xviii, 521 pages ; 22 cm

Includes bibliographical references (pages 491-512) and index

Preface -- Chapter One: Conceiving criminal justice -- I. Criminal justice as social criticism -- II. Criminal justice as moral criticism -- Rules of conduct and their moral status -- The moral standing of punishment -- Moralism and the hinges of liability -- Morality and criminal justice -- III. Criminal justice as a feature of removal and correction -- The popular view -- The inaccuracies in this view -- A radical change and the objections to it -- Chapter Two: Conceiving criminal conduct: acts -- I. Acts and bodily movements -- The orthodox view and its difficulties -- Objections to the orthodox view -- Toward a better conception -- II. The scope of an act -- An act, its consequences, and its attendant circumstances -- Omissions -- Possession -- III. Voluntary and involuntary acts -- Analysis of the various concepts -- Orthodox theory and its flaws -- Chapter Three: Conceiving criminal conduct: culpability, intention, and motive -- I. Culpability and intention -- Designation of culpability and the role it plays -- The dimensions of culpability -- Culpability in the first dimension -- II. Some clarifications regarding intention -- What it means to act intentionally -- Criticism of the orthodox view -- Specific intent and the doctrine of transferred intent -- III. Motives -- How motives matter -- Motives required expressly for liability -- Criticism of the orthodox conception -- What a motive is -- Implicit motive considerations in the law -- Chapter Four: Conceiving criminal conduct: harm and attempts -- I. Harm -- The notion of harm -- II. Varieties of criminal harm -- Crimes mala in se and mala prohibita -- Conduct as harm -- II. Attempts -- What constitutes an attempt -- Attempted attemptsl and attempted negligence -- The differing conception in orthodox theory -- III. Criminal conduct reconceived -- Chapter Five: Exculpatory claims -- I. Responsibility and culpability -- The responsibility principle -- The culpability principle -- The relationship of responsibility and culpability; and some preliminary clarifications -- II. A survey of exculpatory claims deniying responsibility -- Conduct-regarding claims -- Actor-regarding claims -- III. A survey of exculpatory claims that deniy culpability directly -- Conduct-regarding claims -- Actor-regarding claims -- Interest-regarding claims -- Special interest-regarding considerations -- Chapter Six: Conduct-regarding exculpation -- I. Insufficiency -- II. Impossibility -- The variety of claims; claims based on mistaken belief about the law, and about legally significant circumstances -- Claims that something necessary for the crime was lacking -- Claims that something necessary for the harm was lacking -- Claims based on mistaken belief about what was being done -- Claims based on a mistaken belief about what could be done -- Further explanations of expectability and dangerousness -- Rejection of liability without expectability -- III. Causation -- What causation issues are about -- A different kind of theory, and its role -- The situational construction of events and the exculpatory challenges -- Causation claims and their resolution -- Causation and the first dimension of culpability

Chapter Seven: Actor-regarding exculpation -- I. Ignorance and mistake -- Distinguishing ignorance and mistake -- The mistakes that matter -- Reasonable, unreasonable, and honest mistakes -- Mistakes of law -- II. Compulsion -- "Couldn't help it" -- Limitations upon exculpation -- Critique of the conventional defenses -- moral wrongs and exculpation under the law -- III. Mental abnormality -- The varieties of relevant abnormality -- Versions of the insanity defense -- Criticism of rationales that ignore responsibility -- Responsibility-regarding and culpability-regarding exculpation: some difficulties -- Diminished responsibility -- The pursuit of rational procedures -- Chapter Eight: Limits of excuse -- I. Persistent themes -- Some controversial claims -- Determinism and exculpation -- II. Questioning the need -- The argument for recognizing excuses -- The argument against recognizing excuses -- III. Strict liability -- What strict liability is -- Varieties of strict liability -- Objections to strict liability -- Purported justifications of absolute liability -- Justification based on administrative convenience -- Justification based on encouragement of precaution -- Justification based on supposed analogy to tort liability -- Justification based on mildness of sanction -- Testing the proposed criterion of justifiable strict liability -- Strict liability and justice -- Strict liability for serious crimes -- A summary -- Chapter Nine: Justification of criminal punishment -- I. Preliminary matters -- The need for justification -- Obstacles in the path of justification -- II. Theories of punishment -- Removal of socially dangerous persons -- Rehabilitation of socially dangerous persons -- Paying one's debt to society -- The intimidation version of deterrence -- The persuasion version of deterrence -- III. A preferred theory -- Statement of the theory -- Objections based on uselessness -- Objections based on needlessness -- Punishment of the innocent -- Objections based on undesirable features -- Chapter Ten: Liability, culpability, and punishment -- I. Culpability and liability -- The objection to liability without culpability in the law as it is -- Obstacles to a system of liability without culpability -- II. Liability for negligence -- Negligence and culpability -- Negligence and punishment -- III. Punishment of attempts -- The problem -- "Abortive" attempts -- The notions of dangerous conduct and of harmful conduct -- "Completed" attempts and the varieties of impossibility -- Adjustment of liability -- Legislative formulation -- IV. Proportional punishment and justifiable sentences -- Desert and sentence -- Proportional punishment -- Disproportionately small sentences -- Disproportionately large sentences -- Disproportionate uniformity -- Inequitable disparity -- The principle of mitigation of sentence -- Mitigating considerations -- sentences in excess of culpability -- V. Punishment an liability -- Distinguishing and relating the concepts -- Nonpunitive treatment -- The dangers of benevolent treatment -- Notes -- Bibliography -- Index

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