Criminal Justice Ethics: Previous Seminars

Semester 2 2009-10

Wednesday 27 January 2010  2.15 pm

East Reading Room, Wilberforce Building    

Organised jointly with the Centre for Criminology and Criminal Justice:

The Breakdown of the Pseudo-Pacification Process

In this paper Dr Hall explored how far ‘loss of control’ among working class men is a product of consumer culture and what issues this raises about moral responsibility for violence.

Dr Steve Hall

Northumbria University

'Loss of Control', 'Civilisation' and Responsibility

Commentary by

Dr Tony Ward

Law School, University of Hull

2009

THE ETHICS OF SELF DEFENCE
Monday 20 April 2009  2.15 - 4.30 pm
East Reading Room, Wilberforce Building  

Speakers:
Dr Suzanne Uniacke, Department of Philosophy, Hull University

Proportionality and Self Defence

Prof Victor Tadros, University of Warwick
The Moral Foundations of Self Defence

Proportionality and Self Defence

Suzanne Uniacke
Considerations of proportionality are significant to moral and legal appraisal in a range of contexts.  Dr Uniacke discusses proportionality in self defence and its relevance to justified self defence.  The discussion is relevant to the moral significance of proportionality more generally.

Proportionality is a widely accepted necessary condition of justified self defence.  What does proportionate self defence amount to?  What standard does proportionality invoke in this context?  Dr Uniacke argues against an influential view that holds that self defence is proportionate only if the harm that is fended off is (at least) equivalent to the harm inflicted on the aggressor.   She also discusses what gives rise to the proportionality condition and what role it plays in the justification of self defence.

The Moral Foundations of Self Defence

Victor Tadros
Many people think that a person is liable to be harmed in self defence in order to prevent a threat that the person poses or that the person has caused. For example, some people think that it is permissible to harm a person in self defence only in order to prevent that person violating a right of the person attacked. Others think that a person becomes liable to be harmed in self defence only if they are responsible (though not necessarily at fault) for the threat posed. Prof Tadros will challenge the view that being the cause of a threat is a necessary condition for being harmed in order to prevent that threat. The challenge, if it is right, gives rise to problems concerning the scope of liability to be harmed in self defence. He will explore how these challenges might be met, focusing on the role of time and the relationship between self defence and punishment.

2006

Wednesday 1 March
Tony Ward, Law School, University of Hull, English Law's Epistemology of Expert Testimony