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38627 results in Cambridge Textbooks

Page 1467 of 1932

  • 8 - Multiple offenders

  • Andrew Ashworth, University of Oxford
  • Book:
    Sentencing and Criminal Justice
    Published online:
    28 May 2018
    Print publication:
    20 August 2015, pp 272-293

  • Summary

    This chapter, like Chapter 6, deals with some of the problems posed by the sentencing of persistent offenders. Its focus, however, is on offenders who come before the courts in a different context. In Chapter 6 the main concern was with the sentencing of recidivists – those who are convicted repeatedly, despite the fact that they have experienced criminal sanctions. The main concern here is with offenders who commit a number of offences before they are detected and convicted, so that the court has to sentence them on one occasion for multiple offences. Not all these multiple offenders could be described as ‘persistent offenders’, for in some cases the offender has been involved in a single incident which gives rise to a number of charges and convictions. But many ‘multiple offenders’ are people who have been committing offences over a period of weeks, months, or even years before they appear in court, and they then face a number of charges. The criminal record of such multiple offenders may vary: some of them will be recidivists too, having experienced a number of criminal sanctions in the past, whilst others will fall into that seemingly incongruous category of ‘persistent first offenders’ – those who, when they are convicted for the first time, are convicted of several offences which show that they are accustomed to lawbreaking, if not to the criminal process.

    The focus of this chapter, then, will be on multiple offenders, some of whom are being sentenced for a number of offences arising from a single incident, but most of whom are being sentenced for offences committed at different times during the period before their court appearance. It seems that around half of all Crown Court cases and about a quarter of magistrates’ court cases involve two or more convictions, so there is no doubting multiple offenders’ centrality to sentencing. They give rise to difficulties both theoretical and practical, particularly in relation to proportionality. It is one thing to compare a residential burglary with a rape; it is quite another thing to draw comparisons of gravity between two, four or six residential burglaries and a single rape. Before tackling these problems, however, the various procedural methods of dealing with multiple offenders must be briefly explored.

  • 9 - Custodial sentencing

  • Andrew Ashworth, University of Oxford
  • Book:
    Sentencing and Criminal Justice
    Published online:
    28 May 2018
    Print publication:
    20 August 2015, pp 294-335

  • Summary

    This chapter presents a critical appraisal of the law and practice on custodial sentences. Imprisonment involves deprivation of liberty and is the most onerous and intrusive sentence available in this and other European countries, engaging several rights declared in the European Convention. Deprivation of liberty and incarceration in a punitive institution therefore require special justification. To begin that process, it is necessary to understand the practical meaning of custodial sentences. This depends on the various provisions for calculating the proportion of the nominal sentence that the offender will spend in custody, on the conditions in which prisoners are held, and on the terms on which they are later released. While the sentence handed down in court establishes the framework, there are exercises of discretion in the prisons and by the Parole Board that have powerful effects in determining the time actually served.

    The chapter begins with an outline of the state of English prisons. It then considers principles and policies for the use of custodial sentences, and moves on to an analysis of the statutory tests for imposing custody, and also the prevailing approach to long custodial sentences. The chapter concludes with a brief discussion of various groups of prisoners who raise particular issues of principle.

  • 5 - Aggravation and mitigation

  • Andrew Ashworth, University of Oxford
  • Book:
    Sentencing and Criminal Justice
    Published online:
    28 May 2018
    Print publication:
    20 August 2015, pp 163-204

  • Summary

    Some preliminary problems of principle

    The factors recognized as aggravating or mitigating have often been thought to be uncomplicated or uncontroversial, or (in the terminology of the English judiciary) ‘well known’ and ‘well established’. However, it will be argued in this chapter that many of them raise contentious issues. These issues assume particular importance for four reasons:

  • • several aggravating factors and one mitigating factor are statutory requirements under the Criminal Justice Act 2003, as we shall see;

