Introduction

Background of the Study

Statement of the Problem

Purpose of the Study

Rationale

Research Question

Research Hypotheses

Significance of the Study

Definition of Terms

Assumptions and Limitations

Nature of the Study

Organization of the Remainder of the Study

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW

Aspects of Organizational Change

Planned Change Theories

The Evolution of Schools of Management

Collaboration and Cooperation

Organizational Culture and Change

The Role and Evolution of Leadership

1. Fiedler’s contingency model – designed to enable leaders to diagnose both leadership style and organizational situation with a leaders effectiveness dependent upon how well the leaders style fits the situation
2. Hersey and Blanchard’s situational theory – premise that subordinates vary in readiness level and thus need different leadership styles, and based upon directive leadership and supportive dimensions
3. Goal-path theory – premise that the leader’s responsibility is to increase subordinates motivation to attain personal and organizational goals by emphasizing the relationship between the leader’s style, the subordinate’s style, and the work environment
4. Vroom-Jago model – development-driven model that permits leaders to adopt a participation style by answering diagnostic questions in sequence

Model for Leadership of an Organizational Cultural Intervention

1. Establish a sense of urgency – Create a burning platform.
2. Create a guiding coalition – Individuals who are well-respected and who are committed to the change initiative that have the power and influence to drive this change through the organization.
3. Develop the vision and strategy – This must be a relevant vision that can be clearly articulated by every employee within the organization.
4. Communicate the vision – This must be done to gain buy-in.
5. Empower employees to action – Organizations must remove barriers that prevent employees from achieving the organization’s vision.
6. Create short-term wins – So as to energize employees and build momentum necessary for the change initiative.
7. Do not let up – Change must be embedded within the organization in order to make the vision a reality.
8. Make change stick by anchoring these new approaches in the culture – Create supporting systems, processes, and structures that strengthen the culture.

1. Challenge the process – Constantly ask, “Why are things being done this way?”
2. Inspire a shared vision – Share the vision so as to provide direction and meaning to engage others in its pursuit.
3. Enable others to act – Foster environments that enable others to act to produce both high task and high results accomplishments.
4. Model the way – Lead by example.
5. Encourage the heart – Recognize individuality as well as hard work and success.

Causes of Change

1. Change, especially an overhaul of the business strategy, stems more from environmental impact than from any other factor.
2. In large scale or total organizational change, mission, strategy, leadership, and culture have more “weight” than structure, management practices, and systems.
3. Having organizational leaders communicate the change is not sufficient for effective change.
4. Culture change must be planned and aligned with strategy and leader behavior. These variables have more weight because they affect the total system whereas changing structure may not affect the total system. (p. 529)

Readiness for Change

Resistance to Change

Change Management Theory Overview

Leadership Theory Overview

Negotiation

Facilitation

Persuasion

Leadership and Change Management

Negotiating Resources

Formal Groups

Architecture Frameworks

• Application architectures show an organization’s major applications and their interrelationships that are unique and necessary to understand during implementations.
• Data architectures are used to facilitate functions across system boundaries.
• Business system architectures (BSA) provide pictorial representation and modeling for the fusion of strategic resources, competencies, and information technology, capturing the complete business process.

Leadership and Change Management Summary

A Cultural Perspective

• Power distance, which involves the degree of separation employees feel from organizational authority;
• Uncertainty-avoidance, which involves the attitudes of employees toward things that change provokes such as risk and novelty;
• Individualism, which defines the degree to which a given society or organization is characterized by collectivistic thought; and
• Masculinity, which addresses the relative importance of ambitious performance versus quality of life. (Hofstede, 2001)

Encouraging and Discouraging Cultural

Gap in the Literature

Research Recommendation

CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY

Research Hypotheses

Research Design

Sample

Variables

Reliability and Validity

Sample Size Determination

Instrument

Data Collection

Data Confidentiality

Data Analysis

Summary

 CHAPTER 4: DATA COLLECTION AND ANALYSIS

Data Collection, Response Rates, and Population

Variables

Survey Instrument

Hypothesis Testing

Descriptive Analysis

Pearson’s Chi-Square Analysis

Data Gathered for Future Research

CHAPTER 5: RESULTS, CONCLUSIONS, AND RECOMMENDATIONS

Hypotheses

Study Design

Discussion and Findings

Limitations of the Current Study

Implications of the Study

Suggestions for Further Research

Conclusion

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Wilhelm Wundt (1832-1920) is generally honored as the founder of scientific psychology. Wundt wrote his first book on psychology, dealing with sensory perceptions, in 1862. It was based largely on his training as a physiologists and would be characteristic of much of his work. In 1879, Wundt founded the first research laboratory in psychology at the University of Leipzig.

