Retributivism and Totality: Can Bulk Discounts for Multiple Offending Fit the Crime?

This chapter examines how multiple offenders seem to pose a problem for broadly retributive principles of sentencing, focusing on the proper place and exercise of discretion to show why such problems are only apparent. It begins with a discussion of the issue of multiple offending and the discretion it seems to give sentencers as well as the bulk-discount principle that appears to guide decisions. It then considers two ways in which bulk discounts may appear to conflict with retributive sentencing theory, the fittingness problem and the selection problem. It also analyzes the key guiding thought within retributive approaches to criminal justice and distinguishes between two types of retributivism, moralistic and legalistic. The chapter concludes with the argument that retributivism is compatible with common approaches to multiple-offense sentencing.