  • • s. 166 of the 2003 Act reaffirms that the various statutory thresholds for imposing custodial sentences and community sentences should not be read as ‘prevent[ing] a court from mitigating an offender's sentence by taking into account such matters as, in the opinion of the court, are relevant in mitigation of sentence’ and

  • • s. 174(2) of the 2003 Act requires the court in any case to ‘mention any aggravating or mitigating factors which the court has regarded as being of particular importance’ and

  • • most sentencing decisions are now covered by guidelines; many guidelines indicate the significant aggravating and mitigating factors for the relevant offence(s), and the Sentencing Council's guidelines use some such factors at Step One when determining the appropriate category range.

    • For these four reasons, the analysis of the justifications for particular aggravating and mitigating factors becomes a more pressing task than may hitherto have been supposed. Moreover, the sentencing research by Hough, Jacobson and Millie shows that it was chiefly the influence of personal mitigating factors that often made the difference between a community sentence and a custodial sentence in cases ‘on the cusp’, and the Crown Court Sentencing Survey (CCSS) confirms that even the crude number of aggravating or mitigating factors is related to the probability and length of a custodial sentence.

    The restatement in s. 166 of the power to mitigate sentence is broadly framed, and immediately it raises the question whether justifications for taking account of some personal mitigating factors may be found outside the fundamental rationale of sentencing – which, as argued in Chapters 3 and 4, is that the sentence should be proportionate to the seriousness of the offence.

  • 10 - Non-custodial sentencing

  • Andrew Ashworth, University of Oxford
  • Book:
    Sentencing and Criminal Justice
    Published online:
    28 May 2018
    Print publication:
    20 August 2015, pp 336-376

  • Summary

    In Chapter 9 the close connection between custodial and non-custodial sentencing was often evident, particularly when discussing the statutory test for custody. The present chapter aims to examine the principal non-custodial measures available to English courts when sentencing offenders aged 18 or over. The discussion begins with so-called ‘third tier’ sentences (absolute discharges, conditional discharges and bind-overs, compensation orders and fines), and then moves on to the community sentence, as reshaped by the Criminal Justice Act 2003. First, it is necessary to consider the route by which the English system arrived at its present position.

    A brief history

    Successive governments between the 1960s and the early 1990s stated a policy of reducing the use of custodial sentences, and regarded the provision of new forms of non-custodial sentence as a key element in this strategy. Community service orders (and compensation orders) formed part of the 1972 Criminal Justice Act. New forms of probation order were introduced by a Schedule to the 1982 Act, the Act which also legislated for curfew orders on young offenders. The result was that courts in England and Wales had available a wider range of non-custodial measures than the courts of most European countries, most states in the United States and probably most countries in the world. What might be described as the policy of proliferation was not a conspicuous success. Simply widening the range of available non-custodial sentences did little to deflect courts from their use of custodial sentences. Changes in sentencing practice did take place, but these did not impinge significantly on the use of custody.

    It was lack of progress in that direction, combined with concern among sentencers about laxity in the enforcement of non-custodial sentences, that led to changes in the 1991 Act. The notion of ‘alternatives to custody’ had not been found convincing or even comprehensible by many sentencers: there was, they would say, nothing equivalent to prison, and certainly nothing in the available options. Major changes of direction were proposed in the 1990 White Paper: restraint in the use of custody for non-serious offences, a toughening of community sentences, more rigorous enforcement of community measures, and greater use of financial penalties. Perhaps the most important change was the abandonment of the ‘alternatives to custody’ rhetoric, and its replacement with the idea of punishment in the community, focusing on restrictions on liberty.

  • 11 - Ancillary orders and civil preventive orders

  • Andrew Ashworth, University of Oxford
  • Book:
    Sentencing and Criminal Justice
    Published online:
    28 May 2018
    Print publication:
    20 August 2015, pp 377-396

  • Summary

    This chapter sets out to discuss the ever-expanding range of ancillary orders available to courts at the sentencing stage, and to explore the also expanding range of civil preventive orders, breach of which may constitute a serious criminal offence. The chapter begins with a summary of the current sentencing framework, before going on to examine the range of privatory orders, reparative orders, and preventive orders that courts may make. The rationale for the various orders is then reassessed, before a concluding section on sentencing for breach of an order.

