 Finally, the relation between the ideal and the actual is especially problematic in the context of punishment partly because it involves the preconditions of just punishment. That is to say, what makes an actual system of punishment unjust(ified) might be not its own operations as such (what punishment is or achieves within that system), but the absence of certain political, legal and moral conditions on which the whole system depends for its legitimacy (see Duff 2001, ch. 5.2). Recent scholarship on punishment has increasingly acknowledged that the justification of punishment depends on the justification of the criminal law more generally, and indeed the legitimacy of the state itself (see s. 2 above). For example, if the state passes laws criminalising conduct that is not justifiably prohibited, then this calls into question the justification of the punishment it imposes for violations of these laws. Questions of criminalisation are thus directly relevant to punishment’s justification (see Husak 2008). Similarly, if the procedures by which criminal justice officials apprehend, charge, and prosecute individuals are unjustified, then the subsequent inflictions of punishment will be unjustified as well (see Ristroph 2015 and 2016; on specific aspects of criminal procedure, see, e.g., Loader 2014 on policing, Lippke 2011 on plea bargaining, Duff et al 2007 on criminal trials, Flanders 2013 on pardons). More broadly, if a states tolerates (or worse, encourages) serious social injustices, then this may undermine the state’s standing to punish offenders who are also victims of such injustices (see, e.g., Matravers 2006; Duff 2007; Holroyd 2010; Chau 2012; Howard 2013).