There are many conceptions of retributive justice. This paper is designed to articulate and defend a particular kind of retributive justice, one that I call the "Confrontational Conception of Retributivism," or the CCR. This particular conception is political, not comprehensive, and thus is interested in defending the claim that "state" punishment is, as a general matter, warranted as a response to criminal wrongdoing. Accordingly, the focus is on the legal manifestations of criminal punishment, particularly within a liberal democracy; it is not concerned with justifying punishment in other spheres such as parent-child relations. Related to this account of state punishment is that its contours should be devised principally ex ante and that such punishment should be distributed through actors upon whom there are checks with respect to their remaining discretion.
21 posted on 08/02/2014 7:55:10 PM PDT by Carry_Okie
(Grovelnator Shwarzenkaiser: fasionable fascism one charade at a time.)
It’s interesting. For my part, I always thought the most compelling justification for incarceration was not retribution, but, rather, mere prevention of further crimes by the confined perpetrators.
22 posted on 08/02/2014 7:57:51 PM PDT by aposiopetic