NCJ Number
183423
Date Published
1998
Length
5 pages
Annotation
This analysis of the use of caning and corporal punishment in the Singapore criminal justice system notes that Singapore’s justice system is effective and that the western media has sometimes distorted Singapore and its government.
Abstract
Singapore’s penal code includes mandatory caning in addition to imprisonment for offenses such as theft or robbery. However, scholars and the media agree that the city-state of Singapore has little crime. The overall crime rates of the United States are 200-380 percent higher than those of Singapore, although the two countries do not formulate crime rates in the same way. Some media in the United States call corporal punishment barbaric and inhumane, but do not report that the United States Supreme Court has upheld the practice of corporal punishment by teachers and administrators when all other methods have failed. The United States permits juvenile capital punishment as well. The legal systems of both countries rest on the English system of common law; the courts hold all people equally accountable in all common-law countries. Therefore, the concern about the caning of Michael Fay in Singapore is misplaced. People in the United States do not have a right to condemn Singapore for a punishment the United States also uses and should recognize that the United States has the highest crime rates of any industrialized country, a high incarceration rate, and a poor record of rehabilitation. 4 references