    The statutory sentencing framework

    The framework of sentencing established by the Criminal Justice Act 2003 (as amended) has been much discussed in Chapters 9 and 10 above, and the present summary eschews detailed statutory references in order to convey the essence of the decision-making scheme in respect of adult offenders, as set down in the legislation. The following sequence begins with the least onerous sentence and ends with the most onerous.

  • Is an absolute or conditional discharge sufficient?

  • Is the case suitable for a fine (which may be substantial enough to satisfy the community order threshold or come close to the custody threshold)?

  • Is the case serious enough to warrant a community sentence?

  • Is the offence so serious that neither a fine alone nor a community sentence can be justified, and therefore a custodial sentence is unavoidable?

  • If the case passes the custody threshold test, are there factors indicating that the sentence may be suspended or a community sentence given?

  • If neither of those alternatives is possible and an immediate custodial sentence is unavoidable, is the case one to which a minimum sentence applies, or is the case one in which it is appropriate to impose a dangerous offender sentence (life imprisonment or an extended sentence)?

  • If not, what is the shortest term commensurate with the seriousness of the offence?

  • Appendix A - Selected statutory provisions

  • Andrew Ashworth, University of Oxford
  • Book:
    Sentencing and Criminal Justice
    Published online:
    28 May 2018
    Print publication:
    20 August 2015, pp 461-464

  • Summary

    Criminal Justice Act 2003:

    s. 143 Determining the seriousness of an offence

    (1) In considering the seriousness of any offence, the court must consider the offender's culpability in committing the offence and any harm which the offence caused, was intended to cause or might foreseeably have caused.

    (2) In considering the seriousness of an offence (‘the current offence’) committed by an offender who has one or more previous convictions, the court must treat each previous conviction as an aggravating factor if (in the case of that conviction) the court considers that it can reasonably be so treated having regard, in particular, to:

    (a) the nature of the offence to which the conviction relates and its relevance to the current offence, and

    (b) the time that has elapsed since the conviction …

    s. 144 Reduction in sentences for guilty pleas

    (1) In determining what sentence to pass on an offender who has pleaded guilty to an offence in proceedings before that or another court, a court must take into account –

    (a) the stage in the proceedings for the offence at which the offender indicated his intention to plead guilty, and

    (b) the circumstances in which this indication was given.

    (2) In the case of an offence the sentence for which falls to be imposed under subsection (2) of section 110 or 111 of the Sentencing Act, nothing in that subsection prevents the court, after taking into account any matter referred to in subsection (1) of this section, from imposing any sentence which is not less than 80 per cent of that specified in that subsection …

  • 6 - Persistence, prevention and prediction

  • Andrew Ashworth, University of Oxford
  • Book:
    Sentencing and Criminal Justice
    Published online:
    28 May 2018
    Print publication:
    20 August 2015, pp 205-249

  • Summary

    This chapter examines the controversial question of sentencing repeat offenders, including the sub-group of ‘dangerous offenders’. After a brief historical introduction, part 6.2 explores four approaches to sentencing persistent offenders, and part 6.3 considers the relevant provisions of the Criminal Justice Act 2003. Parts 6.4 and 6.5 examine two specific problems, those of ‘professional’ criminals and of petty persistent offenders. In part 6.6 a different approach to repeated rule-breaking is examined – the use of civil preventive orders. Part 6.7 of the chapter turns to the question of selective incapacitation as a strategy for preventing crime, referring to the minimum ‘three strikes’ sentences in English law. In part 6.8 recent legislative attempts to provide suitable sentences for ‘dangerous’ offenders are assessed, and some concluding thoughts are found in part 6.9. Throughout these topics there are linking themes concerned with the promotion of security and the assessment of risk of future criminal behaviour. The invocation of such rationales amounts to a departure from the proportionality principle, and close attention will be paid to the justifications for this.

