法律制裁的历史回归

探寻法律制裁的起源并勾勒其演进脉络,不仅可以透视法律制裁的发生机理,而且可以把握法律制裁的发展规律。法律制裁在历史长河中,不仅有线性的流逝,而且有循环的转化;不仅有各种法律制裁方式产生与灭亡的烙印,而且有同种法律制裁方式由轻至重又由重转轻的轨迹。社会文明进步的标志之一就是法律制裁方式由严酷走向轻缓:从摧残生命的酷刑最终转向以补偿和定纷止争为内容的纠纷解决,从而使法律制裁回归历史的起点。

The Historical Return of Legal Sanctions

By pursuing the origin of legal sanctions and sketching their evolution track, this article probes into the formation mechanism of legal sanctions, and thus grasps the historical circle along which they evolved. During their historical voyage, legal sanctions experienced both one-way development and circulatory transformation. They also witnessed all kinds of measures of sanctions coming into being and passing away, stamping their respective brands, and the same measure of sanction leaving a track evolving from light punishment to severe one and then from severe one back to light one. As one of the symbols of social cultivation and progress, measures of legal sanction are changing from severe punishment to light punishment, that is, from the severe punishment destroying lives to the dispute resolution which is characterized by compensation and dispute settlement, thus the legal sanction returned to the primitive starting point of the history.