Utilitarianism
Definition
The view that an act or a rule is justified by its consequences, so punishment is justified only insofar as it produces enough good, chiefly less future crime, to outweigh the suffering it causes.
Related terms
- Communicative Theory
- Antony Duff's account of punishment as a message addressed to the offender, calling them to answer for the wrong and to reconcile...
- Just Deserts
- A retributivist sentencing principle, revived by Andrew von Hirsch in the 1970s, holding that the severity of a punishment should be set...
- Proportionality
- The legal principle, central to European human rights law and to many constitutional systems, that any interference with a fundamental right must...
- Retributivism
- The view that punishment is justified because the offender deserves it for the wrong done, independent of any future benefit the punishment...
- Expressive Theory
- Joel Feinberg's claim that punishment necessarily carries an element of formal condemnation, which is what distinguishes it from a mere penalty such...
- General Justifying Aim
- H.L.A. Hart's term for the reason a society is entitled to maintain a system of punishment at all, which Hart answered in...
- Mixed Theory of Punishment
- H.L.A. Hart's account separating the general justifying aim of a punishment system (broadly utilitarian) from the distribution of punishment to individuals (governed...
- Scapegoat Problem
- The objection that pure utilitarianism appears to permit punishing a known innocent person if doing so produces more good than harm in...
Explained in these topics
- Philosophical Theories of Punishment
- Theories of Punishment (UGC-NET Unit VII)The forward-looking theory that punishment is justified only when it prevents a greater future harm than it causes, through deterrence, incapacitation or rehab...