    Historical introduction

    The history of English measures aimed specifically at persistent offenders seems to be widely acknowledged as a history of failure. The judges have had sufficient discretion, for the last hundred years at least, to allow them to pass fairly long sentences on persistent serious criminals without invoking any special powers. But penal reformers and governments have invariably felt that no major set of reforms would be complete without making further special provision for persistent offenders. The Gladstone Committee in 1895 argued in favour of a special measure against persistent thieves and robbers, who would otherwise serve a succession of fairly short sentences and therefore return frequently to prey on the community. The Committee's proposals led, after much debate, to the Prevention of Crime Act 1908. This empowered a court to impose, upon an offender with three previous felony convictions since the age of 16, a sentence of preventive detention of between 5 and 10 years, in addition to the normal sentence for the crime (a so-called ‘double track’ system). The practical focus of the Act was soon revised when Churchill became Home Secretary in 1910.

  • 12 - Special sentencing powers

  • Andrew Ashworth, University of Oxford
  • Book:
    Sentencing and Criminal Justice
    Published online:
    28 May 2018
    Print publication:
    20 August 2015, pp 397-422

  • Summary

    This chapter deals with three sets of sentencing powers for particular groups of offender. It begins with the sentencing of young offenders under the age of 18, deals briefly with young adult offenders aged from 18 to 21, and then concludes with the various powers for dealing with mentally disordered offenders. In respect of each group, we will consider the justifications for separate sentencing powers, and the extent to which the rationale for special powers carries through into sentencing practice.

    Young offenders

    For over a century there have been different sentencing procedures for younger offenders. Those aged under 18 (before the Criminal Justice Act 1991, under 17) have been dealt with in different courts, formerly called juvenile courts and then renamed ‘youth courts’. There is a considerable literature about the development of sentencing policy in respect of young offenders, whereas the discussion here is necessarily briefer.

    A short history of juvenile justice

    Ever since 1933, the law has laid down that, in dealing with a juvenile offender, a court ‘shall have regard to the welfare of the child or young person’. This welfare ideology reached its apotheosis in the Children and Young Persons Act 1969, which sought to ‘decriminalize’ the juvenile court by regarding the commission of an offence as merely one way in which the court's powers to intervene for the welfare of the child could be activated. The legislation contemplated that children under 14 would be dealt with outside the criminal courts, and those aged 14–16 would only rarely be taken to court. The 1969 Act failed, however, to resolve the longstanding tension between the welfare ideology and the tougher, punitive approach. In 1970 there was a change of government, and some sections of the 1969 Act (notably the increase in the age of criminal responsibility from 10 to 14) were never implemented. In practice, the 1970s was a decade in which two apparently contradictory developments took place: the cautioning of young offenders increased, but so did the use of custodial sentences.

  • 14 - Sentencing, guidelines and the punitive state

  • Andrew Ashworth, University of Oxford
  • Book:
    Sentencing and Criminal Justice
    Published online:
    28 May 2018
    Print publication:
    20 August 2015, pp 445-460

  • Summary

    The purpose of this chapter is to draw together various themes emerging from the topics examined in the 13 substantive chapters, and to offer some concluding reflections. The chapter begins by returning to a fundamental issue – the role that sentencing should be expected to fulfil in criminal justice. The second topic is the relationship between rule-of-law principles and the sentencing process, examining the interplay between guidelines and judicial discretion in England and Wales and in some other jurisdictions. From this we move to the third topic of guidelines and penal moderation. Fourthly, we return to the struggle between the proportionality principle and the increasing reliance on the rhetoric of protection and risk and the proliferation of preventive orders in sentencing. In the fifth part, entitled ‘Stepping back from the punitive state’, the chapter concludes with a brief reassessment of the prospects for significant changes in the direction of sentencing policy in England and Wales.

