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Confronting Capital Punishment in Asia

Confronting Capital Punishment in Asia Human Rights, Politics and Public Opinion

Author: Roger Hood; Surya Deva
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 9780199685776
Published In: November 2013
Format: Hardback , 336 pages
Jurisdiction: Asia ? Disclaimer:
Countri(es) stated herein are used as reference only

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Introduces the legal and political issues surrounding the persistence of capital punishment in Asia
Explains the impact of public opinion on the political process
Offers a juxtaposition between Western and Asian thought on capital punishment
Provides comparative analysis of capital punishment in four key states: China, Japan, India and Singapore
Analyses the main factors that hinder the abolition of capital punishment in the countries concerned

With the strengthening focus worldwide on human rights, there has been a rapid increase in recent years in the number of countries that have completely abolished the death penalty. This is in recognition that it is a violation of the right to life and the right to be free from cruel, inhuman and degrading punishment. There has, simultaneously, been pressure on countries that still retain capital punishment to ensure that they at least apply the United Nations minimum human rights safeguards established to protect the rights of those facing the death penalty.

This book shows that the majority of Asian countries have been particularly resistant to the abolitionist movement and tardy in accepting their responsibility to uphold the safeguards. The essays contained in this volume provide an in-depth analysis of changes in the scope and application of the death penalty in Asia with a focus on China, India, Japan, and Singapore. They explain the extent to which these nations still fail to accept capital punishment as a human rights issue, identify impediments to reform, and explore the prospects that Asian countries will eventually embrace the goal of worldwide abolition of capital punishment.

Readership: Researchers and scholars in the areas of law, human rights and criminology. Practitioners and Advocacy groups.

Situating Asia in an International Human Rights Context
1: Franklin E Zimring: State Execution: Is Asia Different and Why?
2: Saul Lehrfreund: The Impact and Importance of International Human Rights Standards: Asia in World Perspective
3: Michelle Miao: Examining China's Response to the Global Campaign against the Death Penalty
4: YSR Murthy: The Role of National Human Rights Institutions in Abolishing Capital Punishment: A Critical Evaluation
5: Sam Garkawe: The Role of Abolitionist Nations in stopping the use of the Death Penalty in Asia: The Case of Australia
The Progress So Far
6: Liu Renwen: Recent Reforms and Prospects in China
7: Amit Bindal and C Raj Kumar: Abolition of the Death Penalty in India: Constitutional and Human Rights Dimensions
8: Michael Hor: Singapore's Death Penalty: The Beginning of the End?
9: David T Johnson: Progress and Problems in Japanese Capital Punishment
Public Opinion and Death Penalty Reform
10: Børge Bakken: Capital Punishment Reform, Public Opinion, and Penal Elitism in the People's Republic of China
11: Mai Sato: Challenging the Japanese Government's Approach to the Death Penalty
The Politics of Capital Punishment in Practice
12: Susan Trevaskes: Suspending Death in Chinese Capital Cases: The Road to Reform
13: Surya Deva: Death Penalty in the 'Rarest of Rare' Cases: A Critique of Judicial Choice-Making
14: Bikramjeet Batra: Don't be Cruel: The 'Death Row Phenomenon' and India's 'Delay' Jurisprudence

Roger Hood is a Research Associate, formerly Professor of Criminology and Fellow of All Souls College, and former Director of the Centre for Criminological Research, All Souls College. He received the Cesare Beccaria Medal in 2011 from the International Society for Social Defence and a Humane Criminal Policy for his contributions towards the abolition of the death penalty and in 2012 the European Society of Criminology Award for a lifetime contribution as a European criminologist. His research has had four main strands: the death penalty; race and sentencing; the parole system; and the history of the emergence of penal policy.

Dr Surya Deva is an Associate Professor at the School of Law of City University of Hong Kong. Dr Deva's primary research interests lie in Corporate Social Responsibility, Indo-Chinese Constitutional Law, International Human Rights, Globalisation, and Sustainable Development. He has published numerous book chapters and journal articles in these areas.

Contributors:
Franklin E Zimring, University of California
Saul Lehrfreund, The Death Penalty Project
Michelle Miao, University of Oxford
YSR Murthy, O.P Jindal Global University
Sam Garkawe, Southern Cross University
Liu Renwen, Law Institute of Chinese Academy of Social Sciences
Amit Bindal, O.P. Jindal Global University
C Raj Kumar, O.P. Jindal Global University
Michael Hor, National University of Singapore
David T Johnson, University of Hawaii
Børge Bakken, The Australian National University
Mai Sato, Birkbeck College
Susan Trevaskes, Griffith University
Surya Deva, City University of Hong Kong
Bikramjeet Batra, Amnesty International