Why punish? How might one justify it? Is punishment, ultimately, good? This course will begin with the thesis that punishment, as a whole, is good: the rehabilitative and restorative traditions, along with relevant readings from thinkers like Kant and Hegel, articulate the moral and social benefits of punishment. A look to more instrumental utilizations of punishment will follow, including utilitarian and deterrent traditions and readings from Bentham and Machiavelli. Finally, critical historical genealogies of punishment in Nietzsche and Foucault will serve as a bridge to the covering violence inherent in mass incarceration and the alternative of prison abolition.