Rehabilitation
Definition
The aim of changing the offender's attitudes, skills, or circumstances so that they no longer offend. Rehabilitation treats offending as a problem with a solution, not simply a moral failing to be punished.
Related terms
- Denunciation
- The communicative function of punishment: the sentence expresses the community's collective moral condemnation of the act. Rooted in Durkheim's argument that punishment...
- Deterrence
- A forward-looking aim holding that the threat or experience of punishment discourages future offending. General deterrence targets potential offenders in the population;...
- Incapacitation
- The justification for imprisonment that focuses on preventing crime during the sentence by removing the offender from society, regardless of whether their...
- Proportionality
- The legal principle, central to European human rights law and to many constitutional systems, that any interference with a fundamental right must...
- Retribution
- The view that punishment is justified because the offender deserves it, proportionate to the severity of the offence. A backward-looking justification: it...
Explained in
- The Aims of PunishmentThe aim of changing the offender's attitudes, skills, or circumstances so that they no longer offend. Rehabilitation treats offending as a problem with a solut...