Beccaria

Cesare Beccaria, a world renowned criminologist, was born on March 15th, 1738, in Milan. He grew up in a family of bluebloods, and attended a school for Jesuits. Since he was young, Beccaria had a talent for math. However, Cesare wanted to go in a different direction. He decided to study law at the University of Parma and received a degree in 1758. A job in the field of law was perfect for Beccaria, for he had anger management issues in his adolescence. Beccaria married his wife, Teresa di Blasco, at a very young age. The marriage was not supported by either set of parents, but the couple stayed together. After college, Beccaria devoted his life to the new age of the enlightenment in Western Europe. He went on to become a man who was well respected by many, for his ideas would change the way we live today.
Beccaria’s theories revolved around the topic of law. Beccaria was an enlightenment thinker, so his approach to the ideals of crime was new and exciting. Like all other philosophers of the time, Beccaria strode to abstain from a past of monarchs and looked toward a new beginning. In his treatise, On Crimes and Punishments, he gave way for social ideas regarding what the law should restrict. At the time Beccaria lived, the government was going through serious changes. Social contracts were being considered, and supported, by many. Cesare believed that the contracts were a grand thought. He knew that life is easier when a punishment is registered for a crime. That way, crimes can be prevented. Social contracts created societies in which these punishments existed. If one would join a contract, he or she would have to give up at least some free will for the goal of bettering a community. With social contracts, people lived in peace. Beccaria loved the idea, for, as he stated in his theorem, the greatest happiness is shared by the greatest number.
Cesare Beccaria had originally stated three basic ideas in his thesis. They were as follows: We, as human beings, are