scholarly journals Kantian and Utilitarian Ethics on Capital Punishment

Author(s):  
Mfonobong David Udoudom ◽  
Samuel Akpan Bassey ◽  
Okpe Okpe ◽  
Timothy Adie

It is an indisputable fact that most societies in the world agrees that if a person violates the laws, he/she should be penalized.  However, the variations appear when it involves what sensibly punishment ought to be applied, predominantly for major crimes like murder. Death penalty, which as well referred to as execution or capital punishment, is one amongst these variations which have caused several arguments and debates between its opponents and supporters. Today, numerous countries are attempting to seek out different sanctions for major crimes like life imprisonment relatively to capital punishment. This research tries to take a look at the idea of capital punishment from Kantian and Utilitarian ethics perspectives.

2017 ◽  
Vol 10 (2) ◽  
pp. 193
Author(s):  
Mei Susanto ◽  
Ajie Ramdan

ABSTRAKPutusan Nomor 2-3/PUU-V/2007 selain menjadi dasar konstitusionalitas pidana mati, juga memberikan jalan tengah (moderasi) terhadap perdebatan antara kelompok yang ingin mempertahankan (retensionis) dan yang ingin menghapus (abolisionis) pidana mati. Permasalahan dalam penelitian ini adalah bagaimana kebijakan moderasi pidana mati dalam putusan a quo dikaitkan dengan teori pemidanaan dan hak asasi manusia dan bagaimana kebijakan moderasi pidana mati dalam RKUHP tahun 2015 dikaitkan dengan putusan a quo. Penelitian ini merupakan penelitian doktrinal, dengan menggunakan bahan hukum primer dan sekunder, berupa peraturan perundang-undangan, literatur, dan hasil-hasil penelitian yang relevan dengan objek penelitian. Penelitian menyimpulkan, pertama, putusan a quo yang memuat kebijakan moderasi pidana mati telah sesuai dengan teori pemidanaan khususnya teori integratif dan teori hak asasi manusia di Indonesia di mana hak hidup tetap dibatasi oleh kewajiban asasi yang diatur dengan undang-undang. Kedua, model kebijakan moderasi pidana mati dalam RKUHP tahun 2015 beberapa di antaranya telah mengakomodasi amanat putusan a quo, seperti penentuan pidana mati di luar pidana pokok, penundaan pidana mati, kemungkinan pengubahan pidana mati menjadi pidana seumur hidup atau penjara paling lama 20 tahun. Selain itu masih menimbulkan persoalan berkaitan dengan lembaga yang memberikan pengubahan pidana mati, persoalan grasi, lamanya penundaan pelaksanaan pidana mati, dan jenis pidana apa saja yang dapat diancamkan pidana mati.Kata kunci: kebijakan, KUHP, moderasi, pidana mati. ABSTRACTConstitutional Court’s Decision Number 2-3/PUU-V/2007, in addition to being the basis of the constitutionality of capital punishment, also provides a moderate way of arguing between retentionist groups and those wishing to abolish the death penalty (abolitionist). The problem in this research is how the moderation policy of capital punishment in aquo decision is associated with the theory of punishment and human rights and how the moderation policy of capital punishment in the draft Criminal Code of 2015 (RKUHP) is related with the a quo decision. This study is doctrinal, using primary and secondary legal materials, in the form of legislation, literature and research results that are relevant to the object of analysis. This study concludes, firstly, the aquo decision containing the moderation policy of capital punishment has been in accordance with the theory of punishment, specificallyy the integrative theory and the theory of human rights in Indonesia, in which the right to life remains limited by the fundamental obligations set forth in the law. Secondly, some of the modes of moderation model of capital punishment in RKUHP of 2015 have accommodated the mandate of aquo decision, such as the determination of capital punishment outside the main punishment, postponement of capital punishment, the possibility of converting capital punishment to life imprisonment or imprisonment of 20 years. In addition, it still raises issues regarding the institutions that provide for conversion of capital punishment, pardon matters, length of delay in the execution of capital punishment, and any types of crime punishable by capital punishment. Keywords: policy, criminal code, moderation, capital punishment.