The initial goal of scientific psychology was to understand the nature of human consciousness. To understand this, Wundt used the method of introspection, in which a person experiences something and then describes the personal nature of the experience. This technique can be used quite rigorously when stimulus presentation are controlled, so that introspective accounts can be compared across many experiences. Researchers were to report their experiences in terms of specific sensations and feelings, which were then developed into the basic building blocks of the conscious mind. The main goal of Wundt’s psychology was to first discover these building blocks, and then discover how they combined to form the more complex elements of mental processes.

The research in Wundt’s lab consisted of studies in the fields of sensation and perception: investigating color vision and the passage of time, as well as research into other mental processes such as emotion. One famous study in Wundt’s lab was in the field of reaction time. Wundt hypothesized that by measuring the difference between the speed of a simple mental event and a complex mental event, it was possible to calculate the amount of time mental processing required.

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Other scientific psychology laboratories soon emerged, including that of Herman Ebbinghaus (1850-1909), whose memory studies are still being referenced. These laboratories challenged many of Wundt’s views on psychology, such as his insistence that consciousness could be broken into elemental parts and his reliance on introspection. One German branch of psychology that was opposed to Wundt’s ideas was Gestalt psychology which originated with Max Wertheimer (1880-1943), Kurt Koffka (1886-1941), and Wolfgang Köhler (1887-1967). They argured with the atomistic approach to human consciousness, and instead claimed that “the whole is different from the sum of its parts.” For instance, a picture with all of the color information inverted is still recognizable as having the same pattern, even though the elements comprising the picture are completely different in the two versions. Gestalt psychology made substantial contributions to the areas of perception and learning before many in the field moved from Germany to the United States during the mid-1930s. Even though Gestalt psychology never became part of the mainstream, it had a great influence on the beginnings of American psychology. Much of the modern work with Gestalt theories are now associated with the cognitive approach.

The Start of American Psychology

One of the representatives of Wundt’s psychology that came to America was the British student E. B. Titchener (1867-1927). Titchener’s psychology, which became known as structuralism, closely follows the atomistic portion of Wundt’s psychology by studying the elemental structures of consciousness. However, instead of explaining them by hypothetical mental processes as Wundt had, Titchener focused on research that was purely descriptive. His books on experimental psychology (Titchener, 1901-1905) became very influential in the training of the first generation of American psychologists.

Other groups in America entirely broke away from the teachings of Wundt. Many of these groups used ideas developed by Charles Darwin (1809-1882) to formulate theories to explain variations between members of a species. Darwin’s theory of evolution that linked humans with the rest of the animal kingdom began the idea of comparative psychology, and the idea of interpolating human behavior from the study of animals. Another important contribution by Darwin to the emerging American psychology was that of natural selection. Specifically, how the implication of the selection of characteristics that were most valuable to the organism could be used to examine the adaptive significance of consciousness.

Functionalism

Under the influences of Darwin, many American psychologists began examining consciousness to understand how it helps the organism function, rather than its structures. One American psychologist who believed in the adaptive significance of consciousness was William James (1842-1910). James believed that mental processes had evolved in a similar manner to other traits, and his interest was in understanding the role consciousness played in helping an organism adapt to its environment. James’s emphasis on understanding the functions of consciousness led to the founding of a new system of psychology known as functionalism, which is mainly an American system of psychology. Most of James’s ideas were examined in The Principles of Psychology (1890), which is one of the most important works in the history of psychology.

Behaviorism

The third type of psychology that evolved during this time period contested with both structuralism and functionalism. Behaviorism, as the new system was called, was revolutionary in both the nature of material it studied, as well as the methods used in study. The founder of this branch of psychology was John B. Watson (1878-1958) who believed that psychology would never fully develop until “it need no longer delude itself unto thinking that it is making mental states the object of observation.” Watson called for a radical change in the focus of psychology: studying behavior instead of consciousness. Because consciousness was not directly observable, it was difficult to measure and therefore had no place in the domain of science. Behavior represented actions that were subject to direct observation, and psychology could then be based on discovering the causes of behavior and the investigation of relations between stimuli and response.

Watson also tried to minimize the importance of studying heredity that had been placed into the field of psychology by functionalism. He denied the existence of instints, or inherited traits. This viewpoint led him to decide that a person’s achievements are limited solely by the restrictions placed by the environment on the person’s abilities. This radical change gave psychology a means to improve the human condition in particular, and society in general, and made Watson a popular figure in American culture.

Watson’s scientific psychology could not have an imprecise means of experimentation, such as introspection, so Watson encouraged a number of new techniques:

• Using instruments that increased the precision of measurements.
• Objective tests: using the results of tests to sample behavior.
• The conditioning-reflex method developed by Ivan Pavlov.