    The responsibility of sentencing

    There is no doubt that the task of sentencing imposes a great burden on magistrates and judges. Many of them say that it is the hardest and most disturbing of judicial tasks. Given the momentous consequences it may have for offenders, in terms of deprivations or restrictions on liberty, that is as it should be. In the present context, however, a more significant question is what sentencers and sentencing should be held responsible for. Given the place of sentencers in the criminal process, would it be fair to assume that they are responsible for crime rates in society, or for the subsequent conduct of offenders?

  • 2 - Sentencing and the constitution

  • Andrew Ashworth, University of Oxford
  • Book:
    Sentencing and Criminal Justice
    Published online:
    28 May 2018
    Print publication:
    20 August 2015, pp 54-74

  • Summary

    Major changes in the sentencing field in recent years have raised several questions of a constitutional nature in this country and elsewhere. The position of sentencing in relation to the separation of powers has required clarification, particularly in the context of the legislative introduction of mandatory and mandatory minimum sentences. To what extent is the principle of judicial independence infringed by such developments? The advent of sentencing commissions charged with the creation of sentencing guidelines has raised questions about their place within the constitutional framework. The increasing prominence of fundamental rights has given rise to challenges to the compatibility of certain sentencing laws and procedures with those rights, notably those upheld by European Union law and by the European Convention on Human Rights. These and related constitutional issues are analyzed in this chapter, in the light of current controversies in England and Wales and elsewhere.

    The separation of powers in sentencing

    The doctrine of the separation of powers still has some relevance in British constitutional theory, but the place of sentencing has never been entirely resolved. In principle, the legislature has control over sentencing powers and policies – subject to the limitations of European Union law (see below) and also the European Convention on Human Rights (see below). The judiciary deals with the application of sentencing law and principles to individual offenders. The executive is responsible for carrying out the sentences imposed. But each of these propositions requires further discussion.

    One clear starting point is that the legislature has superior authority to the courts: if Parliament passes legislation, the courts must apply it. Thus, when Sir Ivor Jennings identified three characteristics of the English courts, the first was ‘their subordination to the legislature’. To accept this as axiomatic is not to suggest that the judiciary should not develop policy on matters left aside by legislation. Thus Sir James Fitzjames Stephen went too far when he stated that, if the judiciary were to take upon themselves the task of formulating principles of sentencing, ‘they would be assuming a power which the constitution does not give them’. The statement is only trivially true: it is unhelpful because the British constitution does not explicitly ‘give’ the power to any organ.

  • Preface

  • Andrew Ashworth, University of Oxford
  • Book:
    Sentencing and Criminal Justice
    Published online:
    28 May 2018
    Print publication:
    20 August 2015, pp xiii-xiv

  • Summary

    The five years since the publication of the fifth edition have seen further changes in the form of the English sentencing system, although one of the key features (the size of the prison population) has seen little change, unfortunately. There are four major sources considered in this book – legislation, judicial case-law, sentencing guidelines, and scholarly research and writing – and I have tried to take account of materials available to me on 1 December 2014.

    The pace of sentencing legislation has relented a little. There has been only one major statute, the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012; several other statutes on criminal justice have been enacted, but without bringing major changes to the sentencing system.

    Judicial case-law has continued to flow from the Court of Appeal (and, to a much smaller extent, from the Supreme Court), and full account is taken of judicial precedents in this new edition. A high proportion of case-law is now concerned with the application of sentencing guidelines, and that confirms the focus of the new edition.

    Definitive sentencing guidelines from the Sentencing Council are now at the heart of sentencing in England and Wales, and are therefore central to this edition. From Chapter 1 through to Chapter 14, there is analysis of the applicable guidelines, and mostly those created in the last four years by the Sentencing Council.

