The Abolition of Punishment

17 Pages Posted: 25 Oct 2009

See all articles by Michael Louis Corrado

Michael Louis Corrado

University of North Carolina School of Law

Date Written: 2001

Abstract

Punishment has diverted the attention of philosophers. A lot of work has been done on the justification of punishment, so that there is a kind of consensus about what the moral limits of punishment are, and what the remaining problems are, and so on. But here's the rub: by failing to distinguish clearly between punishment and the other institutions of the criminal law, we have kidded ourselves into believing that we have a nice, bright line to protect us against abuses, if only we could get the state to conform to it: No one may be punished unless he has committed a crime. But given that that limit is a limit on punishment only, and not on the whole machinery of the criminal law, it is going to turn out that the limit is entirely illusory. It does not limit the state in any way, and it actually covers up some of the abuses we would like to invoke it against. That, at least, is what I intend this paper to persuade you of.

Suggested Citation

Corrado, Michael Louis, The Abolition of Punishment (2001). Suffolk University Law Review, Vol. 35, No. 257, 2001, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=1493686

Michael Louis Corrado (Contact Author)

University of North Carolina School of Law ( email )

Van Hecke-Wettach Hall, 160 Ridge Road
CB #3380
Chapel Hill, NC 27599-3380
United States

Do you have negative results from your research you’d like to share?

Paper statistics

Downloads
123
Abstract Views
3,084
Rank
412,219
PlumX Metrics