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Once considered the sole purview of global corporations and consumer product giants like Coca-Cola, Microsoft, Toyota, and Disney, the concept of branding is coming of age in financial services, health care, nonprofit organizations, government, professional services, and even (gasp) education.  While talk of market share, media budgets, brand strategy, positioning, and other common marketing terms still give many school board members and superintendents the willies, the fact is that public education can learn a lot from successful brands.

Widely viewed today by many taxpayers, business leaders, and elected officials as inefficient, ineffective, and bureaucratic, public education is losing its once-noble brand position as the cornerstone of American democracy. “The first problem is the name; it’s called public education,” says marketing guru Laura Ries, who has coauthored four books on branding.

“The perception out there is that anything run by the government is lousy. That may not be the way it is, but anything that is government-run is seen as big, inefficient, many times ineffective, and not as wellrun as the private sector.”

More than just a logo, theme, or color scheme, great brands own a unique attribute or position in the mind of consumers. It’s easy to test this proposition. Name a favorite brand and see what pops instantly to mind.

Now say “public education,” “ABC Senior High School,” or “XYZ School District” and see what happens. What words and images come instantly to mind? Contrast those results with the names of the most prestigious private schools in your area, and you begin to see why brands matter.

Taking a cue from private schools and well-endowed universities, public schools and districts may want to consider name changes that convey a special focus or emphasis on academic excellence, Ries says. Generic school names like North, South, East, and West do little to spark the imagination or position the school as an academic leader in the minds of prospective students and their families.

“Names are very important in branding, and so often the names for public schools are chosen haphazardly or without much thought at all,” says Ries, author of The 22 Immutable Laws of Branding and The 11 Immutable Laws of Internet Branding. “Many of the fancy names used by private schools are infinitely more powerful, and give people an ability to talk about them in a way that sounds much better.”

Charter schools, despite the fact that they have produced mixed results in terms of their actual academic achievement, appeal to parents and business leaders because they tend to have a unique focus and are viewed as being free of the bureaucratie taint associated with traditional public schools, according to Ries.

“People always feel a specialist is better than a generalist,” says Ries. “Public schools need to find ways to focus on one thing, on one word they can own in the mind of the consumer that no one else can own.”

One way in which public schools can build a better brand is to rally behind an outspoken leader who personifies the brand and unites the community around the importance of public schools.

“When Bill Gates talks about the future of the tech industry, people listen because Microsoft is such a big global brand,” says Ries. She notes that few people outside the field of education know who Margaret Spellings is-or care, given the political nature of the position. “Who speaks for public education? One of the problems is that there’s no one leader for this industry.”

It is true that school board members and school superintendents may not be able to solve the lack of visible leadership which exists at the national level. However, it is also true that they can-and should-spend more time on public school advocacy.

“Many times school administrators spend most of their time getting the organization running smoothly instead of working on the public perception of their school district,” says Ries. “While that is certainly understandable, having a highly visible spokesperson promoting public education is very important on multiple levels. A powerful, well-known leader can make a brand believable and keep everyone on course.”

Restoring credibility, rebuilding trust, and reclaiming public education’s brand position requires public relations, not advertising, Ries says. “Most people, when they hear any words like branding or marketing, only think of advertising. We don’t recommend advertising for a brand that’s trying to establish itself unless you have a credible message. What you really want to drive is public relations (PR).”

Giving speeches, publishing opinion pieces, connecting with community groups, and developing close, working relationships with reporters can help make school leaders-and the brand they represent-respected household names. Public relations, whether by word of mouth or in print, provides critical third-party endorsements that help build credibility.

“First, you have to do something, then you have to verbalize it, and then you need to do PR to get people to talk about it,” Ries says. “The difficult thing is not the idea but the verbalization of the idea, and then sticking to that turn of phrase that articulates the message and keeps it relevant.”

More than a decade into the standards and accountability movement, where data drives decisions and public policy, it’s ironic that facts often don’t matter when it comes to public perception. Take Volvo, for example: Volvo still owns safety in the minds of most consumers, even though a Volvo model didn’t make the top 10 in a recent automotive industry study that ranked the world’s safest cars.

Doing Better Job

For weak brands, as in the case of public education, the opposite is true: Research studies consistently show that public education is doing a better job with more students than ever before-so why do so’ many think public education is failing in this country?

Factoids and statistics don’t change minds. Research shows that consumers seek out information that reinforces an existing position, and that they filter out data that contradicts firmly held beliefs.

“Using one verbalization, and sticking to it, is better than trying to get it perfect,” says Ries. “If the numbers don’t match the perception, they’re not going to do you any good.”

