Causation in Criminal Law

Causation which is one of the most important concepts in both of social and natural sciences, may have an ancient history from the history of mankind. Causation is a rational link which is based on cause and effect relation between more than one fact. In the criminal law, this rational link lies between offender's act and consequence which is identified in the crime type. Everyone is responsible from the consequences of their actions. In other words the person can not be held as responsible for the consequence which is belongs to someone else. Likewise, the person who is held responsible from someone else's consequence, is considered as responsible for someone else's action. Consequently, criminal responsibility requires casual link between act and consequence. In the event that if the cause stems from one fact than it is not difficult to identify who is the responsible. However in most cases, the consequence occurs as a result of multiple causes. In this case "Who's work is the consequence?" and "Which offender should be prosecuted because of his act has originated the consequence?" questions will come in to consideration. In this study, different answers for those questions which are discussed for centuries are examined on the final theory of crime. Keywords: causation, criminal law, cause