Читать книгу Lectures on the Principles of Political Obligation. Reprinted from Green's Philosophical Works, vol. II., with Preface by Bernard Bosanquet онлайн

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L. The right of the state to punish.

176. (3) (See sec. 156). What right has the state to punish? The right to live in a community rests on the capacity to act for the common good, and implies the right to protect such action from interference

177. A detailed theory of punishment implies a detailed theory of rights. Here we can only deal with principles

178. Is punishment retributive? Not in the sense that it carries on a supposed 'right' of private vengeance, for no such 'right' can exist

179. The most rudimentary 'right' of vengeance implies social recognition and regulation, in early times by the family

180. And its development up to the stage at which the state alone punishes is the development of a principle implied from the first

181. But if punishment excludes private vengeance, how can it be retributory at all? And how can a wrong to society be requited?

182. When a wrong is said to be 'done to society,' it does not mean that a feeling of vindictiveness is excited in the society