The Contradictions of American Capital Punishment and American Exceptionalism－On Theories of Franklin E. Zimring, James Q. Whitman and David Garland
Date Issued
2012
Date
2012
Author(s)
Su, Yi-Chia
Abstract
Death penalty is not only a matter of life and death, but a lingering doubt when it comes to every country’s penal system. A glance back at the history of social development reveals that the subtlety of death penalty is in its complications, which involves all kinds of given perspectives, such as the matter of culture, moral, ethic, religion, human rights, and even the concept of justice. In 21th century, when the world came to an age of abolition of the use of death, it is a confusing yet disturbing issue that United States, where capital punishment and its penal system being as a peculiar institution, not only not abstain from the death penalty, executions happens continually and steadily.
In regard to analyze the justification of why American seems to walk strongly on the road against all the others, there is the theory called “American Exceptionalism” taken from sociology terms to describe the vibe. Based on the ideal of culture essence, penologists developed more theories on the issue following “American Exceptionalism”. The most two important ones would be the theory of “Vigilante Value”, created by Franklin E. Zimring, and the theory of “Two-Status System” and “Degradation”, cultivated by James Q. Whitman. However, criminologist David Garland noticed the shortages of cultural essentialism, thus providing a wilder historical view to build a new dissecting structure.
While there are certainly valid arguments to the contrary, the ultimate goal of this thesis is trying to find balances between objective and subjective analysis perspectives, by integrating theories of Franklin E. Zimring, James Q. Whitman and David Garland, can a new point of view be framed to find directions and predict whether a turning point is around the corner for the future of American’s death penalty.
Subjects
Death Penalty
Capital Punishment
American Exceptionalism
Vigilante Value
Two-Status System
Degradation
Type
thesis
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