Abstract
Debates on the normative character of a system of criminal law have focused on a contrast between ‘forward’ and ‘backward’ looking positions. In the former case a policy is adopted if it facilitates a goal related to a future state of affairs. Thus, a crime prevention policy is forward looking since it is designed to reduce future crime rates. In contrast a ‘backward looking’ policy is one where policy is governed by reference to actions undertaken in the past. If an offender is sentenced according to the ‘gravity’ of his offence this past action governs the disposition.
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Notes
Glanville Williams, A Textbook of Criminal Law (Stevens & Sons, 1978) p. 624.
See C. Demuth, “Sus”: A Report on the Vagrancy Act of 1824 (Runnymede Trust, 1978) pp. 41 and 43.
J. Rawls, ‘Two Concepts of Rules’ in H. B. Acton (ed.) The Philosophy of Punishment (Macmillan, 1969) p. 113; emphasis in the original.
C. S. Lewis, ‘The Humanitarian Theory of Punishment’, Res Judicata vol. 6 (1953) p. 225.
Cf. D. Thomas, Principles of Sentencing, 2nd edn (Heinemann, 1979) pp. 18–29.
For examples of the role of reference to offending in a formally welfare oriented jurisdiction, see A. Morris and M. McIsaac, Juvenile Justice (Heinemann, 1978) pp. 133–6.
B. Wooton, Crime and the Criminal Law (Stevens & Sons, 1963) pp. 102–3.
R. Pickett, House of Refuge (Syracuse University Press, 1969) p. 175.
C. Godwin, ‘Rules of Procedure’ in F. M. Martin and K. Murray (eds) Children’s Hearings (Scottish Academic Press, 1976) p. 119.
H. Morris ‘Persons and Punishment’ in On Guilt and Innocence (Univ. of California Press, 1976) p. 34.
Cf. A Von Hirsch, Doing Justice (Hill & Wang, 1968) p. 47
J. Finnis, Natural Law and Natural Rights (OUP, 1980) p. 264.
D. J. Galligan, ‘The Return to Retribution in Penal Theory in C. F. H. Tapper (ed.) Crime, Proof and Punishment (Butter-worths, 1981) pp. 157–8.
On the weakness of an emphasis on outcome in a retributive context cf. S. Schulhofer ‘Harm and Punishment’, University of Pennsylvania Law Review, vol. 122 (June 1974) pp. 1467–609.
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© 1983 Antony Cutler and David Nye
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Cutler, A., Nye, D. (1983). Forward and Backward Approaches to Criminal Law. In: Justice and Predictability. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-05987-4_1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-05987-4_1
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