1969 ◽  
Vol 15 (1) ◽  
pp. 43-56 ◽  
Author(s):  
Walter C. Reckless

Undoubtedly the most important trend in capital punishment has been the dramatic reduction in the number of offenses statutorily punishable by the death penalty. About two hundred years ago England had over two hundred offenses calling for the death penalty; it now has four. Some countries have abolished capital punishment completely; a few retain it for unusual offenses only. The trend throughout the world, even in the great number of countries that retain the death penalty, is definitely toward a de facto, not a de jure, form of abolition. In the United States, where the death penalty is possible in three-fourths of the states, the number of executions has declined from 199 in 1935 to an average of less than three in the last four years. This change is related to public sentiment against the use of the death penalty and even more directly to the unwillingness of juries and courts to impose a first-degree sentence. The increasing willingness of governors to commute a death sentence and of courts to hear appeals also contributes to this decline. A review of the evidence indicates that use of the death penalty has no discernible effect on the commission of capital offenses (especially murder).


Author(s):  
Marion Vannier

The concluding Chapter 5 offers a new explanation for how reforms and those driving them can end up normalizing, in the sense of making the public view as acceptable, incredibly severe punitive practices. While not responsible for activating mechanisms of normalization, some death penalty abolitionists have nonetheless helped to maintain and reinforce them. In the shadow of the traditional death penalty, an inhumane form of punishment has proliferated and been championed by a range of penal progressive reformers. This chapter then brings the story to the present. It shows how LWOP is developing in other states and the rest of the world and discusses the dangers of using life imprisonment to challenge LWOP.


Author(s):  
Marion Vannier

Chapter 1 turns to the Californian Congress where opponents of the death penalty first lobbied for LWOP before legislators. It critically examines the period during which the idea of sentencing offenders to life imprisonment with no possibility of release first emerged, starting in the early 1900s and culminating with the introduction of LWOP for capital murder in 1978 in the Californian Penal Code. What emerges from this archival research is that different experts—prison wardens, police officials, academics, spiritual leaders, and criminologists—offered LWOP as a strategic way for legislators to argue against the death penalty. This novel approach was however diverted from its progressive endeavours to serve more punitive agendas. Legislators concerned with preserving capital punishment in contexts of sensationalized crimes and early forms of populist demands drove the reforms that introduced LWOP. This historical investigation reveals that the punishment’s particular severity can serve agendas which are seemingly in tension with one another.


1991 ◽  
Vol 25 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 512-523
Author(s):  
Leon Sheleff

One of the most disturbing aspects of examining the extensive capital punishment debate, with its clear indications of discriminatory practices, ambiguous judicial directives, undeniable miscarriages of justice, controversial statistical data, and inept, inconsistent and/or unjust implementation, is the constantly gnawing thought that if this is the situation vis-à-vis what is considered the most extreme penalty with its special super due process, then what is happening in the cases of lesser penalties. These latter cases of petty thieves sentenced to years of incarceration for relatively minor delinquencies, of accused inadequately defended without appeals being lodged within the judicial system or public interest shown, of compulsory life imprisonment without parole, no doubt reflect all of the faults and errors of capital punishment.


1997 ◽  
Vol 21 (12) ◽  
pp. 746-748 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rob Ferris

Ninety-five countries throughout the world retain the death penalty. All make provision for excluding the ‘insane’ from liability to capital punishment (Hood, 1990). Psychiatrists and other mental health professionals are therefore involved in the process leading up to capital sentencing and execution in many of these countries. Such involvement may take many forms though, with the notable exception of the USA, very little is known of its nature or extent in practice. Whatever form psychiatric involvement takes, and however much it may be shaped in different places by social, economic and cultural variables, as well as the configuration of particular criminal justice systems, certain fundamental ethical questions arise which do not admit of simple answers. It might be argued that these ethical dilemmas no longer have relevance to European countries because they have all effectively abolished capital punishment. However, others may claim that the death penalty, as the most spectacular example of the extra clinical harm to which a psychiatrist's dealings with patients may contribute, ought to be of central concern when practitioners come to consider the uncertain balance between their duty to an individual patient and society at large.