In order to make an effort to counteract this problem, educators need to focus on positioning more than facts, telling stories and using emotion to drive home key concepts and ideas. Testimonials from successful graduates, satisfied parents, and highly credible community leaders will resonate more with information-weary consumers than charts, pie graphs, and 45 slides of mind-numbing data.

Brands are powerful because they represent a promise to the consumer in terms of consistency and quality. How many times in the past have you gone to a McDonald’s while you were traveling because “you know what you’re going to get?”

When it comes to the subjects of your schools or district, do parents know what they’re going to get? Are you delivering the same high-quality education to each and every child who attends?

I’m OK, You’re Not

The lack of consistency is part of what’s driving the “my school’s OK, public education isn’t” phenomenon, according to Ries. “The result of a weak brand is that consumers’ personal reactions may be different, but they can’t verify that their experiences are shared by others,” she says.

Defining your school or district’s brand promise-the one thing your students, parents, teachers, and other key groups can count on time and time again, and want to be a part of-is just the first step. According to Interbrand, a global brand marketing firm, the world’s most successful brands are characterized by consumer recognition, consistency, emotion, and uniqueness.

This is the reason that educators should stick to one theme or message consistently over a long period of time, rather than creating new tag lines, logos, and color schemes every year.

Collateral materials, websites, PowerPoint presentations, voice mail messages, e-mail signatures, fax cover sheets, automobile stickers, e-mail newsletters, and speeches all represent moments of truth for your brand image and message. When colors, fonts, formats, and other design elements change every time that a new piece is produced, your brand power diminishes.

It’s hard enough for public schools to cut through the clutter which is created by today’s advertisers without adding to the confusion through inconsistency and poor definition. Changing perception-the heart and soul of branding-represents a long-term investment.

“You’re not going to be able to combat the perception that our schools are failing, or that private schools are better, by running an ad campaign,” says Ries. “You’re going to have to get out there and promote the idea that public education is better than we think.”

The bottom line of the entire situation is this: Public education won’t survive without public support. It’s time for public education to reclaim its brand position as the world’s great equalizer, the place where the American dream takes root.

The movement away from product-driven and toward image advertising might have been heralded as early as 1981, when two advertising executives, Al Ries and Jack Trout, published their best-known work, Positioning: The Battle for Your Mind (McGraw Hill, New York). Trout and Ries defined positioning as “the communication activities necessary to alter the conception about a product or an organization that is held by a prospect.” Ries and Trout urged their readers to “oversimplify” their messages in order to cut through the “over-communications” occurring in American life.

While their approach was persuasive, it took the convergence of several major trends to move financial industry advertisers away from the concept of advertising that sells products and into a new focus on positioning through brand imagery.

First among these trends is the advent of the superregional financial services company. As more financial services institutions like Bank One and Norwest enter new markets, they need to establish their identity among their new customers and prospects. Often they are looking for a quick way to establish themselves as part of the local financial services community. Selling services can come later.

Increasing the urgency is the name change which often accompanies the expansion. That was the reasoning behind the NationsBank prime-time, major network placement on New Year’s Day. The TV commercial was designed to introduce the new name adopted by NCNB in the wake of its merger with C&S/Sovran. No products sold–just NationsBank CEO Hugh McColl establishing the behemoth’s new identity.

The name, NationsBank, itself marks a swing in taste. In the early days of consolidation, merged banks usually retained identities. Early attempts at forceful name changes, such as that which occurred after Mellon Bank’s takeover of Girard Bank, were often accompanied by public relations disasters. More often, as in the Fleet/Norstar combination, the names of the constituent banks were left inviolate.

When banks which were to be combined decided to merge identities, a new, often artificial, name was created to soothe feelings. That trend may have died when C&S and Sovran Bank created, then abandoned, “Avantor” as the name of the new company. More recently, acquired banks are likely to adopt the new parent’s name–with an attendant marketing splash.

In addition to the growth of the superregional, a second contributing trend is the growth of product management and, with it, decentralized control over advertising budgets. The result of dividing the advertising budget pie into micromanaged slices has led to an inability to mass the dollars needed for major media campaigns. Often, even when the marketing director is able to obtain agreement on joint budgeting for that purpose, it’s difficult to obtain consensus on advertising content.

Although some marketing directors were unwilling to speak on the record (another symptom of the fragility of some of these budgetary alliances), several acknowledged the trend. One state coordinator for a midwestern-based superregional put it this way: “Even when I get a few departments to agree to a major advertising expenditure, I can almost never get agreement on what to put in the ads. As a result, I fall back on name recognition and let each (department) do their own thing with their own budgets.”

