If you are in or about New York City on November 4, please consider attending The Retributivist Tradition And Its Future at St. John’s University School of Law.  The conference will take up many of the chapters in Retributivism: Essays on Theory and Policy (Mark D. White, ed., 2011).  My own small contribution to the conference, which I’m still chewing over, might be titled something like, “The Retributivst Tradition As Its Future.”

The conference description follows and the program is after the jump.  Hope you can make it. 

Retributivism as a justification of punishment is a very old idea, with sources in ancient codes of religious law and morality. After a period of dormancy in the 20th century, retributivism is now ascendant again as a theory of punishment, as scholars have reinterpreted the commitment to just desert in novel and provocative ways.

This conference, The Retributivist Tradition and Its Future, brings together leading thinkers in punishment theory to reflect on retributivism’s past and present, with an eye toward what retributivism and punishment theory generally might become. Many of the speakers are also contributors to the recently published volume, Retributivism: Essays on Theory and Policy (Mark D. White, ed., OUP 2011), which will also be considered at the conference.

8:30-9:00         Registration/Breakfast

9:00-9:15         Welcome: Dean Michael Simons (St. John’s University School of Law)

9:15-10:45       Panel I: Conceptualizing Retributivism

    Panelists: Michael Cahill (Brooklyn Law School)

    Dan Markel (Florida State University School of Law)

    Kyron Huigens (Cardozo Law School)

    Discussant: Youngjae Lee (Fordham University School of Law)

     Moderator: Matt Lister (Villanova Law School)

10:45-11:00     Break

11:00-12:30     Panel II: Philosophical Perspectives on Retributivism

    Panelists: Sarah Holtman (University of Minnesota, Philosophy)

    Jane Johnson (Macquarie University, Philosophy)

    Mark White (CUNY, Political Science, Economics, Philosophy)

    Discussant: Ekow Yankah (Cardozo Law School)

    Moderator: Larry Cunningham (St. John’s University School of Law)

 12:30-1:30       Lunch

 1:30-3:00         Panel III: Retributivism and Policy

     Panelists: Mark Tunick (Florida Atlantic University, Political Science)

    Luis Chiesa (Pace Law School)

    Marc DeGirolami (St. John’s University School of Law)

 

    Discussant: Adil Haque (Rutgers School of Law – Newark)

    Moderator: Elaine Chiu (St. John’s University School of Law)