Sher, George2019-05-172019-05-172018-122018-11-19December 2Burkett, Daniel. "Punishment by Agreement - A Contract-Based Argument for the Moral Permissibility of Punishment." (2018) Diss., Rice University. <a href="https://hdl.handle.net/1911/105905">https://hdl.handle.net/1911/105905</a>.https://hdl.handle.net/1911/105905Punishment necessarily involves the infliction of harm, and therefore requires us to treat wrongdoers in ways that it would clearly be wrong to treat others. Traditionally, this harm is justified on the basis of either (1) the Consequentialist claim that punishment maximises the good for the wider community, or (2) the Retributivist claim that wrongdoers simply deserve the harm they receive. However, both theories are subject to well-known objections. Specifically, there are a variety of cases in which each theory either punishes the innocent, or fails to punish the guilty. This leads some authors to the controversial conclusion that punishment is never morally justified. I propose an alternative solution: I argue that the moral permissibility of punishment should instead be based on the fact that each wrongdoer has agreed to her punishment. Specifically, I argue that it will be morally permissible to punish an individual P under a particular punishment practice X so long as—at some prior point—P simultaneously (i) had good reason to agree to X, and (ii) gave some kind of agreement to X. I then argue that (i) will be met where an individual can expect to benefit from the implementation of a punishment practice, and—more controversially—that (ii) can be satisfied by the existence of hypothetical agreement. I reflect on the practical implications of this theory by applying it to a number of real-world crimes, and demonstrating how it can go about prescribing specific punishments for particular offences. I conclude by showing that the Contractarian theory is well-equipped to avoid the objections commonly levelled against traditional theories of punishment, and that—for this reason—it provides a promising solution to the problem of punishment.application/pdfengCopyright is held by the author, unless otherwise indicated. Permission to reuse, publish, or reproduce the work beyond the bounds of fair use or other exemptions to copyright law must be obtained from the copyright holder.PunishmentContractarianismContractAgreementMoral PermissibilityThesis2019-05-17