“Doing their own thing with their own budgets” is another part of the phenomenon. Take, for example, a recent baskethall game between Indiana University and the University of Kentucky in Indianapolis’ Hoosier Dome. Bank One’s logo was visible throughout the stadium–on banners adorning the press table and festooning the upper decks, on the basketball court itself and on chair backs at court side.

Sidney P. Cook, senior vice president/director-marketing for Bank One, Indianapolis NA, points out that the branding or positioning of the Bank One name at a high-profile basketball game supports other nontraditional advertising vehicles such as more targeted micromarketing and direct mail, for example.

“Once we establish the name of the bank through programs like the Hoosier Classic, we find a greater acceptance of our direct mail programs,” says Cook. “They’re a terrific combination.” The combination, he maintains, is more cost-effective than reliance on media advertising alone, and using direct mail allows the bank to do more with less.

Doing more with less, and doing it differently, is still another major thread in the new advertising reality. Most marketers responding to a poll fielded by the Chicago chapter of the American Marketing Association (AMA) late last year said that dollars channelled away from traditional broadcast and print advertising will never return.

In their report on the study, the chapter revealed that nearly two-thirds of the respondents said that advertising dollars have been “permanently reallocated to other areas such as database marketing, direct mail and telemarketing.”

Enchantment with these high-efficiency techniques is only part of the story. Disenchantment with traditional media plays a role as well. The changing habits of media-hungry Americans has been well-chronicled.

First, there is the demise of the afternoon newspaper. When the Dallas Times-Herald ceased publication last December, it left in its wake only a handful of major markets with an afternoon edition. Commuters’ moving out of public transit and into automobiles and the popularity of early evening TV news are the two trends most frequently blamed for the demise of the afternoon editions.

It is also true that advertising revenue had been sharply reduced as major retail chains consolidated and airlines filed for bankruptcies, thus depriving newspapers of a large chunk of anticipated revenue. However, it was the steep drop in readership that ultimately did the afternoon papers in. The survivors report fewer readers–in some markets, as much as 60% of the households do not get a home-delivered newspaper, according to the admittedly biased Radio Advertising Bureau.

Retailers have never been as significant to the electronic media as they have been to print, but drive-time radio and network television are having their own problems–despite the popular wisdom that auto-bound commuters are listening to the radio and that, with no afternoon newspaper to read, the commuter turns on the television as soon as he reaches home.

On the contrary–new technology in audio systems has increased the range of choices available to the listener. With cassette, CD players and personal stereos available at increasingly lower prices, fewer commuters are tuning in to the radio.

Radio stations have also changed into a narrowly programmed, highly specialized outlet that forces advertisers to “buy the band” in order to reach a mass audience. As budgets contract, buying the band becomes a less-desirable option. But all of that is nothing compared to what’s happening in front of the television. As one market researcher who responded to the AMA poll said, “Advertisers and broadcast media don’t want to discuss it, but zapping, zipping and muting are so prevalent that broadcast advertising dollars are a poor marketing value nowadays.”

Zapping and zipping are terms of the VCR age –a byproduct of our ability to tape the shows we want and to watch them at our convenience, often eliminating the commercials. Add that to the glut of cable TV options, 105 channels in some markets, and it’s no wonder that advertising strategists are looking for more personal ways to get the message into the home.

At one time, according to industry experts, 93% of U.S. homes watching television were tuned to either CBS, NBC or ABC and were watching the show while it aired. Now media professionals calculate that fewer than 60% of TV watchers are tuned to the three major networks. The house’s TV sets (often as many as four or five) are still on, but they are just as llkely to be tuned to the newer Fox network, to a cable TV outlet, such as ESPN, MTV or one of the Home Shopping Networks, or, increasingly, to the external mode watching rented movie or a previously taped show or event. One of the sets, by the way, is likely to be connected to a Nintendo game.

The growth of cable has helped some advertisers, such as local banks. Advertising on cable outlets is less costly than advertising on network television, and cable stations usually provide a more targeted audience. Sheldon Weiss, director-marketing of Leon Shaffer Golnick Advertising, a Fort Lauderdale-based producer of syndicated TV advertising, says that the growth of cable has helped his business and his clients.

In general, national magazines have always played a minor role in most banks’ advertising budgets. With the exception of packages assembled by Magazine Networks, Inc., the reach of a typical magazine far exceeds that of a bank. Still, it should be noted that the malaise of the media has not left “slick print” unharmed. Many titles have ceased publication in the last two years, and others are much thinner than before.

The net result of all of this change has been a bleak outlook for the media, rolling readjustments on Madison Avenue and, in some cases, a determined rear guard action.

