Punishment And Modern Society: A Study In Social Theory

By David Garland

This analysis of the punishment of offenders argues that the social meaning of punishment is poorly understood and needs to be explored if we are to discover ways of punishing that match our social ideals better than current punishments do.

The analysis emphasizes that the institutional framework of modern penology tends to narrow our perceptions of punishment and also to obscure its social ramifications. Thus, it is crucial to understand the major theoretical perspectives on punishment. These include Durkheim's emphasis on punishment's moral effects, Foucault's view that disciplinary punishments operate as power-knowledge mechanisms within broader strategies of domination, the cultural approach of Robert Elias, and the Marxist perspective. The analysis concludes that each approach represents an incomplete, but useful perspective on different aspects of punishment and that future discussions should consider punishment to be a complex social institution that should be analyzed as part of mainstream sociology.

Chicago. The University of Chicago Press, 1990. 308p.