Crime and Punishment in the Eyes of Cesare Beccaria An Analysis of an Enlightenment Penal Law Reform The Ph.D. dissertation is centred around a relatively concise, but extremely influential book: Cesare Beccaria's treatise On Crimes and Punishments (Dei delitti e delle pene). This work, first published in 1764, sums up in a clear, yet intellectually penetrating way all the main Enlightenment principles of a complex penal law reform. In its time, the book was not only of great philosophical importance and it not only changed the way western societies perceived crime and punishment, but it also served as a concrete guideline for various penal law reformers. It is therefore by no means an overstatement to say that it caused a true paradigm shift in both legal and moral philosophy. The main aim of the thesis is to give a legal-philosophical account of Beccaria's thoughts on crime and punishment, to examine their historical as well as moral background and show the actual impact they had on the legislation of many different, mainly European states. The first chapters of the dissertation are focused on Beccaria's life, his intellectual background and his formative influences (particularly the French, English and Scottish Enlightenment, the social contract theory, utilitarianism, Montesquieu's thoughts on penal...

Does the individual really matter in the post-modern world, brimming with countless signs and signifiers? My main objective in this writing is to demonstrate how this happens in Verhoeven's films, exploring his central themes and subtext and doing what science fiction does: hold a mirror up to the contemporary world and critique it, asking whether our species' current trajectory is beneficial or hazardous.; Dutch director Paul Verhoeven is a polarizing figure. Although many of his American made films have received considerable praise and financial success, he has been lambasted on countless occasions for his gratuitous use of sex, violence, and contentious symbolism--1995s Showgirls was overwhelmingly dubbed the worst film of all time and 1997s Starship Troopers earned him a reputation as a fascist. Regardless of the controversy surrounding him, his science fiction films are a move beyond the conventions of the big blockbuster science fiction films of the 1980s (E.T. and the Star Wars trilogy are prime examples), revealing a deeper exploration of both sociopolitical issues and the human condition. Much like the novels of Philip K. Dick (and Verhoeven's 1990 film Total Recall--an adaptation of a Dick short story), Verhoeven's science fiction work explores worlds where paranoia is a constant and determining whether an individual maintains any liberty is regularly questionable. In this thesis I am basically exploring issues regarding power. Although I barely bring up the term power in it, I feel it is central. Power is an ambiguous term; are we discussing physical power, state power, objective power, subjective power, or any of the other possible manifestations of the word? The original Anglo-French version of power means "to be able," asking whether it is possible for one to do something. In relation to Verhoeven's science fiction work each demonstrates the limitations placed upon an individual's autonomy, asking are the protagonists capable of independent agency or rather just environmental constructs reflecting the myriad influences surrounding them.