Comparing expert versus general public rationale for death penalty support and opposition: Is expert perspective on capital punishment consistent with “disciplined retention”?
| Date | 01 October 2021 |
| Author | Timothy Griffin |
| Published date | 01 October 2021 |
| DOI | 10.1177/14624745211029370 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
Article
Comparing expert versus
general public rationale
for death penalty support
and opposition: Is expert
perspective on capital
punishment consistent
with “disciplined
retention”?
Timothy Griffin
University of Nevada, USA
Abstract
The author compared American criminologists’ stated reasons for death penalty sup-
port or opposition with those of the general public as reported by Gallup pollsters.
While experts were overwhelmingly more likely to oppose capital punishment, the
rationale for opposition or support were largely comparable for both groups, albeit
with some potentially informative differences. As is the case with the general public, the
most common reasons for experts’ opposition are moral beliefs, concerns about
system errors, and the unfair application of the death penalty. Similarly, among the
small minority of experts who expressed (often qualified) support for the death penalty,
the favored rationale is simple retributive justice—exactly as is the case with the general
public. The results show that, not only is opposition to the death penalty among
experts not absolute, but the underlying rationale of expert dissenters is arguably a
partial bridge to greater public-expert symbiosis on this highly contentious and divisive
issue. The radical “newsmaking criminology” contribution of these findings and their
ramifications is that the entirety of expert perspective is arguably as consistent with
disciplined retention of the death penalty as it is with strict abolition. Future research
Corresponding author:
Timothy Griffin, Department of Criminal Justice, University of Nevada, Reno, NV 89557, USA.
Email: tgriffin@unr.edu
Punishment & Society
!The Author(s) 2021
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DOI: 10.1177/14624745211029370
journals.sagepub.com/home/pun
2021, Vol. 23(4) 557–577
could reveal even more expert sympathy for retributive thinking, and thus greater
affinity with public views, than might be assumed.
Keywords
death penalty, disciplined retention, Marshall hypothesis, newsmaking criminology
Introduction
The death penalty remains a contentious issue in the United States, sharply divisive
along geographic and political boundaries (Garret, 2017; Johnson and Zimring,
2019). As of this article’s completion, 24 states render death sentences and have
inmates on death row (although one of these, Ohio, is currently under “unofficial
moratorium” pending resolution of the method of execution), three more retain
capital punishment but are under gubernatorially imposed moratoriums (Oregon,
California, and Pennsylvania), and 23 do not have capital punishment (Death
Penalty Information Center, 2021). Furthermore, while overall support for and
use of the death penalty has trended downward in recent years, a slim majority of
Americans still support it when asked if they “favor” it as an appropriate punish-
ment for murder (Gallup, 2019). Reasons for Americans’ support of the death
penalty have been examined at length, and among the leading discussed factors
are a culture of vigilantism (Zimring, 2004), racial bias and conflict (Jackson and
Jackson, 1996; Paternoster and Brame, 2008; Peffley and Hurwitz, 2007), and
religious values (Lytle and ten Bensel, 2016; Yelderman et al., 2019).
Conversely, in contrast with the splintered views exhibited by the general
American public, among social science experts there at least appears to be a vast
body of literature questioning death penalty effectiveness and morality, although
the author is aware of no content analyses quantifying this. Formal surveys of
“experts” on the matter are remarkably few and limited, although they are con-
sistent with an “abolition presumption”. This thinking is well captured in the
opening paragraph of Brandon Garret’s (2017) book, End of Its Rope: How
Killing the Death Penalty Can Revive Criminal Justice:
We can abolish the death penalty. We must abolish the death penalty. Ten years ago,
that declaration would have been laughable, just another liberal fantasy. But no more.
(Garret, 2017: 1)
Garret goes on to argue that death sentences and executions, even in states tradi-
tionally disposed to use capital punishment, have dramatically declined, owing in
large part to public reservations about the flaws in the American death penalty
process and improved legal representation in capital cases, and this is part of an
inevitable trend toward abolition of the death penalty and a refurbishing of equity
558 Punishment & Society 23(4)
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