Argument: Flogging will be over-utilised, rehabilitation will be under-utilised

The “packaging” of flogging with a revitalised approach to rehabilitation that proposition suggests may be a feasible response to some crimes, but politicians are much more likely to treat the lash as a panacea for any activity or trend that affects the public’s confidence in the justice system.

The public and the mass media are not inclined the probe the depths of criminal sentencing. Criminals are hard to sympathise with, and public confidence rests largely on the visible aspects of a sentence – has a criminal been locked away? Will they be closely monitored on release? Has a criminal received a sufficient number of lashes? As a consequence, as with custodial sentences, cutbacks to reform programmes can be achieved with little objection, leaving only the empty and brutal gesture of flogging itself. Political reality will neutralise the aspirations of the proposition

Lawmakers are currently too keen to invoke imprisonment as a response to crime. They are likely to be just as hasty in ordering the use of whipping as a sanction for criminality. A 1995 US Department of State Report on the use on penal practices in Singapore noted that 3244 sentences had incorporated caning [i] . A subsequent Department of State briefing published in 2008 stated that the Singaporean judiciary had handed down 6404 sentences that included either mandatory or discretionary use of caning [ii] . The corporal sentences handed down to Malaysian women that were discussed above were widely held to have been influenced by a clamp-down on “moral” offences mounted by the Malaysian judiciary [iii] .

Flogging will not prevent politicians from making grabs for political capital by criminalising the ill-judged actions of otherwise harmless, well-adjusted and compliant members of society. Moreover, law makers are likely to discount or overlook the close link between flogging and rehabilitation that the proposition case is dependent on.

[i] “Singapore Human Rights Practices, 1994”, US Department of State, February 1995, http://dosfan.lib.uic.edu/ERC/democracy/1995_hrp_report/95hrp_report_eap/Singapore.html

[ii] “Singapore”, Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor, US Department of State, 11 March 2008, http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/hrrpt/2007/100537.htm

[iii] “Malaysia canes women for adultery”, Al Jazeera English, 18 February 2010, http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia-pacific/2010/02/201021844619366612.h

Candidate 1: "The opposition is unable to conclusively prove that the growth in the prison population and the reduced effectiveness of rehabilitation is a direct result of over-criminalisation.

It may be true that the list of non-traditional crimes is expanding, but the harm that the resolution is seeking to address arises in the prison system, not in politician’s manifestos.

The majority of offenders imprisoned in the USA and the UK have committed genuine crimes, albeit of a petty or non violent nature. Once exposed to the prison system the criminal tendencies of these individuals are entrenched, rather than eliminated. The prison system does not transform unwitting and harmless offenders into criminals – it makes criminals out of desperate, poorly socialised or ignorant offenders. The prison system harms those placed in its care because it is no longer able to carry out its rehabilitative objectives.

The failure to rehabilitate those convicted of “ordinary” criminality impacts on the prison system itself, when recidivism and social exclusion lead to offenders being repeatedly convicted.

The root cause of the problems in the status quo is not the creation of too many crimes, but a failure to accept the contemporary reality of crime and criminal behaviour. Flogging would allow policy makers to engage with this reality, while satisfying the fundamental need to see wrongdoing punished.

The danger posed by over-inclusive corporal sentences is neatly eliminated by the balancing of judicial and legislative power in liberal democracies. Judges are given discretion in order to allow them to mitigate the effects of atavistic, unreasonable, disproportionate or populist manipulations of the law. If a judge believes that flogging would be excessive or unnecessary, given the nature of an offence, he will usually be free to hand down a different sentence."
Candidate 2: "Flogging harms offenders less than imprisonment

The criminologist Peter Moskos [i] observes that most of us, if given the choice, would opt to receive ten lashes rather than spend five years in prison. Paradoxically, a significant number of us would condemn corporal punishment as barbaric and inhumane. If imprisonment is a more rational response to criminal behaviour, why would so many rational individuals opt to receive corporal punishment?

Contemporary prisons are the result of a failed utopian experiment. They serve no useful rehabilitative purpose, and exist only to fulfil a common desire to punish deviant behaviour and to segregate criminals from the public at large. Prisons harm inmates and obstruct attempts to reintegrate them into society. It may be necessary to incarcerate certain compulsive and habitually violent criminals, but for a majority of offenders, prison only serves exacerbate underlying social, economic and psychological problems that lead to criminality.

