The punishment's purpose

• Author: Gheorghe Diaconu
• Position: Faculty of Juridical and Administrative Sciences, the Law Department, University of Pitesti, Romania
• Pages: 133-138

The punishment’s purpose

Lecturer Ph.D. Gheorghe DIACONU

1

Abstract

The repr essive r eaction involves, as any human action, a certain finality. As the

punishment’s essence is the suffering, then, in the course of time i t has been arisen the

question r egarding the goal for which the society utilizes the suffering and for what the

society punishes. According to the classic pena l doctr ine that ba ses on the idea of

retribution, the repressive reaction was limited to a simple revenge and it didn’t existed any

concern in order to influence the doer’s future behaviour. In the positivist conception, the

punishment’s purpose was to shelter the society against the offender’s new att acks. Going

up to an extreme point with this idea, the positivists equated the punishment with the

curative t reatment at which the patients in the hospitals were submitted and which it was

adequate t o each category of offender. For the positivists, the penal sanction, it was meant

to combat the organic or the psychological anomalies or the dysfunctions of the socia l

environment that have influenced the offender a nd that determined him to commit

antisocial deeds. In the modern vision, the punishment cannot have a goal on its own and

that is to answer to bad with bad because it doesn’t come from an abstract desire for

revenge, but from a concrete necessity of hindering the repetition of the antisocial deeds

and of defending the fundamental social values.

Keywords: the punishment’s purpose; the classic penal doctrine; retributive character;

prevention; suffering; positivist vision.

JEL Classification: K14

As any human action that usually involves the existence of a purpose, the

repressive r eaction has a certain finality, too. If the punishment’s essence is the

suffering, then, in the course of time it has been arisen the question regarding the

goal for which the society utilizes the suffering and for what the society punishes2.

In the classic penal conception which is based on the idea of retribution, of

rewarding the bad with bad (of an irrational ba d that leads to the guilty p erson’s

suppression, the evil gives the expression of discontent and of the society’s

disapproval concerning the doer’s conduct), the punishment couldn’t have another

goal than the rewarding of the bad by suffering. This fact expressed the very limits

of the retributive system. If the punishment took into consideration only the evil

caused by the offence, the repressive reaction was reduced to a simple revenge

which was juridically disciplined. It didn’t exist any preoccupation in order to

influence doer’s future behaviour or the people around him. Only indirectly and

outside the penal law’s concern, it was admitted that the punishment would

probably serve for the collectivity to whom the punished person belonged.

1 Gheorghe Diaconu, Faculty of Juridical and Administrative Sciences, t he Law Department,

University of Piteşti, Romania, gheorghe.diaconu@just.ro

2 I. Tanoviceanu, Tra tat de drept penal şi procedur penal, third volume, Bucharest, 1924, p. 197.