"What is the meaning of punishment today? Where is the limit that separates it from the cruel and unusual? In legal discourse, the distinction between punishment and vengeance—punishment being the measured use of legally sanctioned violence and vengeance being a use of violence that has no measure—is expressed by the idea of ""cruel and unusual punishment."" This phrase was originally contained in the English Bill of Rights (1689). But it (and versions of it) has since found its way into numerous constitutions and declarations, including Article 5 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, as well as the Amendment to the US Constitution. Clearly, in order for the use of violence to be legitimate, it must be subject to limitation. The difficulty is that the determination of this limit should be objective, but it is not, and its application in punitive practice is constituted by a host of extra-legal factors and social and political structures. It is this essential contestability of the limit which distinguishes punishment from violence that this book addresses. And, including contributions from a range of internationally renowned scholars, it offers a plurality of original and important responses to the contemporary question of the relationship between punishment and the limits of law."
Edited by:
Amy Swiffen,
Joshua Nichols
Imprint: Routledge
Country of Publication: United Kingdom
Dimensions:
Height: 234mm,
Width: 156mm,
Weight: 453g
ISBN: 9781138347984
ISBN 10: 1138347981
Pages: 192
Publication Date: 14 August 2018
Audience:
College/higher education
,
Primary
,
A / AS level
Format: Paperback
Publisher's Status: Active
"""It’s Not Just a Good Idea, It’s the Law"": Rationality, Force, and Changing Minds Mark Kingwell Cruel and thus not Unusual: Jacques Derrida’s Seminar on the Death Penalty Michael Naas The Violent Rhetoric of Accusation: Cicero and the Marcus Ameleus Scaurus Case G. Pavlich The Colonialism of Incarceration Robert Nichols ""Ran away from her Master…a Negroe Girl named Thursday"": Examining Evidence of Punishment, Isolation, and Trauma in Nova Scotia and Quebec Fugitive Slave Advertisements Charmaine Nelson The Work of Death: Massacre and Retribution in Southampton County, Virginia, August 1831 Christopher Tomlins Civilising Missions and Humanitarian Interventions: into the Laws and Territories of First Nations Irene Watson The Rhetoric of Abolition: Continuity and Change in the Struggle Against America’s Death Penalty, 1900-2010 Austin Sarat, Robert Kermes, Adelyn Curran, Margaret Kiley, Keshav Pant ""Too wicked to die"": The enduring legacy of humane reforms to solitary confinement Kelly Struthers Munford, Kelly Hannah-Moffat, and Alex Hunter Nonviolent communion versus medieval ships of fools: Engaged-citizenry alternatives to Europe’s war on refugeesPablo Ouziel"
Joshua Nichols is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Public Administration at Dalhousie University, Halifax, Canada and a Fellow at the Center for International Governance Innovation. Amy Swiffen is an Associate Professor in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at Concordia University, Montreal, Canada.