Using corporal punishment to reduce or replace custodial sentences would provide an effective way to fulfil the social need to punish criminals, while removing the harmful externalities of mass incarceration. Strictly supervised whipping or caning can adequately and proportionately express society’s anger with the criminal, while avoiding the dangers of long-term incarceration and reinvigorating the use of rehabilitation.

In the United States, the UK and many European countries, prison populations have increased dramatically, but reductions in rates of offending have been minimal or non existent. In the absence of funding, or coherent, centrally administered rehabilitation strategies, prisons have become places devoid of productive activity. Prisoners are not encouraged to address the causes of their offending, or to acquire skills that will help them to live independently in society following their release. Boredom, overcrowding and under-staffing have led to the emergence of gang- and drug-cultures in many prisons. Inmates incarcerated for minor offences quickly become complicit in gang violence, or fall prey to alcoholism and drug addiction. Gang associations and chemical dependencies carry over into inmates’ lives once they are released. The prison system serves only to breed criminality, not to cure it.

The cost of incarcerating the average offender in the United Kingdom is estimated to be £45000 a year [ii] . Reduced spending on incarceration can be used to fuel an increase in spending on detoxification, rehabilitation and restorative justice schemes. Moreover damaging effects of prison will not cancel out the positive effects of rehabilitation.

The physical injuries resulting from whipping, although painful, are less severe than the subtler damage wrought on inmates by imprisonment.

[i] “In Defense of Flogging”, The Chronicle of Higher Education, 24 April 2011, http://chronicle.com/article/In-Defense-of-Flogging/127208/

[ii] “Tough on Crime, Tough on Criminals”, The economist, 23 June 2011, http://www.economist.com/node/18867740"
Candidate 3: "As distasteful as debaters, moral philosophers and constitutional lawyers may find it, society still has a need to punish criminals. Although it seems to lack logic or reason (inflicting suffering on a criminal cannot be recompense for what he has taken, and may even prevent him from properly compensating his victim), a criminal justice system which does not punish will not command the confidence of the public.

If a criminal justice system is unable to command the confidence of the public, alternative methods of addressing criminal behaviour will be sought. Eliminating the role of punishment in criminal justice would put our entire judicial system at risk.

The resolution calls for a minimal and carefully controlled use of force by the state. This use of force is necessary in order to provide protection for the state’s citizens in the long term – by leaving the prison system free to treat and control offenders who are truly violent and dangerous, and by preventing the social exclusion of non-violent offenders.

While a state should endeavour to demonstrate the virtues of non violence and compromise, it can also fail in its duty to its citizens by being negligent of the needs of offenders, and wilfully ignorant of the most effective solutions to criminality."
Candidate 4: "Custodial sentences make recidivism more likely

A custodial sentence is capable of destroying the relationships and livelihood of an offender. Imprisonment means that an offender will be unable to work and will lose his job, if he has one. Statistics sourced from the Pew Foundation indicate that a criminal record can reduce the likelihood of a black, male American securing a job by up to 57%1. The isolation inherent in imprisonment can lead to the breakup of marriages and to the decay of relationships between parents and children. The stigma associated with a custodial sentence may result in an offender being shunned by his friends, his family and his community. He will, in effect, be left with no sources of support once he is released. A former inmate will be left with no incentive to adjust his behaviour and disengage with criminality2. The Pew Foundation notes that 43% of offenders in the United States were returned to prison within three years of release1.

The long-term damage done to an offender's life is not an intended consequence of custodial sentencing. However, it cannot be claimed to be a proportionate response to crime, as it affects both serious offenders and those accused of non-violent offences such as burglary or fraud. The decay of an offender's relationships and social support structures is yet another harmful externality of custodial punishment.A corporal sentence caters to the social imperative to punish criminals, but it also allows offenders to remain with their families and to avoid financial hardship by remaining in employment. In Moskos' own words, corporal punishment allows society to express its disapproval quickly and efficiently, leaving the offenders to "move on" with the process of reform.

It is in the interests of any effective system of rehabilitation to ensure that a non-violent offender remains in contact with their family and remains in employment (excepting, of course, offenders who have attack or abused family members). Families, spouses and social networks can play an important role in supporting and encouraging an offender to engage with rehabilitation programmes. Wives and children can effectively monitor an offender's behaviour when trained staff are unavailable, integrating the reform process with the offender's day to day life.

