Punishment deters when its expected cost merely exceeds crime’s benefit

Evidence

A crime is committed because it procures certain advantages. If one linked, to the idea of crime, the idea of a slightly greater disadvantage, it would cease to be desirable. ‘For punishment to produce the effect that must be expected of it, it is enough that the harm that it causes exceed the good that the criminal has derived from the crime’ — Michel Foucault, Discipline & Punish- The Birth of the…, 154

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Feigned punishment could deter crime without real suffering — Jeremy Bentham, The Panopticon Writings, 28; Punishment’s deterrent power migrated from visible spectacle to certainty of apprehension — Michel Foucault, Discipline & Punish- The Birth of the…, 45; Certainty, not severity, makes punishment deter because it fixes crime-punishment links in minds — Michel Foucault, Discipline & Punish- The Birth of the…, 157 (+6 more)

Related

• Certainty, not severity, makes punishment deter because it fixes crime-punishment links in minds (similarity 0.87)
• Punishment’s severity must aim at future prevention, not past harm (similarity 0.87)
• The real target of punishment is potential offenders, not the convict himself (similarity 0.86)
• Penalty operates through the idea of pain, not pain itself (similarity 0.85)
• Criminal punishment patterns lack deterrence or retributive logic (similarity 0.84)
• Raising penalty severity theoretically deters crime but complex systems prevent it (similarity 0.83)
• Feigned punishment could deter crime without real suffering (similarity 0.83)
• Punishment’s deterrent power migrated from visible spectacle to certainty of apprehension (similarity 0.82)
• Punishment is designed to maximize apparent suffering while minimizing real pain. (similarity 0.82)
• Punishment must make the crime-punishment code immediate in act and reality (similarity 0.81)
• The example shifted from terror to the decipherable lesson of crime and punishment (similarity 0.80)
• Penal reform aimed to increase punishment’s effects while lowering its costs. (similarity 0.80)
• Abstract legal codification deters crime by engineering a mental link between offense and punishment (similarity 0.80)
• Punishment’s primary audience is the non-criminal public, not the offender (similarity 0.79)
• Harsher penal measures show no connection to actual crime rates. (similarity 0.79)

Broader Connections

• Certainty, not severity, makes punishment deter because it fixes crime-punishment links in minds #qualifies (0.82) — Michel Foucault, Discipline & Punish- The Birth of the…, 157
• The real target of punishment is potential offenders, not the convict himself #expands (0.78) — Michel Foucault, Discipline & Punish- The Birth of the…, 177
• Crime can be redefined as tort requiring repair rather than retribution #complicates (0.75)