Hello, I’m Zhan Qingyun.

After all the cases discussed lately, we can summarize: what is punishment for?

Dudley and Stephens offers its greatest lesson here. The Case of the Speluncean Explorers extends the questions it inspired about punishment’s purpose.

Does society gain anything by punishing people such as Dudley and Stephens?

Their acts occurred in an extraordinary setting. They were not ordinary violent offenders or cannibalistic monsters. Once returned to civilization, they would return to civilized behavior; it is hard to imagine repetition there.

Like Pi after reaching the coast of Mexico, they watched the tiger walk away without looking back.

The animal nature awakened by extreme conditions subsided.

Is punishment still worthwhile? That question also recalls Zhang Koukou.

He killed three people, but with a specific purpose. He spared elderly people and children in the Wang family and targeted three people connected to his mother’s death. His homicidal desire was triggered by a particular circumstance.

Does punishing such a person have value? To answer, we must ask what criminal punishment seeks. We have mentioned the issue in fragments; today let us summarize.

Theories fall into two broad camps. The first is utilitarianism, familiar not only in law but in economics, politics, and sociology. It says policy should maximize social happiness—the greatest possible happiness for the greatest number.

Jeremy Bentham, the leading British utilitarian thinker, applied the theory to law: law’s basic purpose is maximizing society’s happiness.

Punishment itself is bad because it causes suffering. But if a smaller evil prevents a greater one, it is justified.

Bentham also imagined potential offenders calculating utilitarianly: weighing pleasure or economic gain against the chance of capture and the cost after capture. Law should make the expected punishment exceed the benefit, so rational calculation discourages crime.

Utilitarian punishment has three main purposes. The first is deterrence and prevention.

Prevention has two levels. General deterrence punishes one offender to warn other potential offenders not to act similarly.

Specific deterrence targets the offender: punishment teaches that repeating the act will carry a cost.

Utilitarian reasoning creates difficulties.

Draconian penalties may indeed deter crime. If stealing five yuan brings ten years in prison, people will behave cautiously.