Deterrence Essay

833 Words2 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Major theories of criminal behavior

All beings with a sense of understanding learn how to make choices, even in its smallest measurement, they also learn of consequences to those choices. Children, for example, have been told countless times to stop a certain behavior because they may hurt themselves. Some children heed their parent’s warming’s while others continue down a path that usually ends with a painful lesson but the originating act is usually not repeated. Why can this not be the same for adults? Generally it is understood that a person will make a choice or take an action based on the possible outcomes or consequences. Combining the notions of decision making with criminal behavior, one would find that a path has been made to the idea of deterrence. Kubrin, Stucky, and Krohn (2009) explain that deterrence encompasses the ideas that an individual will weigh his or her options in reference to a criminal act and will make a choice based on the perceived risks. Those perceived risks are consequences or fears of being punished. …show more content…

People who engage in criminal behavior weigh the possible risks of consequences against the possible gain in rewards. What really tips the scale in this gamble of criminal behavior is the certainty and severity of punishment (Kubrin, Stucky, and Krohn 2009). There can be a problem with this idea, are those who commit illegal acts rational thinkers? The theorem for deterrence and rational choice consists of the following: the guarantee of punishment could lower criminal behavior, the severity of consequences will also reduce criminal acts, and swift discipline will avert further criminal behavior from offenders (Kubrin, Stucky, and Krohn

Show More
Related

  • Theories That May Explain Crime in Germantown Avenue Communities in Philadelphia

    2015 Words  | 5 Pages

    Houser, K. (2014). Nature of Crime, Deterrence Theory. Lecture conducted from Temple University, Ambler, Pa.

    Read More

  • Analysis of the Case of Andrea Yates

    875 Words  | 2 Pages

    Pratt, T. C. (2008). Rational Choice theory, criminal control policy, and criminology relevance. Policy essay, 43-52.

    Read More

  • Crimes and Social Deviances in the 1990s

    638 Words  | 2 Pages

    There are many views on crime and deviance and many theories to why they occur.

    Read More

  • Rational Choice, Deterrence, Incapacitation and Just Desert

    1470 Words  | 3 Pages

    Rational Choice, Deterrence, Incapacitation and Just Desert In seeking to answer the question, "Why do people engage in deviant and/or criminal acts?", many researchers, as well as the general public, have begun to focus on the element of personal choice. An understanding of personal choice is commonly based in a conception of rationality or rational choice. These conceptions are rooted in the analysis of human behavior developed by the early classical theorists, Cesare Beccaria and Jeremy Bentham. The central points of this theory are: (1) The human being is a rational actor, (2) Rationality involves an end/means calculation, (3) People (freely) choose all behavior, both conforming and deviant, based on their rational calculations, (4)

    Read More

  • Rational Choice Theory: Approach To Situational Crime

    1557 Words  | 4 Pages

    Situational crime prevention is an idea criminologists use in order to reduce the chances of crime initially taking place. This theory does not aim to punish criminals after the crime has taken place like the criminal justice system does, but however the opposite, it aims to reduce the chances of the crime taking place to start with. Ron Clarke (2005) describes this theory as an approach that aims to reduce the opportunities out there for crime, involving rational choice theory. Clark focuses on three methods within this theory, directing at specific crimes, altering the environment we live in and aiming to reduce the benefits of committing crimes.

    Read More

  • The Death Penalty Should Not Exist in Today's Society

    944 Words  | 2 Pages

    There is a common knowledge that capital punishment would prevent people from committing crime. But until now, there has not been any actual statistics or scientific researches that prove the relationship between the capital punishment and the rate of crimes. According to Jack Weil, “criminals, who believe that their chances of going to jail are slight, will in all probability also assume that their chances of being executed are equally slight. Their attitude that crime pays will in no way be altered” (3). Most people commit a crime when they are affected by the influence of drugs, alcohol or even overwhelmed emotions, so they cannot think logically about they would pay back by their lives. Also, when criminal plan to do their crime, they prepare and expect to escape instead of being caught. Some people believe that the threat of severe punishment could bring the crime rates down and that capital punishment is the ultimate crime deterrent. However, in fact, the rate of ...