    Scholarly research and writing has also burgeoned, largely through the various initiatives of Julian Roberts, whom I am fortunate to have as a colleague. In the last few years he has edited and written in books of essays on a range of central topics in sentencing, and those essays – which have enriched analysis of the theory and practice of sentencing – are taken into account here, along with other recent writings.

  • 13 - Procedural issues at sentencing

  • Andrew Ashworth, University of Oxford
  • Book:
    Sentencing and Criminal Justice
    Published online:
    28 May 2018
    Print publication:
    20 August 2015, pp 423-444

  • Summary

    This chapter examines several procedural issues that arise at the sentencing stage at the Crown Court or in a magistrates’ court. Other types of court do exist or have existed, but without insisting on full procedural formality. For example, the North Liverpool Community Justice Centre opened in 2005 to provide a local focus to justice, combining the jurisdiction of a magistrates’ court, youth court, and Crown Court in combination with local problem-solving services. An evaluation found that, despite the extra resources at its disposal, the court did not reduce reoffending rates, although there was a higher proportion of drug offenders than at other courts. The Centre is due to close. There have also been six pilot Dedicated Drug Courts (DDC) across the country. These have the jurisdiction of a magistrates’ court and try to achieve continuity of the bench. However, an evaluation found that they were not more effective in reducing reoffending, and that much depended on the availability of good local services.

    This chapter considers general issues in sentencing procedure. Before sentence is passed in any case other than a minor summary one, there will usually be either a trial or, if the plea was guilty, a prosecution statement of facts. In some cases these provide the court with an insufficient basis on which to pass sentence: what is to be done? Again, what is the role of advocates for prosecution and defence in relation to sentencing, and what role should they play? When should pre-sentence reports be relied upon by sentencers? What are the various obligations on sentencers to give reasons for sentence, and to explain the effect of sentences? What place do victims have in the sentencing process, and what role should they have?

    The factual basis for sentencing

    Even after a full trial on a not guilty plea, the court may not have heard sufficient evidence on certain points to provide a proper factual basis on which to pass sentence. A carefully controlled trial will concentrate on the legal points at issue: if the offence is defined broadly by the law, some points relevant to sentence (e.g. provocation, knowledge of the class of drug possessed) might not be fully dealt with during the trial.

  • 4 - Elements of proportionality

  • Andrew Ashworth, University of Oxford
  • Book:
    Sentencing and Criminal Justice
    Published online:
    28 May 2018
    Print publication:
    20 August 2015, pp 112-162

  • Summary

    This chapter investigates the practical application of the proportionality principle in English sentencing. After examining the relevant statutory provisions, we begin an exploration of the concept of proportionality in practice and in theory. Part 4.2considers people's opinions about the relative seriousness of different offences, and part 4.3 discusses a possible theoretical framework for determining questions of offence-seriousness. Part 4.4 relates this framework to a selection of English offences: most of these are now the subject of guidelines, and one question will be how the guideline structure interprets proportionality. In part 4.5 we consider the variations in culpability, and part 4.6 presents some provisional conclusions on the elements of proportionality.

    The proportionality principle

    In 1990 the Home Office left no doubt that the intention behind the reforms which became the Criminal Justice Act 1991 was to introduce ‘a new legislative framework for sentencing, based on the seriousness of the offence or just deserts’. Arguing that both rehabilitation and deterrence have drawbacks as purposes of sentencing, the White Paper asserted that:

    If the punishment is just, and in proportion to the seriousness of the offence, then the victim, the victim's family and friends, and the public will be satisfied that the law has been upheld and there will be no desire for further retaliation or private revenge.

    As noted in Chapter 3.5 above, the 1991 Act failed to convey this message clearly, and led to some confusion. In the Criminal Justice Act 2003 the sources of confusion are much more plain to see, because, as noted in the previous chapter, s. 142 sets out five (conflicting) purposes of sentencing to which courts ‘must have regard’.

