Kohlberg's Moral Development Stages

The issues within criminal justice over the years have become vast. Prospectively, these complications are caused by government officials, police officials, and civilians. Several attempts have been made to rectify these concerns, but minimal progress has been made with current approaches. In hindsight, Kohlberg’s moral development stages are deemed a possible solution to the ills of criminal justice. Furthermore, there are three stages of Kohlberg’s moral development. Within each stage are two levels. They all explain how an individual assimilates through these stages from having no “cognition of morality, to learned morals that are from laws and codes, to thinking beyond conformity and rules that guides the beliefs in how one is expected
The first stage discussed by the proponent in the stage of preconventional morality is punishment and obedience orientation. In brief, this stage debates that an individual’s first moral attribute stems from observing authoritative figures. To simplify, the person in question has no knowledge of what is right or wrong and is subjected to punishment as a consequence of his or her act of the behavior, whether moral or immoral. The second stage is instrumental purpose and exchange orientation. During this phase the individual’s self-interests are the only things that matters. Henceforth, if the situation is in their favor it is right. The third and fourth stage under conventional morality categorizes the individuals understanding of morality by external contributors such as: parents, an educational institution, order orientations, and laws. At this level Kohlberg states that people rarely go beyond the next step due to conforming to the aforementioned contributions. However, under post-conventional morality, people are beginning to develop an understanding of the “independent” moral principle. The fifth and sixth stage begins by setting a platform describing important events. The fifth refers to the social contract or legalism. The belief is that these persons sought out to analyze from an independent view of others moral values. Though, they are not one hundred percent in with the norm, they adhere to these normalities to avoid a problematic life. In contrast, the sixth stage illustrates a hire purpose to evaluate morals form an ethical