[barrkel]

What makes you think retribution is the principal component of justice? That seems very wrong to me.

Justice is a deep concept - https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/justice/ is an overview, and it's not short - but on plain sight, I'd say that since it is the public, through the medium of government, that enforces justice, it should do so with a utilitarian view.

Society has a vital interest in reintegrating people who have been punished, so that they don't fall back into a life of crime as the only life available to them. If justice is mostly retribution, then society is not well served. Even further, society can profit from the valuable contributions of people who've learned the error of their ways.

[slibhb]

> What makes you think retribution is the principal component of justice? That seems very wrong to me.

It seems right to me. In my opinion, justice comes from the concept of reciprocity. In other words, if someone does bad, it is just that bad is done to them (retribution). The reverse is also true: it is just that good things occur to people who do good deeds.

> Justice is a deep concept - https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/justice/ is an overview, and it's not short - but on plain sight, I'd say that the fact that it is the public, through the medium of government, that enforces justice, it should do so with a utilitarian view.

It's wrong to write as if this is a closed question. There are plenty of philosophers who aren't utilitarians and who see justice grounded elsewhere than "whatever I think will be good for society".

[WalterBright]

The idea of prisons should be to simply keep people away from society so they cannot harm others. There's no need to heap punishment on top of that. That's medieval and doesn't belong in modern civilization.

[RcouF1uZ4gsC]

> That's medieval and doesn't belong in modern civilization.

The concept of retribution as justice goes far back beyond medieval, to at least the Bronze Age (see Hammurabi).

In addition, it seems a common component across cultures. The utilitarian view is by no means nearly as universal.

Here is a modern example: every few years you hear about some former Nazi Concentration Camp guard that was arrested. From a utilitarian point of view it is completely useless. The old guard is never ever going to take part in anything like that again. However, from a justice as retribution for misdeeds, it make perfect sense.

[cm2187]

Or if someone kills his wife in a passion crime, along that logic, what is the point of jailing him then? He doesn’t have another wife to kill and so there is no further harm to society expected. So he should walk free if the only objective is no further harm to society.

Punishment achieves fairness and deterrence.

[slibhb]

It's part of modern civilization for the same reason people enjoy it when the bad guy gets punished at the end of a movie. This is the essence of justice, whether you have the stomach to face it or not.

[WalterBright]

I enjoy watching movies as much as anyone, but that doesn't transfer into enjoying people being hurt/punished in real life. I'm happy to leave my darker impulses behind when exiting the theater.

[smabie]

You can't leave them behind and I'm sure you've wanted someone punished for some misdeeds they've committed. This isn't a bad thing and is an overwhelmingly natural response.

[WalterBright]

I know it's a natural response. But it's uncivilized.

[slibhb]

Those impulses are the reason we care to investigate crimes, capture criminals, put them on trial, and then punish them.

So I wouldn't call them dark.

[barrkel]

Sure, it's not a closed question. I'm mostly pointing out, as an example, the fact that society operates the mechanics of justice these days, it is the interests of society that are paramount. Making individuals whole is a part of that, but avoiding repetition is also vital, or else the punishment plays a part in causing crime later.

[slibhb]

In my opinion you vastly overestimate your ability to answer questions like "what are the interests of society?" and "what causes crime?"

[barrkel]

I don't think I have the ability. I can, however, say with a some certainty that retribution is not principal component of justice, because a moment's consideration shows more considerations at play.

Retribution had a place - in Babylonian times, when eye for an eye was the rule. Things have moved on.

[slibhb]

Things haven't moved on. All modern justice systems continue to be based on retribution. They seek to punish the guilty (proportionally to their crimes) and to exonerate the innocent. It's all well and good to argue "this punishment is too severe, it does not fit the crime". But to argue that "the world has moved on" from retributive justice is just naivete.

If you're interested in a defense of retributive justice, read Kant:

> Punishment by a court can never be inflicted merely as a means to promote some other good for the criminal himself or for civil society. Punishment can only be inflicted in response to a crime committed, i.e., retributive justice only. A human being ought never to be treated merely as a means to an end as all human beings have an innate personality even thought they may be condemned to lose their civil personality. The law of punishment is a categorical imperative, and woe to him who crawls through the windings of eudaemonism in order to discover something that releases the criminal from punishment or even reduces its amount by the advantage it promises, in accordance with the pharisaical saying, “It is better for one man to die than for an entire people to perish.” For if justice goes, then so does the value of human beings. However, what if a proposal comes forwards to preserve the life of a criminal sentenced to death in exchange for allowing dangerous experiments to be performed, so that physicians can learn something of benefit to the commonwealth? A court would reject with contempt such a proposal form a medical college, for justice ceases to be justice if it can be bought for any price whatsoever.

[barrkel]

You'll notice, I hope, from my comments that I've never said retribution wasn't an element. What I've been arguing is that it isn't and shouldn't be the principal component in modern justice.

An anecdote that frames my thinking: the most recent crime I've suffered was when I've been assaulted on the street - bikejacked, in fact, pulled off my motorcycle at a stop light by one hoodlum, kicked in the head (though helmeted), while another rode off on my bike. In the moment, there's anger at the perpetrators. But more than that, I feel pity; pity that their lives are so empty that the only way they see to get their kicks is to do this kind of thing.

They should suffer consequences (i.e. a deterrent), sure, but I don't really want retribution. Revenge wouldn't have brought back my bike (I'd put months of work into that bike, getting it back on the road, but when the bike was recovered it had been crashed into a parked car). It certainly wouldn't have made me feel safer on the road; if anything, it would have made the us (well paid) vs them (aimless, hopeless poor youth) dichotomy worse, not better.

As it turned out, the London police are much worse than the hoodlums. Didn't get a line-up of faces until more than 4 months after the fact, long after any hope of remembering anything. I have a lot more anger at the police than I do at those hoodlums.

I want that kind of crime to no longer be a risk. That requires a systematic solution, not a point fix of retribution, which I don't want - I don't and didn't want those kids' lives ruined. They'll just do even worse things.

I can imagine different crimes where retribution and revenge might play a larger part in the emotions of the victim. I think those crimes are a small minority of total crime, and even then justice is and needs to be rational, not emotional. Revenge, as a reaction, overreacts. Justice needs to be balanced. So I'm not sure it can be a principal component even for that minority of crime.

Turn the other cheek; violence begets violence; etc. But some people seem to use the word "justice" and mean "revenge".

[ndiscussion]

> Society has a vital interest in reintegrating people who have been punished

Food for thought, but this is only true if we release them. For most of history, we simply executed criminals.

In most of the world, that's still the case (thieves without hands etc).

Without making a moral judgment on what's right or wrong, if most societies evolved that way, it probably means it's conducive to the long-term health and survival of societies. Survivorship bias and all that.

[InfiniteRand]

I think this actually varies a lot across cultures, although one common principle, historically at least, is that justice is less deadly for the rich than it is for the poor. For instance, the concept of blood money reduces the punishment of murder to a fine