When we challenge collective punishment, defenders often fall back on one refrain: it works. They say it fosters accountability, motivates group norms, and deters misbehaviour. They claim it teaches responsibility. But what if these assumptions are not only unjust, but false?
A peer-reviewed study published in Scientific Reports dismantles this defence. Titled Measuring the efficacy of collective sanctions experimentally, the research tests whether punishing a group for one member’s actions leads to more cooperative behaviour. The findings are clear. It doesn’t. And in some cases, it backfires.
The authors conducted a public goods game in which participants could either cooperate or “free-ride.” When only the non-cooperative individual was sanctioned, cooperation increased. But when the entire group was punished for one person’s actions—mimicking the logic of collective punishment—overall cooperation decreased. Innocent participants became less motivated, more resentful, and less likely to work together. The punishment did not teach responsibility. It eroded trust.
This is not merely a theoretical issue. In British Columbia schools today, collective punishment is widespread. Students lose recess because one child was loud. Entire classes are denied field trips due to a few students’ behaviour. The many are penalised for the few. And all too often, disabled and racialised children bear the consequences most acutely.
This study matters because it proves what many of us know intuitively: injustice does not yield justice. When institutions punish everyone, they alienate the very people they claim to be teaching. They break solidarity. They disincentivise cooperation. And they entrench harm in the name of order.
As parents, students, and educators, we must demand better. Evidence-based policy. Trauma-informed practice. Individualised accountability. And above all, an ethical framework that never sacrifices the dignity of the innocent to discipline the guilty.
It’s not just a moral argument. It’s a scientific one.
