The death penalty and homicide deterrence in Japan

Muramatsu, Kanji; Johnson, David T.; Yano, Koiti

doi:10.1177/1462474517706369

Cited by 10 publications

(4 citation statements)

References 42 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…For the past decade, fewer than 10 persons under a life sentence have been released on parole each year. 41 In reality, then, a life sentence in Japan often means "life without parole." If death disappeared as a sentencing option in Japan, a life sentence would be seen for what it is: an extremely severe criminal sanction.…”

Section: Life After Deathmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Death Penalty and Democracy

Johnson

2019

The Culture of Capital Punishment in Japan

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Many people in Japan argue that for abolition or significant death penalty reform to occur, public discussion (giron) must first change public opinion. This belief is misleading, because public opinion about capital punishment in Japan is rooted in moral intuitions about retribution and atonement that are largely impervious to rational discussion, and because death penalty abolitions and moratoria are invariably caused by political leadership from the front, not by changes in public perception. Claims that capital punishment reflects "democracy-at-work" are similarly simplistic because "democracy" means more than majority rule. If the abolition of capital punishment does occur in Japan, it will probably have several positive consequences for Japanese criminal justice and society. Keywords Public opinion • Chiba Keiko • Marshall hypothesis • Leadership from the front • Article 9 • Representative democracy • Participatory democracy • Legal democracy • Liberal democracy Why would an abolitionist Minister of Justice order executions? Chiba Keiko was the first of eight people to serve as Minister of Justice while the Democratic Party of Japan controlled Japan's central government between August 2009 and December 2012. She held the post for one year, and she was one of three DPJ Ministers to authorize executions. In CHAPTER 6

show abstract

Section: Life After Deathmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Death Penalty and Democracy

Johnson

2019

The Culture of Capital Punishment in Japan

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Findings of this study have some implications for advocates of both abolition and retention. While for many criminologists there are serious questions about whether anything useful about the deterrent value of the death penalty can ever be learned from any data that are likely to be available (National Research Council 2012;Muramatsu et al 2018), for abolitionists, our results indicate a continuing need to redouble efforts on distributing information about the known limited deterrent effects of the death penalty. Overall, belief in deterrence among the Taiwanese public (68%) is higher even than Oberwittler and Qi's (2009) general population study in China (59%).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 85%

Support for the Death Penalty in Taiwan?: a Study of Value Conflict and Ambivalence

Jou

Hebenton

2019

Asian J Criminol

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

While a substantial number of studies have examined public opinion on the death penalty in the USA, and more recently parts of Asia, including China, very few empirical studies have considered support for the death penalty in Taiwan. This paper examines public attitudes in Taiwan and the role of 'value conflict' in attitudes to both death penalty abolition and in the context of alternatives. Using the results of 1016 respondents drawn from a national face-to-face sample (n = 2039) survey conducted by the Taiwan Alliance to End the Death Penalty (TAEDP) in 2014, we demonstrate that public attitudes in Taiwan are simultaneously committed to many underlying values in conflict. The results also indicate that value conflict exists among the majority of the sample (more than 60 per cent) who are prepared to accept alternatives to abolition, and whom we can describe as ambivalent. Recognition of value conflict, ambivalence and the moral psychology underpinning public attitudes to the death penalty is essential, not only conceptually but to allow for a more appropriate and nuanced understanding of the abolitionist/retentionist debate.

show abstract

“…In a comparative analysis of Japanese, Chinese, and American public opinion, Jiang et al (2010) find that support for the practice is lowest in Japan, but also that belief in its deterrent effects is highest. However, Muramatsu et al (2018)'s time series analysis demonstrates that neither death sentences nor executions reduces homicides. There is significant secrecy and silence surrounding the actual timing of executions (Johnson, 2006) not to say sentencing decisions (Johnson, 2013), producing a public that is both uninformed and misinformed about its effects.…”

Section: Death Penalty and Iccprmentioning

confidence: 99%

Public preferences for international law compliance: Respecting legal obligations or conforming to common practices?

2023

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Despite significant debate about the ability of international law to constrain state behavior, recent research points to domestic mechanisms that deter non-compliance, most notably public disapproval of governments that violate treaty agreements. However, existing studies have not explicitly differentiated two distinct, theoretically important motivations that underlie this disapproval: respect for legal obligations versus the desire to follow common global practices. We design an innovative survey experiment in Japan that manipulates information about these two potential channels directly. We examine attitudes towards four controversial practices that fall afoul of international law—same-surname marriage, whaling, hate speech regulation, and capital punishment—and find that the legal obligation cue has a stronger effect on respondent attitudes than the common practices cue. We also show subgroup differences based on partisanship and identification with global civil society. These results demonstrate that the legal nature of international law is crucial to domestic compliance pull.

show abstract

The death penalty and homicide deterrence in Japan

Cited by 10 publications

References 42 publications

The Death Penalty and Democracy

The Death Penalty and Democracy

Support for the Death Penalty in Taiwan?: a Study of Value Conflict and Ambivalence

Public preferences for international law compliance: Respecting legal obligations or conforming to common practices?

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About