A Justice Site
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CSUDH - Habermas - UWP
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California State University, Dominguez Hills
University of Wisconsin, Parkside
Created August 6, 2001
Latest update: August 6, 2001
jeannecurran@habermas.org
takata@uwp.edu
Collaborative Journal Entry by jeanne
Review and Teaching Essay by Jeanne Curran and Susan R. Takata
Copyright: Jeanne Curran and Susan R. Takata and Individual Authors: August 2001. "Fair use" encouraged.
This essay is based on a New York Times article on August 6, 2001: A Health Danger From a Needle Becomes a Scourge Behind Bars By David Rohde. New York Times. p.A1. August 6, 2001. backup backup2Once upon a time we didn't worry much about whose responsibility it was to not exploit or harm others. Incarceration seemed simple. Retribution it's called. You did something wrong. You pay for it. "If you can't do the time, don't do the crime." But life was considerably simpler then, and we managed to enslave whole continents of people following that logic. We didn't enslave indigenous people; we undertook the humanitarian cause of improving their lives. We will read passages of Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness, and speak of the ease with which we engage in collective denial of any responsibility for harm and social injustice in this world.
But those are fairly clear cut cases of imperialism, and surely incarceration is different. Oh, you mean they have done something wrong, those who are incarcerated? So they "deserve" their punishment? These are the philosophical issues that surround issues of criminal justice. What do we mean by justice in this context? Are we absolved of responsibility because they "have done something wrong'? Or are they to be punished because the state has sanctioned such punishment?
There are no easy answers to any of these questions. Rawls and Nozick differ strongly in their approaches to social justice. And here we deal with a variation on social justice for those who have engaged in what the state has defined as criminal. I have been in meetings with wardens and ex-felons, in which the wardens have stated that half of thoses who are incarcerated in their institutions should not be there. That's a whopping large margin for error, folks. And the warden is a fairly conservative voice in speaking for the criminal justice system.
In David Rohde's article we broach the issue of health. Does paying for the crime include exposure to a potentially fatal disease? Does the felon sacrifice all human rights? And so we return to our philosophical issues? What rights? What responsibilities?
New York Times backup, in case you can't get it.