    Read More

  • How Does The Fear Of Crime Influence Criminal Justice

    872 Words  | 2 Pages

    This paper will be focusing on the courts as the specific sub-system in the criminal justice system. As said in the book the court system is responsible for charging criminal suspects, carrying out trials, and sentencing a person convicted of a crime. The fear of crime influences criminal justice policies in the court system. One way it does this is with the courts sentencing. Courts are able to give out severe punishments as a method of deterrence. This specific type of deterrence would be general deterrence. The book says that general deterrence theory should work if the punishment is clear, severe, and done swiftly. According to this theory, crime rate should drop because people will fear the punishment. The other way fear of crime influences

    Read More

  • Herbert Morris's Theory Of Punishment

    1614 Words  | 4 Pages

    She makes two points of difference between the views of deterrence and the moral education theory. First, in the moral view of education, the state is concerned to educate its citizens morally so they will not choose the wrong behavior (Hampton, 276). Secondly, the criminal is not to be used for social engineering (Hampton, 276). The second point is important. Deterrence justification of punishment is often used as a warning or an example to others to not do this action. Eventually, that would be a side effect of any public form of punishment which the moral view of education does not rule out. However, deterrence’s means to the end is a social purpose, using the criminal as the

    Read More

  • Issues In The Australian Prison System

    1360 Words  | 3 Pages

    The major goal of the Australian prison at the beginning of the 20th century was the removal of lawbreakers from their activities in society (King, 2001). The Australian legal system relies on deterrence (Carl et al, 2011, p. 119), that is, a system that has two key assumptions: (i) specific punishments imposed on offenders will ‘deter’ or prevent them from committing further crimes (ii) the fear of punishment will prevent others from committing similar crimes (Carl et al, 2011, p. 119). However it is not always the case that deterrence is successful as people commit crime without concern for punishment, thinking that they will get away with the crime committed (Jacob, 2011). Economists argue that crime is a result of individuals making choices

    Read More

  • Writing Assignment 1

    731 Words  | 2 Pages

    According to Radelet & Borg (2000), deterrence was, in the past, the most frequently-cited reason for arguments in support of the death penalty. The claim stems from a belief that potential criminals will be less likely to commit severe acts of violence if they know that those who carried out similar crimes before them were put to death – in much the same way that heads on pikes at the gates of a city were intended to deter criminal activity in the Middle Ages. Recently, however, many studies have concluded that the death penalty offers no significant deterrent effects, and the few which claim to find support for these effects have received substantial criticism (Radelet & Borg, 2000). The majority of both criminologists and law enforcement officers surveyed expressed that they do not believe the death penalty offers any difference in the amount of violent crimes committed (Radelet & Borg, 2000).

    Read More

  • The Rational Choice and Biological Trait Theories

    1763 Words  | 4 Pages

    The rational choice theory comes from the classical theory which is based off of personal choice towards criminal behavior. Criminal behavior under the rational choice theory has been due to the free thinking of society and has always been because of a specific thought process of personal vendettas. For example, a jealous person may feel the need to do something physically illegal like punching another person in the face because the benefit of gratitude is worth the risk of consequence. The example above is part of the rational choice theory and the reason is because that particular person weighed the costs and benefits of their illegal action. Rational choice theory is a vision where crime is a functionality of the decision-making process of the criminal in which they weigh the costs and benefits of an illegal act in society (Siegel, 2011).

    Read More

  • Pros And Cons Of Retribution

    537 Words  | 2 Pages

    Deterrence – is connected to punishment where it is a way to let a person who has committed a crime know and to let the rest of society or those looking to commit a crime know it will not be tolerated or accepted and there is the possibility of some form of punishment. (Stojkovic and Lovell 2013) If a person or society sees what can happen if they commit a crime by seeing what happens to others then they are more likely to obey the laws and live an honest lifestyle.

    Read More

  • Death Penalty Essay

    1506 Words  | 4 Pages

    Between 1977 and 2010, an estimated 8,000 people were on Death Row in the US and out of those 8,000, more than 1,200 were actually executed (Siennick, 2012). Policy makers and scholars have been especially interested in whether the death penalty serves a crime-control function by deterring prospective murderers (Siennick, 2012). This debate on whether or not the Death Penalty is an effective deterrent is important to our society because we need to understand the impact of this ultimate and final punishment. Expectations of deterrence follow from the basic idea that potential murderers decide whether to kill after considering the benefits and costs of killing (Siennick, 2012). The Death Penalty as punishment can be a deciding factor to a potential murderer when they make the decision whether to kill someone or not. There is assorted evidence on whether or not this happens and there isn’t a chosen method to gather data that fully supports this idea.

    Read More

  • The Death Penalty is a Necessary Deterrent to Crime

    1720 Words  | 4 Pages

    effective deterrent. In Schonebaum, S.E. (Ed.), Does capital punishment deter crime? (pp. 87-96) San Diego, CA: Greenhaven Press, Inc.

    Read More

  • Justifications for Punishment in Modern Society

    1614 Words  | 4 Pages

    Deterrence suggests that people are “deterred” from a crime by the threat of punishment. In other words, people won’t commit a crime if the ramifications that were to follow are so severe. Deterrence comes in two flavors, specific and general. Specific deterrence refers to the “threat of punishment” being directly aimed towards a particular individual who has already committed the crime through actually experiencing the punishment first hand. An example of this may be, being convicted of a crime and as a result being sentenced to so many years in jail or prison. However, in order for it to be successful, the “previously ...

    Read More

More about Deterrence Essay

Open Document