1 "Tackling Recidivism: They All Come Home", The Economist, 20 April 2011, 2"A Plague of Prisons: The Epidemiology of Mass Incarceration in America". Drucker, E. The New Press"
Candidate 5: "Prison reform is politically unachievable

The failures of the prison system are tolerated within political culture and by the public, partly because the privations of the prison environment are seen as a suitable punishment for criminal behaviour. Deprivation of liberty and the emptiness of criminal life are seen as retribution for criminals' dishonest or violent activities.

Politicians dare not confront the damaging effects of imprisonment for fear of being labelled as "soft" on crime. There is greater political cache to be gained from introducing policies that prolong prison terms, and remove judges' discretion to order non custodial sentences. Novel approaches to the problem of criminality are seen as signs of political weakness.

The use of monitored corporal punishment will keep offenders who have not committed serious crimes out of the prison system. At a nominal rate of five lashes for every year of incarceration, flogging will serve as a clear demonstration of societal disapproval, satisfying popular conceptions of retributive "justice". Once the need to punish is satisfied, policy makers will be free to institute new rehabilitation schemes that address the root causes of criminal behaviour; these schemes can be set up without sacrificing political capital or appearing to prioritise the rights of criminals over victims or the public."
Candidate 6: "There is political capital to be gained from adopting a hard line stance on law and order issues, but there is also political capital to be gained from showing that a particular policy has had a positive effect on reoffending. The Pew Foundation report cited above has also determined that some 90% of US voters were in favour of reducing the length of prison sentences and "strengthening" probation and parole systems1.

The opposition assumes that politicians are interested only in cheap, hollow, short term solutions to problem. However, a large number of policy makers are genuinely public spirited, with a sincere interest in solving long-standing social problems. The adversarial nature of politics tends to prevent politicians from seeking elaborate or novel solutions to such issues. Spending money on intangible rehabilitation programmes will always provoke more criticism than spending money on training more police officers.

The resolution allows politicians to engage with the novel solution to criminality offered by rehabilitation while at the same time meeting a general demand for criminals to be visibly and strictly punished for their actions.

There will be a cynical minority of politicians who will see the dramatic nature of flogging as an opportunity to disguise cuts to reform programmes. Equally, there will be others who will use corporal sentences as an opportunity to address and resolve the politically intractable problem of criminal deviance.

1 "Tackling Recidivism: They All Come Home", The Economist, 20 April 2011,"
Candidate 7: "Imprisonment punishes offenders' families

Even though liberal democratic systems of justice continue to place an emphasis on punishment rather than rehabilitation, sentences are still required to be proportionate to the crime that they punish. Further, a sentence must only punish those judged responsible for the crime. Collective punishment and guilt by association are not tolerated within rational, liberal systems of criminal law.

Imprisoning or fining an offender often places an intolerable burden on the offender's family. If the offender is a breadwinner, the family is denied the income that he would otherwise provide. They may be forced to use inadequate benefit systems. Other members of the family may be forced to take up a second job, adversely affecting childcare arrangements. Any fines that an offender is ordered to pay are often impact upon his family, damaging household budgets and forcing other family members into debt.

The negative effects of a custodial sentence extend beyond the offender himself. Financial and social deprivation may have a minimal impact on an offender while his is imprisoned, but may cause considerable suffering within his family. Sudden social isolation and poverty have themselves been shown to provoke criminality and increase childhood deviance.

Corporal sentences allow a punishment to be targeted only at the criminal, not at their families."

There is political capital to be gained from adopting a hard line stance on law and order issues, but there is also political capital to be gained from showing that a particular policy has had a positive effect on reoffending. The Pew Foundation report cited above has also determined that some 90% of US voters were in favour of reducing the length of prison sentences and "strengthening" probation and parole systems1.

The opposition assumes that politicians are interested only in cheap, hollow, short term solutions to problem. However, a large number of policy makers are genuinely public spirited, with a sincere interest in solving long-standing social problems. The adversarial nature of politics tends to prevent politicians from seeking elaborate or novel solutions to such issues. Spending money on intangible rehabilitation programmes will always provoke more criticism than spending money on training more police officers.

The resolution allows politicians to engage with the novel solution to criminality offered by rehabilitation while at the same time meeting a general demand for criminals to be visibly and strictly punished for their actions.

There will be a cynical minority of politicians who will see the dramatic nature of flogging as an opportunity to disguise cuts to reform programmes. Equally, there will be others who will use corporal sentences as an opportunity to address and resolve the politically intractable problem of criminal deviance.

1 "Tackling Recidivism: They All Come Home", The Economist, 20 April 2011,