Typical of the outlook was the New York Times’ recent shareholders’ report, for example. The company suggested that newspaper advertising linage might have peaked early in the 1980s, and it could not project a return to those levels in the foreseeable future.

The layoffs taking place at major advertising agencies may have been caused, in part, by the late-1980s consolidation wave that hit that industry in the face of major acquisitions by the UK-based Saatchi brothers and Martin Sorrell. Whatever the reason, there is no question that the industry is losing jobs. Major agencies are cutting back and smaller ones are closing. And like the proverbial dominoes, suppliers to the industry are feeling the shock wave. For example, recent cutbacks announced at Birch-Scarborough, one of the leading broadcast rating agencies, were triggered by a decline in subscribers, most of whom had been advertising agencies.

As might be expected, TV and radio stations have been cutting both staff and advertising rates, as have newspapers, reversing a decade-long trend of escalating media costs. Network news bureaus are closing, and local stations are covering less, relying more on feeds from syndicated news broadcasts.

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The death penalty has existed since ancient times. In its early days, the death penalty imposed as punishment was a form of private justice. It was not applied by the state, but rather by the family or tribe of the person who had suffered damage  (G. Rabbah). With the appearance of God, the rationale for imposing the death penalty shifted from private revenge to a divine one. 

The first death penalty law was the lex talonis of the God of Hamurabi M.H. Reggio, 2008). Later, in the seventh century BC, the Draconian Code of Athens prescribed death as a punishment for all crimes. Finally, the Roman law of twelve tablets codified it in the fifth century BC (Death Penalty Information Center). As far as 437 BC, the usefulness of the death penalty was questioned. By arguing its non-deterrent effect, Diodotus persuaded the Athenian assembly to reverse its decision to execute all adult males of the city of Mitylene. 

The death penalty was applied during the Middle Ages in an arbitrary and discriminatory way. The feudal system gave many people, not only the king or emperor, the power to impose capital punishment. This expansion of power led to the arbitrary imposition of the death penalty by the Feudatories (When Life Generates Death (Legally)-History). Also in this period, the fusion of political and religious powers led to the imposition of the death penalty for crimes committed against church. Methods of applying the death penalty differed for nobility, freemen and slaves. In order to reduce pain, the nobles were executed by cutting off their heads, while the others experienced death by hanging or poison.

In the eighteenth century, various philosophers called for the abolition of the death penalty. Montesquieu, for example, called for its restriction to murder, attempted murder, certain types of manslaughter and some offences against property. Beccaria, on the contrary, did not call for its limitation but rather for its complete abolition. The writings of Beccaria ended the distinction in the application of the death penalty between poor and nobles, and his ideas led to the promulgation of a penal code in Tuscany that eliminated it entirely  (When Life Generates Death (Legally)-History)

From that time on, the abolitionist movement has been flourishing. Michigan was the first jurisdiction to abolish the death penalty in 1846. Twenty years later, Venezuela abolished the death penalty, the Netherlands followed suit in 1870 and Costa Rica in 1882. Likewise, Brazil and Ecuador abolished the death penalty in the late 1890s and Panama, which joined the club of the states of the world in 1903, has joined the abolitionist club  since its formation  (When Life Generates Death (Legally)-History)

The progress of the abolitionist movement was temporarily slowed with the rise of totalitarianism in Europe after World War Two, and it was not until 1948 that the abolitionist movement regained its strength. In 1948, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights legitimized the struggle towards abolition of the death penalty. Since World War Two, approximately one state per year has abolished the death penalty.

In his report submitted to the UN, Novel Morris reported that twelve countries were totally abolished by the end of 1965 and eleven were abolitionist for ordinary crimes (United Nations, Capital Punishment, 1967). Three decades later, Roger Hood reported that the number of abolitionist countries has been on an increase since the last report submitted to the UN by Norvel Morris. In his book, The Death Penalty: A Worldwide Perspective, Hood stated that fifty-eight countries are totally abolitionist, fourteen are abolitionist for ordinary crimes and thirty de facto abolitionists  (Hood, p. 12-13).

Over the years, the abolitionist movement has succeeded in persuading many previously retentionist countries that the death penalty is a deadly evil. Recently, more than half the countries of the world have abolished the death penalty de fecto or de jure. 

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Although an international customary norm that bans the imposition of the death penalty has not yet materialized, the fact is that the abolition of the death penalty is becoming increasingly accepted. This acceptance is paving the way for an international customary norm banning capital punishment altogether.

