Responsibility and Punishment About this class In this class we will study a number of issues pertaining to legal punishment and the attribution of legal responsibility. We will investigate the dominant justifications of legal punishment (– instrumentalism and retributivism), their weaknesses, and some recent alternatives; the notions of freedom, responsibility, and personality as these appear in law, and the place of corrective justice relative to theories of justice. What I expect from you In this class we will try to learn through discussion. It is thus imperative that you show up for class prepared. To help you prepare for discussion, you will be asked to post a discussion essay on the Blackboard site for our class every Sunday evening and to have replied to at least one of the posts written by your classmates. The posts should be between 400 and 500 words and should articulate a main point or idea in the reading for the week that you found worthy of further discussion. In addition to the Blackboard posts, you will write one conference style presentation (about 3000 words) and a final research paper (4000-5000 words, may build on your conference style presentation). Summary of Assignments and Grade Distribution Blackboard posts (20%) Conference style paper (30%) Research paper (40%) Class participation (10%) Texts We will read extensive selections from four classic texts and supplement these with some important articles. Our main texts are: H.L.A. Hart Punishment and Responsibility (OUP, 1968) J. Feinberg Doing and Deserving (Princeton UP, 1970) C.L. Ten Crime, Guilt, and Punishment (OUP, 1987) M. Moore Placing Blame (OUP, 1997) R.A. Duff Punishment, Communication, and Community (OUP, 2001) The articles we’ll supplement these with are: J. Rawls “Two Concepts of Rules,” Philosophical Review, vol. 64, 1955, pp. 3-32. 1
Russ Shafer-Landau “The Failure of Retributivism,” Philosophical Studies, vol. 82,1996, pp. 289-316. Russ Shafer-Landau “Retributivism and Desert,” Pacific Philosophical Quarterly, vol. 81, 2000, pp. 189-214. Geoffrey Sayre-McCord “Criminal Justice and Legal Reparations as an Alternative to Punishment,” Philosophical Issues (Nous supplement), vol. 11, 2001, pp. 502-530. Our Schedule Week
Reading
Assignment
1
Rawls “Two Concepts of Rules”, Hart “Prolegomena to the Principles of Punishment”
Blackboard post
2
Hart “Intention and Punishment” & “Negligience, Mens Rea, and Criminal Responsibility”
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3
Hart “Punishment and the Elimination of Responsibility” & “Changing Conceptions of Responsibility”
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4
Hart “Postscript: Responsibility and Retribution” & Feinberg “Problematic Responsibility in Law and Morals”
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5
Feinberg “Justice and Personal Desert” & “Action and Responsibility”
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6
Feinberg “The Expressive Function of Punishment” & “Sua Culpa”
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7
Ten, “The Utilitarian Theory” and “Retributive Theories”
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8
Ten “The Scope and Weight of Reasons for Punishment” & “Treatment Without the Excuses of Punishment”
Conference style paper due
9
Moore “Closet Retributivism” & “The Moral Worth of Retribution”
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10
Moore “Justifying Retributivism” & “The Independent Moral Significance of Wrongdoing”
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11
Shafer-Landau “The Failure of Retributivism” and “Retributivism and Desert”
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12
Duff “Consequentialists, Retributivists, and Abolitionists” & “Liberal Legal Community”
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13
Duff “Punishment, Communication, and Community”
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14
Duff Communicative Sentencing” & “From Theory to Practice”
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15
Sayre-McCord “Criminal Justice and Legal Reparations as an Alternative to Punishment”
Research paper due
2