Conclusion

Abstract

Within the tradition of analytical philosophy, the basic movements of this book have been the following. First, a general analysis of responsibility was set forth, one which was grounded in and based on contemporary moral responsibility theory, and one which can be used in criminal justice contexts and which is congruent with the basic elements of a crime under U.S. law. The analysis provides philosophical substance to the content of the notion of desert. Desert is not some ephemeral concept which is a primitive and understood only by way of retributivist intuitions. Rather, the notion of desert is based on the concepts of moral and legal responsibility and all that they entail. I stopped short of discussing and ensnarling readers in the quagmire of brilliant philosophical discussion which separates various contemporary philosophers of moral responsibility theory. Instead, I provided a view of responsibility with which most philosophers could concur. Even if it turns out that the analysis provided herein is incomplete or somewhat incorrect, the retributivist position I present and defend herein is not contingent on the plausibility of a particular analysis of responsibility anyway. For whatever responsibility theory is the best, and most plausible, is the one to which my version of retributivism and desert must subscribe. Moreover, my theory of responsibility and punishment does not assume that there must be responsible agents, only that there are some. For all I know, each case of wrong doing is such that it is mitigated so that punishment would rarely, if ever, be justified. My purpose herein has been to articulate and defend analyses of responsibility and punishment for individual and collective agents such that, to the extent that any such agents are sufficiently responsible for wrong doings, they are to be punished in proportion to the harms they caused to others. In other words, persons who commit wrongs against others ought to get what they deserve within the confines of practicality and reasonableness. For what a wrongdoer deserves just is a function of what they are responsible for, considering possible mitigating factors obtaining, and what measure of hard treatment (both in kind of punishment and amount of it) ought to be meted out to them.