The Death Penalty in the United States of America

The application of the death penalty in the United States of America dates back to the colonial period  (Prinzo). The first person executed in the US was Captain George Kendall in 1608. Executed in the Jamestown colony of Virginia, Kendall was charged with spying for Spain  (Introduction to the Death Penalty). In the 17^th century, the common law of England, which prevailed in the new colonies, stated that public hanging was the obligatory punishment for crimes committed against the state, the person and property. Thirteen crimes were punished by death in the US: idolatry, witchcraft, blasphemy, murder, assault in sudden anger, sodomy, buggery, adultery, statutory rape, rape, man stealing, perjury in a capital trial and rebellion. Following the American Revolution, the death penalty retained the obligatory nature that it had under the British colony (Walsh).

Over the years, and perhaps ironically, the mandatory nature of the death penalty proved to be one of the ways by which criminals could escape punishment. In the absence of jury discrimination, juries preferred to acquit a person whom they believed to be guilty yet not deserving of death. This problem found its solution in statutes that allowed a discriminatory death penalty. The first state to enact such a statute was Tennessee in 1838 (Walsh). In addition to reforms introduced by enacting new statutes that allowed for a discretionary death penalty, the 19^th and 20^th centuries carried also the hope of abolishing it. There were two attempts made to abolish the death penalty in the US. The first abolitionist round took place between the years 1897 and 1917. During that time, ten states abolished the death penalty, and the main factor that enhanced this abolitionist trend was the improvement in socio-economic conditions across the country. The same factor that led to the abolition of the death penalty in these ten states, however, also led to its reinstatement in eighth of them when socio-economic conditions once again deteriorated  (When Life Generates Death (Legally)-History)

The beginning of the 1970s introduced a second abolitionist round. Contrary to the first round, this abolitionist course was enhanced by factors of a legal nature. In 1972 the US Supreme Court ruled in Furman v. Georgia,[1] in a five-to-four decision, that the death penalty as administered under existing statutes was unconstitutional. In that case, the judges ruled that in the absence of any guidance to juries in the statutes of Georgia, there was a substantial risk that the death penalty would be imposed in an arbitrary and discriminatory manner. To declare the death penalty practice unconstitutional, the majority in Furman relied on the Eighth Amendment prohibition of cruel and the Fourteenth Amendment requirement of equal protection under the law  (Cole). The justices who based their argument on the prohibition of cruel and unusual punishment were Brennan and Marshal JJ. Brennan J. argued that the death penalty violated the concept of human dignity, and Marshall J. stated that the death penalty served no legitimate penal purpose. Douglas, Marshal, and Stewart JJ. Based their argument on both the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments (Cole).  These three judges wrote that the unlimited discretion of juries led to discrimination against the poor, powerless and black.

As a result of Furman, death penalty statutes in thirty-nine states were invalidated. The next step was thought to be the abolition of the death penalty. However, Furman instead led to the adoption of new death penalty statutes that limited the discretion of juries by presenting mitigating and aggravating circumstances. Most of the thirty-nine states responded to Furman by enacting new death penalty statutes. One year later, twenty states had enacted new death penalty statutes.

In 1976, the Supreme Court ruled on the constitutionality of the new death penalty statutes in Gregg. V. Georgia.[2] The “guided-discretion” statutes provide that all capital trials must proceed in two stages. In the first stage, the jury decides the guilt or innocence of the defendant. In the case of guilt, the trial will proceed to the second step, the penalty stage. During the second step and before reaching its decision, the jury considers the aggravating and mitigating circumstances. A decision to sentence the defendant to death can be reached if at least one aggravating circumstance is present. If a defendant is sentenced to death, the decision will be automatically appealed to the State Supreme Court, which must: (a) see if the punishment is proportional to the crime committed by the defendant; (b) make sure that the jury’s finding of an aggravating circumstance is supported by reliable evidence; and (c) determine if the sentence reached was influenced by any arbitrary factors.

The majority of the Court in Gregg found that the “guided-decision” statutes removed the possibility of rendering arbitrary and discriminatory death sentences. It stated: “No longer can a jury wantonly and freakishly impose the death sentence, it is always circumscribed by the legislative guidelines.  Two judges in Gregg dissented. Brennan J. stated in his dissent that “evolving standards of decency” should make the Court get rid of the death penalty because it is no longer accepted in our times. Brennan added that the death penalty violates the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments. The second dissent[3]  was pronounced by Marshall J., who refused the death penalty by stating that it is not necessary to promote any legitimate notion of retribution and such a penalty has no deterrent effect. Similar to Brennan J., Marshall J. affirmed that the death penalty violates the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments.

Following the reinstatement of executions as a result of the decision in Gregg, the number of execution has continuously increased. From twenty-one executions in 1984, the number rose to thirty-eight in 1993 and eight-five in 2000  (Current Information on the Death Penalty-Death Sentences and Executions in 2000). The following timeline of death penalty cases throws light on the significant cases which have been under discussions in the court of law at various time.

