Capital Punishment Imposition in U.S. and Iran: a Theoretical Review of the Constraints and Justifications

• In Event: The Death Penalty: Ideology, Attitudes, and Justifications

Abstract

Although capital punishment is still implemented in several countries, it is considered an inhumane and severe punishment in many developed nations. While capital punishment is not universally abolished, the imposition of it is restricted to specific crimes under certain conditions. The international human rights law and human rights instruments have specified the criteria for imposing the death penalty. The criteria which are taken from human rights norms and rooted in criminal law, determine that the imposition of the death penalty should be justified under certain principles: proportionality, necessity, severity terms, and non-arbitrary deprivation of life. As the imposition of capital punishment by the U.S. has become a pretext for non-democratic countries such as Iran that implement the death penalty for many crimes, the premise of this article is to examine whether the imposition of capital punishment is consistent with human rights norms in criminal justice and legal system of the two countries. While the principles have been gradually applied to the U.S. despite criticism from both Western and non-democratic countries for implementing capital punishment, Iran's legal system which is derived from Sharia imposes capital punishment unlike some of the aforementioned criteria.

Author

• Amirhossein Mazaheri, Florida International University