of enlightenment thinkers represented by Montesquieu and Beccaria.Compared with the original torture system,Beccariia’s theory further emphasizes a symbolic punishment strategy,and Beccaria’s thought has initially shown the characteristics of utilitarianism.This trend of thought supported the theoretical building of Bentham through the refinement of the steam era.In Bentham criminology theory,crime and punishment theory is the crucial two parts,the ootham here with a formulaic cold vision discusses the thought of the utilitarian criminology,this thought and flashing the ideal glorious enlightenment is very different,the pursuit of rational and calculation has the characteristics of modernity,the criminal behavior,established the behavior,motivation,temperament psychological structure system,the "scientific" analysis of the crime for discipline technology provides the knowledge basis.Bentham takes this concept of crime and punishment as a guide to design the crime governance system.First of all,in the overall power pattern,Bentham abandoned the traditional British governance model centered on justice and advocated the governance model of legislative sovereignty,and thus improved the government function system around the legislative power center,so as to infiltrate power into the society from top to bottom.Bentham positified the law,and thus the law became a science.Bentham also has a deep understanding of the police function.With this understanding,Bentham drafted the Thames Police Law and put his concept about the police into practice.Among them,Bentham contributed the most to the Crime chronology and Police Bulletin,but Bentham’s contribution to the police system is often ignored.In terms of prison system,Bentham’s circular prison is famous.The purpose of its design is not only to be an imprisonment for punishment,but also to design a place for the implementation of modern society,so as to tame and correct the body of the criminal,and the soul of the criminal is therefore subject to the rules of society.It also has a more secret role in the use of labor contracts: it connects the operation of Bentham with the whole society to construct a complete social system.Foucault sees Bentham’s prison as a metaphor for modern discipline society,so that Bentham’s original intention to reduce the actual severity of punishment is ignored,but the utopian discipline of panoramic prison is still chilling.