Ac 2.2

• AC 2.2 reparation

  Involves making amends for a wrong, they did to an individual, victim/society or both. harm done can be material or social.

  • Amends for material damage- financial compensation to victim, e.g. paying repairs, unpaid work, making amends imposed as compensation order through community payback, e.g. removing graffiti imposed as a community order
• AC 2.2 reparation

  Restorative justice- makes amends for social damage done, involves offender, recognising their wrongdoing can be done through restorative, justice, schemes that bring victim and defendant together, allows victim to explain, crimes impact, offender can appreciate harm, cause, express, remorse, and seek forgiveness, can bring victim closure and re-create defendant into society

  • Theory- labelling, favours restorative justice as a way of reintegrating offenders into society by allowing them to show remorse, it allows reintegration and prevents them from secondary deviance
• AC 2.2 reparation

  Functionalists, (Durkheim) argue ‘restitutive justice’- reparation to put things back to how they were before the crime was committed, is essential for the smooth functioning of complex modern societies

  • Criticisms-may not work for all types of offence, such as sexual/violent crimes (murder), some see reparation as too soft, a form of punishment that lets offenders off lightly
• AC 2.2 public protection

  incaptitation- punishment may be used to protect public from offenders by incapacitating them, removing physical capacity to offend again

  • There’s been many capitation policies, e.g. execution, cutting off hands (thieves), chemical castration (sex offenders), foreign travel bands (prevent football hooligans going to matches abroad) curfew/tag restricting movement
• AC 2.2 public protection

  Imprisonment- main form of incapacitation, important part of claim ‘ prison works’ because it takes defendant Out of society

  • In capitation for public protection has influenced sentencing laws, e.g. crime act 1997 in introduce mandatory minimum jail sentences for repeat offenders, e.g. seven years minimum for a third class, a drug trafficking, offence
  • Theory- biological (Lombroso) argued, criminals are biologically different from population and not able to rehabilitate, he favoured sending habitual criminals to exile. Other bio theorists favour chem castration for SA
• AC 2.2 public protection

  Theory – right realist, see in capitation as a way of protecting public from crime, smaller numbers of persistent offenders are responsible for the majority of crimes, so incipit them with long prison sentence would reduce crime rate significantly

  • Criticisms leads to longer sentences and rising prison, population, and high costs, it does nothing to deal with cause of crime or change offenders, it’s unjust because it imprisons them for crimes that the law assumes they may commit in the future
• AC 2.2 rehabilitation

  Definition- the idea that punishment can be used to reform offenders, so they no longer offended, rehabilitation use treatment programs to change defendants future behaviour by addressing the issues leading to their behaviour. Rehabilitation policies include:

  • Education and training programs, so they can avoid unemployment and earn an honest wage
  • Anger management courses for violent offenders, e.g. aggression, replacement, training, and other cognitive behaviour therapy programs
  • Drug treatment and testing orders that treat alcohol dependency
• AC 2.2 rehabilitation

  Rehab policies require attendance to want to change their lives but require lots of input and resources and professional support to help them achieve change, especially when offending leads to social exclusion

  • Theory- individualistic, sees rehabilitation as a significant aim of punishment, they advocate different ways of changing behaviour
  • Cognitive theories, favour, cognitive behaviour therapies to teach defendant to correct thinking errors/biased that leads them to criminal behaviour
  • eysenk- personality theory favours aversion therapy to deter offending behaviour
• AC 2.2 rehabilitation

  • Sociological theories – e.g. left realist favour rehabilitation because they see social factors like unemployment poverty and poor educational opportunities as a cause of crime so addressing this will help reduce offending
  • Skinner-operant learning theory, supports use of token economies to encourage defendants to do good behaviour
• AC 2.2 rehabilitation criticisms


  LR say rehabilitation has limited success as many offenders re-offend after doing programs aimed at changing behaviour

  • Marxist, say, rehab programs shift responsibility on individuals failings rather than on how capitalism leads to crime
• AC 2.2 deterrence

  Individual- uses punishment to deter the individual offender from reoffending, punishment convinces them that it’s not worth repeating Margaret Thatcher’s government introduced a tough new system and juvenile detention centres described as a short sharp shock like army to deter children

  • General- aim at deterring society, if public see individual, offender being punished, they will see what they would suffer if they commit a similar crime. Making a general example of the individual will teach everyone a lesson, e.g. public punishment in the past and now media reports
• AC 2.2 deterrence

  Severity V certainty- important to distinguish severity of punishment and certainty of punishment. E.g. how severe punishment is, if there’s a little chance of being caught, it will be unlikely to her criminals e.g., although there’s a three year sentence for burglary, only 5% of burglary reach conviction so it doesn’t deter as it’s unlikely to be caught

  • Theory- right realist=rational choice, way up cost/benefits severe punishments + likely to get caught = deterrence
  • Situational crime prevention, target hardening, makes it harder to commit offence so act as a deterrence
• AC 2.2 deterrence

  Theory- social learning theory (general) if people see friends being punished, they will be less likely to imitate behaviour

  • Criticisms – little evidence that short, sharp shocks, reduced offending, half offenders, reoffend within a year of release, deterrence assumes potential offenders, know what sentences are a different crimes
• AC 2.2 Retribution

  Definition- paying back, punishing offenders as vengeance for a criminal act

  • Just desserts – retribution based in the idea that offenders deserve to be punished and society’s morally entitled to take that revenge
  • Proportionality- punishment should fit the crime (eye for an eye) should be proportionate to harm done, this leads to a belief system/fixed scale of monetary penalty’s for different offences, e.g. fine for speeding
• AC 2.2 retribution

  Expressing moral outrage- although retribution may deter potential offenders, it’s real purpose is to express societies, moral condemnation, retribution is a justification for punishing crimes already committed, not preventing further ones, e.g. penalty for GBH is five years, but if it’s racially motivated it can be increased to seven years, reflecting societies greater outrage
• AC 2.2 retribution


  theory right realist theories like rational choice as retribution assumes offenders are rational actors who consciously choose to commit the crime and a responsible for their actions and suffer the outrage of society for their acts

  • For Functionalists like Durkheim the moral outrage that retribution expresses performs boundary maintenance, reminding everyone, the difference between right and wrong.
  • Criticisms can be argued offenders need forgiveness. due to fix tariff sentences punishment has to be inflicted, even when no good will come of it