Criminological School of Thoughts

The Classical School of Criminology

The starting point of a discussion of the  history of criminology is the concept  of the classical tradition in criminology, and the contribution of Cesare Beccaria and Jeremy Bentham. Cesare Beccaria (1738 – 1794). An Italian legal theorist and humanist, sought for the reform of the judiciary and penal system, which he considered irrational and unfair. His focus was the abolition of torture and capital punishment in protest against the severity of the penal law. His work draws freely from social contract theory that the state resulted from an agreement among society’s members to submit their individual rights voluntarily to the sovereign to rule in order to stabilize social relationship and safeguard individuals liberty and preservation of their lives and property. As such, authoritarianism has no place in social contract as the people have the right to overthrow an unjust government and establish a more equitable contract.

The classicists believed that human beings are naturally pleasure loving and would use their free-will (liberty) to choose acts that  bring pleasure (hedonism) to them  as against those that will bring pain and suffering. It was a basic assumption that criminal behaviour was essentially a rational act, following a deliberate calculation of the relative risk and gain involved. The offenders have a heuristic view that there were a lot of pleasurable outcomes and profit that will result thereof. This is the cost benefit analysis. That is, People are rational beings who engage in any act deliberately knowing the cost benefits. Human actions are not determined  by  inside or outside “forces” but can be seen as matters of conscious decisions and “free will”. Classical criminology is more interested in penology (societal reaction to law-breaking) than in reasons why people break the laws.

(i) The Utilitarian Principle

The principle of utilitarianism was derived from the economist notion of “utility”. Utility is defined as that quantity of goods and services, which make a desired usefulness, and satisfaction derived from it. Jeremy Bentham, then postulate that laws should have a “spirit” of utilitarianism,  that is, the laws should be made for  the greatest happiness for the greatest number in the society. Bentham argued that their violation would open the door to anarchy. He believed that individual weigh the probabilities of present and future pleasures against those of present and future pains. Thus, people acted as human calculators and they put all  factors into a sort  of mathematical equation to decide whether  or not to commit a crime. That is, if  the advantages of criminal acts, for example,  are greater than the disadvantages,  the probability of the crime will increase.

In order to deter people from law-breaking behaviour, the school advocated punishment painful enough to make such acts painful to criminal. He linked the classical theory of punishment with his utilitarian principle.  He  believed  that utility should be viewed from the perspective of how much pleasure or pains the  law generates. According to him, the objective of the law should be to attain, “the greatest happiness of the greatest number”.

(ii) The Theory of Punishment

Jeremy Bentham, an English reformer was not happy with the legal system in England in the 18th century. He made efforts to oppose the harsh and arbitrary punishment by the state to the accused persons. His main theory was that punishments for crime should not exceed what was necessary to maintain public order. He was against capital punishment and secret trials. To him, the English  legal system was barbaric and ineffective. He maintains that a punishment  involving brutality is unnecessary because it produces more pain than satisfaction. He became interested in equality before the law. A criminal  law  should be clear,  so that all could know and understand it. The accused should be given  adequate time and resources for his defence. Punishment should be quick, certain, and commensurate with the crime committed. He believes that the law exists to create happiness for all, thus since punishment creates unhappiness it can be justified if it prevents greater evil than it produces.

His assumptions about punishments were:

(a)      The punishment should be commensurate with the seriousness  of the wrong, that is, the punishment should be more than the pleasure derived...

(b)      Indeterminate sentences should be abolished. Particular crimes merit particular punishments, and offenders should know what they would get. In other

words, the given punishment should not be more than is necessary to deter the offence. .

(c)     Sentencing discretion should be sharply reduced. A system of standardized penalties should be introduced. There should be no discrimination and discretion.

The most significant of the classical thought was the idea of free-will .The concept of free-will is central to commit crime .The individual is believed  to be rational  and has the ability to choose between right and wrong, pleasure and  pain,  happiness and sadness; and so on. The classicists established that punishment should be designed to fit the crime committed .Its points of departure is the  juridical definition of crime, rather than the criminal behaviour.

  

 The Neo-Classical Model

The main proponent of the Neo-classical thought is Vanden Haag and R.  Bayer. The neo-classical school did not agree with the idea that human beings  are  naturally pleasure-loving animals who use their free-will to choose acts that will bring pleasure to them or for the purpose of maximizing pleasure. According to them, children, the insane, imbeciles, and morons cannot be said to exercise free- will rationally because of their defective mental ability. So they cannot be held responsible for any act they committed against the law of the land. That is, they believed that it would be an act of injustice if these set of people are administered punishment in the same category like the normal adult offender.

The point of contention to the Neo-classicist is that the classical  school erred in  the idea of a blanket punishment for the criminals. They therefore attempt to fill   the gaps left by the classical school. The Neo-classical school believes that extenuating circumstances should be taken into consideration before punishing a criminal. They maintained that punishment should therefore be based on full or partial responsibility, considering such conditions as the insane, imbeciles, and morons because of their defective mental ability. Therefore, it is impossible  for  this group of people to exercise free-will in committing crime.

REFERENCES

Carrabine, Eamonn, et al (2004). Criminology: A Sociological Introduction.

London: Routledge.

Ferdinand, Theodore N. (1966). Typologies of Delinquency: A Critical Analysis.

New York: Random House.

McGuire, Mike, et al, eds. (2002). The Oxford Handbook of Criminology. 3rd edition. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Neubeck, Kenneth J. and Davita S. Glasberg (2005). Sociology: Diversity,  Conflict, and Change. Boston: McGraw-Hill.

Williams, Hall J. E. (1984). Criminology and Criminal Justice. London: Butterworths.

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