Legal Literacy - Get a comprehensive guide to criminal offenses. Learn about their elements, theoretical basis, and differences in monistic and dualistic views in legal practice.

The elements of a criminal offense can be distinguished from two perspectives, namely the theoretical view and the statutory view. Theoretically, it is based on the opinions of legal experts, which are reflected in the wording of the formulation. From the point of view of the law, it is how the reality of the criminal act is formulated into a specific criminal act in the articles of existing laws and regulations. In criminal law, there are two views on the elements of a criminal act, namely:

Doctrine of the Elements of a Criminal Act: Monistic View

The monistic view is a view that sees the condition for the existence of a crime must include two things, namely nature and action. This view provides principles of understanding, that in the understanding of an act/crime it already includes a prohibited act (criminal act) and criminal responsibility/fault (criminal responsibility).

According to D. Simons a criminal act is: An unlawful act that has been committed intentionally or unintentionally by a person who can be held responsible for his actions and which has been declared by law as a punishable act. With this limitation according to Simons, for the existence of a criminal act, the following elements must be fulfilled:

  1. Human actions, both in the sense of positive actions (doing) and negative actions (not doing);
  2. Threatened with punishment;
  3. Against the law;
  4. Committed with fault; and
  5. By people who are able to take responsibility

Strafbaarfeit which literally means a criminal event, is formulated by Simons who has a monistic view as: “Behavior (handeling) that is threatened with punishment, which is against the law, which can be related to fault and which is carried out by a person who is able to take responsibility.

Andi Zainal Abidin stated that “the error referred to by Simons includes dolus (intentional) and culpalata (negligence, carelessness) and commented as follows: Simons mixes the elements of a criminal act (criminal act) which includes the act and its unlawful nature, the act and criminal liability (criminal liability) and includes intent, negligence and carelessness and the ability to be responsible. Monistic adherents do not explicitly separate between the elements of a criminal act and the conditions for punishing the perpetrator. The condition for being punished is also included and becomes an element of the crime.