No Shortcuts to the "End of History"

Pondering all the failed revolutions throughout the Third World over the last 50 years, the literary journalist Ryszard Kapuscinsci once offered this summary the lesson of the 20th century: There are no short cuts in history. Using force to try to accelerate social progress and political change before its time will fail.     

Cesare Beccaria: Utilitarian or retributivist?

Ever since Cesare Beccaria's On Crimes and Punishments first appeared in 1764, it has been common to regard its author as a theorist of criminal jurisprudence who stressed considerations of utility to the exclusion of considerations of justice. There is strong evidence for this view, and Beccaria was in many ways a forerunner of Bentham. There is, however, another side to Beccaria that has often been overlooked. In the way in which he established the right of the sovereign to punish and in his concern for the rights of the criminal (rights which no consideration of utility could override), Beccaria showed that he was much closer to the outlook commonly associated with Kant and Hegel than one would at first suspect. Though there were utilitarian aspects to his thought, Beccaria may be considered basically a retributivist who incorporated certain obvious, though by no means dominant, utilitarian themes into his work. In blending utilitarianism and retributivism, Beccaria was usually consistent, and he usually gave greater emphasis to the former.     

The false memory syndrome: Clinical/legal issues for the prosecution

Early trauma, especially alleged recollected sexual or ritualistic abuse, has dominated both the clinical and legal systems recently. The clinical/legal challenge is to discern between true abuse and false memories. Modern medical technology has provided new insights into the operation of the brain along with the central and peripheral nervous systems and their relationship to the endocrine system. We now have a better understanding of how our system processes trauma and severe anxiety. An understanding of trauma recollection and client's susceptibility to causal suggestions from the neuropsychological perspective is crucial when these types of abuses are alleged.