Confusion is often associated with sentencing aims and methods, the choice and completeness of sentencing rationales, the relevance of sentencing principles and policies, judicial independence, and unlimited judicial discretion. Although widespread satisfaction has not always been one of the achievements of sentencing reform, sentencing is a high profile form of public decisionmaking that encompasses a wide range of cases and circumstances. Members of the public, politicians, and judges have come to expect sentencing systems to influence crime rates. Nonetheless, tensions have developed between academicians and sentencing practitioners as to what sentencing systems should accomplish. Those who study sentencing should look at sentencing theory, sentencing rationales, ways to structure sentencing that support the rule of law, and workable sentencing reforms and should engage in empirical research on the sentencing process. 53 footnotes