The Coexistence of Structural Injustice and Individual Accountability

Shelby argues that imprisonment can be legitimate because criminal offenders possess rational agency, "Forewarned by the public legal proscription and equipped with the capacity for rational and free action, offenders had an adequate opportunity to avoid this unwelcome and unpleasant treatment. They could have refrained from serious wrongdoing but chose not to" (61). Yet he simultaneously acknowledges that "prisons are full of people who were socioeconomically disadvantaged prior to their imprisonment" (82) and that "much crime is a symptom of underlying structural injustices that demand redress" (53). I feel like there is a tension between these two facts. Shelby dismisses the objection that oppression compromises agency by noting that "skepticism about the agency of those who themselves have been victims is not, in any case, something Davis could consistently endorse, as she calls for social movements centered on achieving justice; and this call presupposes that human beings, including those who are oppressed, are ordinarily capable of recognizing and acting on considerations of justice" (63–64). However I believe there is a significant difference between the capacity for collective political action under conditions of shared activism, and the individual capacity to resist criminal behavior when facing material deprivation, or an environment saturated with violence. If someone is raised in a situation with no serious employment or educational prospects, and decides to rob a convenience store to feed their kids, is that a meaningfully autonomous choice? The structural injustices acknowledged in this argument extremely often lead to those in already oppressed circumstances being pushed down a path that leads to illegal action in a situation where it would be deeply harmful to them and their family (to which they have special obligations). I see why the recognition of this choice being agentically free is necessary when operating from a legal framework, however when holistically examining a situation as philosophically grounded as prisons, taking into account the full weight of structural causation seems to demand more than Shelby offers. The deeper question I think arises here is whether Shelby can coherently maintain both that structural injustice explains crime and that punishment for that crime remains fully legitimate.

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