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Do Wrongdoers Have a Right to Make Amends?

Radzik, Linda
June 4, 2015

Source: (2003) Social Theory and Practice. 29(2): 325-341.

The recent literature on criminal justice has yielded an intriguing suggestion: that someone who does wrong has a right to make amends. In this essay, I will evaluate arguments for and against this claim with regard to cases of both criminal wrongdoing and private wrongs. I conclude that the balance of arguments speaks in favor of a right to make amends. This conclusion has ramifications for the just design of criminal sanctions, and these are also addressed. (author’s abstract).

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