    However, other provisions of the 2003 Act appear to insist on proportionality of the sentence to the seriousness of the offence. Thus s. 143(1) states that ‘in considering the seriousness of any offence, the court must consider the offender's culpability in committing the offence and any harm which the offence caused, was intended to cause or might foreseeably have caused’. That leads on to the question of when, under the 2003 Act, seriousness is a relevant matter.

  • 3 - Modelling the Climate System

  • Hugues Goosse, Université Catholique de Louvain, Belgium
  • Book:
    Climate System Dynamics and Modelling
    Published online:
    26 January 2019
    Print publication:
    10 August 2015, pp 73-132

  • Summary

    OUTLINE

    Models are essential tools in climatology to understand the processes responsible for observed changes and to make predictions. After defining what is traditionally meant by climate modelling, this chapter presents the different types of models. Then the chapter briefly reviews the main characteristics of the components of those models. Finally, a discussion is provided of the methodology applied to test the performance of the models and to interpret their results in conjunction with observations.

    Introduction

    3.1.1 What Is a Climate Model?

    In general terms, a ‘mathematical model’ of the climate system is defined as a mathematical representation of the system based on physical, biological and chemical principles or laws. The equations derived from these laws are so complex that they must be solved numerically, leading to the formulation of a numerical or computer model (Figure 3.1). Such a model is used to perform simulations corresponding to realistic past or future conditions and idealised experiments. This is the reason why the term ‘climate simulator’ has been proposed to make a distinction between various types of models, such as physical, statistical or conceptual models (e.g., Crucifix 2012a). Nevertheless, we will keep here the classical denomination of climate model, which includes the following model equations (mathematical model) and the way these are solved (numerical model). This approach is largely practised in the field, keeping in mind that the word ‘model’ can have different meanings in different communities.

    Numerical resolution of the equations provides an approximation of the true solution, which is, in practise, discrete in space and time. This can be interpreted as if the numerical models give estimates of climate variables averaged over regions, whose size depends on model spatial resolution, and over specific time intervals, which are related to the time step. For instance, some models provide globally or zonally averaged values, whilst others have a numerical grid, whose spatial resolution could be less than 100 km (Figure 3.2).

  • Preface

  • Hugues Goosse, Université Catholique de Louvain, Belgium
  • Book:
    Climate System Dynamics and Modelling
    Published online:
    26 January 2019
    Print publication:
    10 August 2015, pp xi-xii

  • Summary

    The climate has a significant impact on life on Earth as well as on human activities. Temperature and precipitation strongly constrain the type of vegetation that can grow in a particular region. The design and location of houses depend on summer and winter temperatures and also on the probability of flooding. One single, late frost or a heavy hail storm could ruin an entire crop. Since the beginning of humanity, people thus have had to cope with climate and, if possible, to adapt to it. As a consequence, the various human civilisations have observed and tried to understand climate variations. They first provided mythological or religious explanations, often relying on weather lore to obtain forecasts. In parallel, climate has evolved as a science, elaborating more and more sophisticated representations of the observed phenomena. Such a description of climate now involves a very broad range of expertise corresponding to different domains of the sciences, including physics, chemistry, biology and geology.

    A comprehensive analysis of all the components of the climate system (i.e., atmosphere, ocean, ice sheets, land surfaces, etc.) and of all the interactions between them is beyond the scope of any course or book. Here I provide only a relatively brief overview of the processes that rule the behaviour of the individual components. More detailed descriptions are provided in meteorology, oceanography and glaciology textbooks, for instance, with some suggestions for reading given in the reference section. The focus of this book is on the interactions between the different elements of the climate system and on the main feedbacks that govern climate variability on all the time scales. On this basis, the first goal of this book is to analyse the dominant causes of past climate changes and to critically discuss the projections of climate change over the next centuries or millennia.

    Because of the complexity of the system, many analyses devoted to a quantitative estimate of climate change or climate variability rely on the use of comprehensive three-dimensional numerical models. Simple models are also widely applied to underline clearly the fundamental properties of the climate.

Page 1467 of 1932