Hostname: page-component-7c8c6479df-24hb2 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-03-18T01:55:03.917Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

The restorative logic of punishment: Another argument in favor of weak selection

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  31 January 2012

Nicolas Baumard
Affiliation:
Philosophy, Politics, and Economics Program, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA 19104. nbaumard@gmail.comhttps://sites.google.com/site/nicolasbaumard/Home

Abstract

Strong reciprocity theorists claim that punishment has evolved to promote the good of the group and to deter cheating. By contrast, weak reciprocity suggests that punishment aims to restore justice (i.e., reciprocity) between the criminal and his victim. Experimental evidences as well as field observations suggest that humans punish criminals to restore fairness rather than to support group cooperation.

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2012

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

André, J. B. & Baumard, N. (2011) The evolution of fairness in a biological market. Evolution 65:1447–56.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Baron, J., Gowda, R. & Kunreuther, H. (1993) Attitudes toward managing hazardous waste: What should be cleaned up and who should pay for it? Risk Analysis 13(2):183–92.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Baron, J. & Ritov, I. (2008) The role of probability of detection in judgments of punishment. Unpublished manuscript.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Baumard, N. (2010a) Comment nous sommes devenus moraux: Une histoire naturelle du bien et du mal. Odile Jacob.Google Scholar
Baumard, N. (2011) Punishment is not a group adaptation: Humans punish to restore fairness rather than to support group cooperation. Mind and Society 10(1):126.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Boyd, R., Gintis, H., Bowles, S. & Richerson, P. (2003) The evolution of altruistic punishment. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA 100(6):3531–35. Available at: http://www.pnas.org/content/100/6/3531.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Carlsmith, K. M, Darley, J. M. & Robinson, P. H. (2002) Why do we punish? Deterrence and just deserts as motives for punishment. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 83(2):284–99.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Clutton-Brock, T. & Parker, G. (1995) Punishment in animal societies. Nature 373(6511):209–16.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Darley, J. M., Carlsmith, K. M. & Robinson, P. (2000) Incapacitation and just deserts as motives for punishment. Law and Human Behavior 24(6):659–83.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Evans-Pritchard, E. E. (1940/1969) The Nuer, a description of the modes of livelihood and political institutions of a Nilotic people. Clarendon Press/Oxford University Press. (Original work published in 1940; 2nd edition, 1969, Oxford University Press).Google Scholar
Fehr, E. & Gächter, S. (2002) Altruistic punishment in humans. Nature 415(6868):137–40. Available at: http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v415/n6868/abs/415137.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Glaeser, E. L. & Sacerdote, B. (2000) The determinants of punishment: Deterrence, incapacitation and vengeance. Harvard Institute of Economic Research Paper, No. 1894. (SSRN). Available at: http://ssrn.com/paper=236443.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gurven, M. (2004) To give and to give not: The behavioral ecology of human food transfers. Behavioral and Brain Sciences 27:543–59. Available at: http://journals.cambridge.org/abstract_S0140525X04000123.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Henrich, J. & Boyd, R. (2001) Why people punish defectors: Weak conformist transmission can stabilize costly enforcement of norms in cooperative dilemmas. Journal of Theoretical Biology 208(1):7989. Available at: http://linkinghub.elsevier.com/retrieve/pii/S0022519300922021.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Hill, K. & Kaplan, H. (1999) Life history traits in humans: Theory and empirical studies. Annual Review of Anthropology 28:397430.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hoebel, E. A. (1954) The law of primitive man: A study in comparative legal dynamics. Harvard University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Howell, P. (1954) A Manual of Nuer Law: Being an account of customary law, its evolution and development in the courts established by the Sudan government. International African Institute Publication. Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Malinowski, B. (1926) Crime and custom in savage society. Rowman & Littlefield.Google Scholar
Miller, W. (1990) Bloodtaking and peacemaking: Feud, law, and society in Saga Iceland. University of Chicago Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Polinsky, A. M. & Shavell, S. (2000) The economic theory of public enforcement of law. Journal of Economic Literature 38(1):4576.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Posner, R. (1983) The economics of justice. Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Sunstein, C., Schkade, D. & Kahneman, D. (2000) Do people want optimal deterrence? Journal of Legal Studies 29(1):237–53.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Trivers, R. L. (1971) The evolution of reciprocal altruism. Quarterly Review of Biology 46:3557. Available at: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2822435.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
von Führer-Haimendorf, C. (1967) Morals and merit: A study of values and social control in South-Asian societies. Weidenfeld & Nicolson.Google Scholar