PUNISHMENT (from Lat. punire, to punish, from poena, punishment, Gr. 7rocvil)

This article appears in Volume V22, Page 653 of the Encyclopedia Britannica.

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PUNISHMENT (from Lat. punire, to punish, from poena, punishment, Gr. 7rocvil) , the infliction of some kind of pain' or loss upon a person for a misdeed, i.e. the transgression of a law or command. Punishment may take forms varying from

capital

CAPITAL (i.e. capital stock or fund)
CAPITAL (Lat. caput, head)

punishment, flogging and mutilation of the

body

BODY

to imprisonment, fines, and even deferred sentences which come into operation only if an offence is repeated within a specified time. The progress of civilization has resulted in a vast

change

CHANGE (derived through the Fr. from the Late Lat. cambium, cambiare, to barter; the ultimate derivation is probably from the root which appears in the Gr. «a urmu', to bend)

alike in the theory and in the method of punishment. In primitive society punishment was left to the individuals wronged or their families, and was vindictive or retributive: in quantity and quality' it would

bear

special

SPECIAL

relation to the character or gravity of the offence. Gradually there would arise the idea of proportionate punishment, of which the characteristic type is the lex talionis,' " an eye for an eye." The second stage was punishment by individuals under the

control

CONTROL (Fr. contrdle, older form contre rolle, from Med. Lat. contra-rotulus, a counter roll or copy of a document used to check the original; there is no instance in English of the use of " control " in this, its literal, meaning)

of the state, or community; in the third stage, with the growth of law, the state took over the primitive

function

FUNCTION

and provided itself with the machinery of " justice " for the maintenance of public order. Henceforward crimes are against the state, and the exaction of punishment by the wronged individual is illegal (cf.

LYNCH

LYNCH, PATRICIO (1825–1886)

LAW). Even at this stage the vindictive or retributive character of punishment remains, but gradually, and specially after the humanist

movement

MOVEMENT

under thinkers like Beccaria and Jeremy Bentham, new theories begin to emerge. Two

chief

CHIEF (from Fr. chef, head, Lat. caput)

trains of thought have combined in the condemnation of primitive theory and practice. On the one hand the retributive principle itself has been very largely superseded by the protective and the reformative; on the other punishments involving bodily pain have become objectionable to the general sense of society. Consequently corporal and even

capital

CAPITAL (i.e. capital stock or fund)
CAPITAL (Lat. caput, head)

punishment occupy a far less prominent position, and tend everywhere to disappear. It began to be recognized also that stereotyped punishments, such as belong to penal codes, fail to take due account of the particular condition of an offence and the character and circumstances of the offender. A fixed fine, for example, operates very unequally on rich and poor.
Modern theories date from the 18th century, when the humanitarian

movement

MOVEMENT

began to teach the dignity of the individual and to emphasize his rationality and responsibility. The result was the reduction of punishment both in quantity and in severity, the improvement of the prison system, and the first attempts to study the psychology of crime and to distinguish between classes of criminals with a view to their improvement (see CRIME; PRISON; CHILDREN'S COURTS; JUVENILE OFFENDERS). These latter problems are the province of criminal anthropology and criminal sociology, sciences so called because they view crime as the outcome of anthropological and social conditions. The man who breaks the law is himself a product of social evolution and cannot be regarded as solely responsible for his disposition to transgress. Habitual crime is thus to be treated as a disease. Punishment can, therefore, be justified only in so far as it (I) protects society by removing temporarily or
1 Talio, in juridical Latin, the abstract noun from talis, such, alike, hence " retaliation." See Exod. xxi. 24; Lev. xxiv. 20; Deut. xix. 2I.permanently one who has injured it, or acting as a deterrent,2 or (2) aims at the moral regeneration of the criminal. Thus the retributive theory of punishment with its criterion of justice as an end in itself gives place to a theory which regards punishment solely as a means to an end, utilitarian or moral, according as the common advantage or the good of the criminal is sought.

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