ABSTRACT
Violence thus consititutes a problem for modern society even when seen only in terms of criminal violence: when people add to this violence which does not primarily involve legal agencies it becomes clear that violence is appropriately a major cause for concern. Thus changes in the structure of local communities may mean that person who would once have dealt with a violence problem personally may now be more likely to involve the police. At one time, for example, an assault on a member of the family would, in many social groups, result in some other member of the family seeking out the offender and obtaining revenge directly. The problem here, of course, is that this would not necessarily be the pure effect of sentencing but may reflect deterrence of the would-be offender, the type of crime and type of offender as much. In any event, the length of prison sentence per se would not appear to have an enormous effect.
