[lbo-talk] A Note on the Middle 75%

[Somebody Somebody]

Roman Republican law did not provide for iduicia populi, trial by the people, for all crimes, however. For private offenses, which is basically what's at issue in this discussion, the result of a guilty verdict was to be turned over to the wronged party who could enslave, kill, or imprison him (see Bauman, Crime and Punishment in Ancient Rome). Family justice isn't much of an advance over bourgeois legal norms. 

Personally, I disagree with Angela Davis and would consider "prison-like substitutes" such as house arrest and/or limited freedom of movement with electronic surveillance to be progressive reforms compared to the status quo. Prisons were the best that the 18th century bourgeoisie could come up with to manage the vagrants and landless poor of early capitalism. Technology, as in most other areas, will provide more humane alternatives.