How a criminology concept became the backbone of the U.S.'s Cold War strategy

"The verb deter was coined in the English language in the 16th century from the Latin deterreo (to frighten) and first applied systematically in 18th- and 19th-century criminological texts. During the 1850s, the English criminologist T.B.L. Baker invented the noun form deterrence to capture an idea about the effects of actual and potential punishment on criminal thought and behavior. Early criminologists believed that criminals who possessed what the utilitarian philosopher (and early deterrence theorist) Jeremy Bentham called "rational agency""

"Modern criminologists argued that punishments such as prison sentences should not be seen as they had been in an earlier age: as acts of moral retribution or as efforts to reform the criminal. Punishments should be seen as "deterrents": rational tools to prevent crime by warning would-be criminals about what to expect for committing similar infractions. As one criminological textbook explained in 1912, the "theory of deterrence" prescribed punishment "not because wrong has been done but in order that wrong may not be done.""

Deterrence entered English from Latin deterreo in the 16th century and later became central to criminological thought. During the 1850s T.B.L. Baker coined the noun deterrence to describe the effects of actual and potential punishment on criminal thought and behavior. Early theorists, drawing on Jeremy Bentham’s notion of rational agency, held that potential offenders would respond to the fear of punishment. Modern criminologists reframed punishment as a preventive instrument rather than moral retribution or reform. Theories emphasized proportionate punishments and argued that certainty and swiftness of punishment mattered more than severity. Beccaria advocated matching punishment to crime; later writers reiterated that severity alone was not decisive.

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