LAW REFORM ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 14 (2) ◽  
pp. 191
Author(s):  
Diastama Anggita Ramadhan

The death penalty practice have been an issue in various country. Since the deployment of the ICCPR, there are many country have succesfully abolish the practice of the death penalty or put it in to a moratorium. This international regulation is also affected the developing country. From all over country around the world, several developing countries are still actively use the death penalty as their capital punishment. They argued that executing people have successfully decrease the level of crime in their country. However, it is important to understand that the international regulation are ordered country to abolish the death penalty. This article then will give several strategies for developing country in order to promote the abolishment of the death penalty in all condition.Keyword: Death Penalty; Abolition; Strategy.


2018 ◽  
Vol 62 (14) ◽  
pp. 4714-4735 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shanhe Jiang ◽  
Ming Hu ◽  
Eric G. Lambert

China’s current Criminal Law has 46 death-eligible offenses, and China executes more people than any other country in the world. However, there is a lack of study of attitudes toward capital punishment for specific offenses, and no death penalty view comparison between college students and regular citizens in China was found. This study was taken to address these limitations. Using a sample of 401 respondents from Zhejiang, China, in 2016, the present study found that more than 72% of respondents favored the death penalty without any specification of crime types. Level of death penalty support differed by various specific crimes. As expected, relative to college students, general population citizens were more likely to support capital punishment. Both groups had the highest death penalty support for murder. The study also revealed similar and different reasons behind death penalty attitudes between college students and regular citizens.


Author(s):  
Louis Mendy

Death Penalty has been practiced since human beings decided to constitute nations and live in countries. It was institutionalized to get rid of people who were supposed to be harmful to societies. However, proponents of Capital Punishment do not seem to understand that people may be executed because of their evil acts, but their death will never wipe evil out of their societies. Since the ratification of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights by a very large majority of countries in the world, the legality and legitimacy of Death Penalty have been constantly questioned by human rights defenders. Even the three major and revealed religions: Christianity, Judaism and Islam recognize that life is a sacred right from God. For the people who are against Death Penalty, Capital Punishment is akin to a premeditated voluntary homicide by a government. Even if Death Penalty is considered as a deterrent in many societies, it has never been proven that it can stop people from committing murders. The abolition of Death Penalty is nowadays a moral duty for all governments. Even a moratorium is proposed to countries which have not abolished it yet. The tendency today is the total abolition of Capital Punishment in the world and its restoration by countries that have already abolished it is something unheard of, retrograde and senseless.


2021 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 118-135
Author(s):  
Irvino Rangkuti, Alvi Syahrin, Suhaidi, Mahmud Mulyadi

The application of capital punishment itself has been regulated in Indonesia as contained in the law. Article 2 paragraph (2) of Corruption Act concerning Eradication of Corruption Crimes. According to Romli Atmasasmita, it was argued that the death penalty for corruptors was effectively implemented in the People's Republic of China (PRC), and it was quite successful to reduce corruption. This certainly can be used as an example in Indonesia in imposing capital punishment for corruptors. The imposition of capital punishment for perpetrators of corruption is urgently needed as "shock therapy" because psychologically the death penalty aims for the benefit of general prevention so that others do not participate in committing crimes. Also, the application of capital punishment is based on the reason that capital punishment is more certain than the prison sentence because the prison sentence is often followed by running away, forgiveness, or because of the release. When compared from an economic standpoint, basically the death sentence is more efficient when compared to life imprisonment. As for the problems that can be formulated, namely: legal arrangements regarding corruption in the Corruption Act; the application of capital punishment sanctions against perpetrators of corruption in Indonesia. The results of the study show that: Corruption is a type of extraordinary crime ("extra-ordinary crime") that must be handled extraordinarily, so that the act is contrary to the 1945 Constitution, therefore it does not need to be protected by the 1945 Constitution. accommodated in Article 2 paragraph (2) of the Corruption Act, must meet the requirements "in certain circumstances" by the Elucidation of Article 2 paragraph (2), but its application has never been implemented, so it is necessary to review the rules "in certain circumstances".


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