Rehabilitation or Retribution? Essay

The expectations of society for the criminal justice system are to avenge and rehabilitate individuals who thrust committed crime. Punishment and rehabilitation are 2 acknowledged objectives of the criminal justice system, Retri just nowion, which is based on an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth philosophy, simply means visitment and vengeance for what evils have done. season rehabilitation, as Nicholas Tan (1999) noned that is the idea of curing an offender of his or her criminal tendencies, of changing their habits, their outlook and possibly even personality, so as to make them less inclined to commit crimes in the future, the main(prenominal) aim of rehabilitation is to help prisoners to get close to skills in prison, so that when they re-enter into society, they can adapt quickly to the new environment.Debates everyplace these twain plans have lasted for a long time, many would argue that the main purpose of prison systems is to penalize people who have committed c riminals. While this should be the secondary function of prisons, the most important function should be rehabilitating criminals approve to the society, not just retribution. As a recent survey appearinged that over 60 percent respondents agreed that prison should reform prisoners, rather than punish them (Human Rights and Justice Studies, 2000). In this essay, it impart argue that rehabilitation is a more(prenominal) efficient way of life to help prisoners rather than retribution by illustrating advantages of rehabilitation. most(a) theorists throughout history have argued that the primary purpose of prisons is to punish criminals for what they have done, criminals should get punished when they break the law. When they are sent into prisons, as punishment, they sure do not have rights to watch TV, access to internet and so on. However, some people may disagree with this, because going into prison is already a punishment, criminals have already lost their freedom, they shoul d not suffer purposeless punishment by being denied other human rights while in prison.After all, punishment is not the ultimate goal of prisons, redemption from goof is the basic aim of prisons. The root of all crime is due to the inadequacy of education and training, if prisons preventoffenders from receiving education or learning information from outside, so after released, they may feel alienated from society and not be accepted by society, and employers will not employ those who do not have knowledge or job skills which will deteriorate the land site of recidivism. Therefore, rehabilitation should be the main purpose of prisons, for it promotes the humanizing belief in the notion that offenders can be saved and not simply punished (Nicholas. T.,1999).However, some people are afraid that if allow prisoners to peck education or access to internet may provide an environment to make get out criminals. Whereas Dr Paul Fauteck (2006) argued that the prison education programs a re not coddling criminals, society in general benefits from prison education programs. The basic aim of receiving education in prisons is to help them reintegrate and rehabilitate into society, so that they will not be alienated from society.Receiving education in prisons does not necessarily suggest prisoners will commit high technological crime after they get released, in other words, the possibilities for offenders to commit high technological crime after they receive prison education are quite remote, after all, in some cases, prisoners can be educated to understand why their actions were wrong, and be allowed tail end into normal society with the possibility of positively effecting society (Wikia, Inc., 2007). Contrarily, if prisons do not provide educational materials, then the possibilities for recidivism will be very bulky because of the rejection of society.While some dissenters controvert that rehabilitation is not efficient on helping criminals, because statistics have shown that more than half criminals got rearrested after they released about deuce or three years. In fact, criminal rehabilitation dos to constrain recidivism, it is a cost efficient form of crime prevention (Paul. F, 2006). For example, some medicine could work to cure some offenders, and indeed, the most recent studies show that they do work. Such programs include pro-social modeling programmes, and some sex-offender treatment programs.This search demonstrates that the net effect of treatment is, on average, a positive decline of overall recidivism (re-offending) rates of between 10% and 12%, which would promote a reduction in crime (Nicholas.T., 1999). From thisperspective, it is easy to say that rehabilitation helps to trim back the rate of recidivism, if prisons do not provide these treatments or knowledge, then zip fastener will ever change. Moreover, rehabilitation can also help them to sort out that being in prisons are disastrous which is a good way to stop them re- entering into prisons.Yet, rehabilitation and punishment are mutually exclusive goals, but they become more and more integrated in modern society, since the new-made 18th century prisons have combined elements of punishment with elements of rehabilitation. As the French philosopher Michel Foucault put it, punishment shifted over time from the disciplining of the body to the disciplining of the soul (Politics.co.uk, 2007). Therefore, internment sentences should provide for a set term of rehabilitation followed by a set term of punishment. Furthermore, rehabilitation and rehabilitation are both important, they should work together to punish and change criminals.To sum up, retribution theory heighten more simply on punishment which is very barbaric, and it should not be encouraged in modern society. While the notion of rehabilitation is more humanism and flexible, it can help prisoners by providing education and trainings, so the unfeigned aim of prison systems should rehabilitate and reform criminals, not simply punish them.REFERENCES_Crime_ (2007), cited from http//campaigns.wikia.com/wiki/CrimeNicholas Tan (1999), _Rehabilitation vs Retribution_, cited from international debate education association, http//www.idebate.org/debatabase/topic_details.php?topicID=307Paul Fauteck (2002-2006), crook rehabilitation-criminal recidivism rates, cited from http//www.going-straight.com/