Death Penalty Timeline

(Source: Stateline.org reporting)

The continuous increase in the number of executions can be understood as an assertion of its constitutionality. In other words, an observer may be convinced that due to the impossibility of a constitutional challenge, courts apply the death penalty whenever they feel the gravity of the crime deserve such a punishment. A closer look at the number of people executed and their cases shows that the death penalty practice can still be challenged under the Sixth and Fourteenth Amendment.

The main debate surrounding the issue of capital punishment is its constitutionality. Death penalty proponents believe that the death penalty is an integral part of our criminal justice system and reserved for offenders who commit the most heinous of crimes, while death opponents believe in the sanctity of life for any reason. Capital punishment has been applied to both genders at all levels of competency. It has affected the lives of adults, juveniles and nearly all races of mankind.

The continuation of the death penalty raises several arguments. Capital punishment was a volatile issue in 20^th century and continues to be a morally divisive topic in the 21^st century. The underlying ideology of those who support capital punishment appears to be the notion of retribution and the concept of a safer society based on the theory of general deterrence. The following questions need to be examined when determining the validity of that premise: (a) is the death penalty a general deterrence to future criminal activity?, (b) is it morally acceptable to take a life in the name of justice?, (c) is the death penalty a form of cruel and unusual punishment? And (d) should an offender with a mental deficiency be a candidate for execution?

The questions are at the core of the issue and make capital punishment one of the most controversial topics facing society today. Thus, it is an intensely debated moral dilemma that affects the consciousness of Americans from every walk of life.

Both legal and moral issues need to be examined when addressing capital punishment. The moral issues are seeded within ethics, values, religious beliefs, and emotions. Thus, they play a pivotal role in representing some of the contrasting differences between death penalty proponents and death penalty opponents. The law has historically evolved from the moral majority. Many, if not all of our laws, represent society’s morals and value system. As with any society, laws are continually changing to reflect people’s ideological shifts and technological advances. Thus, the paradigm regarding the legality and morality of capital punishment transform accordingly. It is of significance to note that statistical variances can be noticed as paradigm change.

Since its inception, the death penalty has been carried out in a number of ways. Some appear to be inhumane and bring about vociferous protest by opponents of the death penalty. Others seem to be more practical in terms of the euthanasia for lack of a better term of a criminal adjudicated guilty of a capital crime. For example, lethal injection appears to be a peaceful way to die. It seems remarkably subtle how one lies on a gurney and slowly slips from life to death. Those who oppose capital punishment might contend that this method is the lesser of two evils; however, proponents of the death penalty might suggest that the victim experienced immense pain and suffering before dying an untimely death.        

Capital punishment by lethal injection may be too easy of a sentence for a premeditated killer. Those who pursue strict retribution through capital punishment might sanction a more harsh application of death. More severe types of execution have included the gas chamber, electric chair, firing squad and hanging. In contemporary America, the gas chamber is permissible in 5 states, electricity in 10, hanging and firing squad in 3 respectively. It should be noted that all of the states that have capital punishment legislation now allow for lethal injection as an alternative. Death by lethal injection is also the method of choice by the Federal government  (Death Penalty Information Center)

There were several national trends during the 19^th century that affected the number of people executed in the United States. These trends include the following: (1) the invention of the first and second degree murder statutes, (2) the authorization of sentencing duties by a trial jury, (3) a reduction in the number of capital crimes that permitted the death penalty as a sentencing option, (4) the elimination of public executions, and (5) the introduction of more efficient methods of carrying-out executions. As the debate over the appropriateness of the penalty transcended generations, so to did the trends.

Political Aspects of Death Penalty

While a great deal of research has been done about many aspects of the death penalty, very little attention has been paid to the movement organized against it. As this study aims to look at the death penalty from different aspects, it would also analyse the death penalty issue from political perspective in order to investigate the external and internal factors that shape the anti-death penalty movement.

When we look at the successes and failures of the anti-death penalty movement, the role of political opportunities and constraints is apparent. The death penalty was successfully abolished from 1972-1976, largely due to the legal and institutional openings created by the Civil Rights Movement  (Haines). The Civil Rights Movement dramatically transformed American politics, redefining traditional politics as necessarily racial politics  (Winant). Indeed, the anti-death penalty movement and other racially-based movements were impacted by the political opportunity structure created by the Civil Rights Movement such that they collectively “transformed the meaning and contours of American culture” (Winant).. In 1963, civil rights attorney and the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund joined forces to highlight the racial disparities in capital sentencing. The ACLU later joined in this effort as well, as this coalition of lawyers began to attack the constitutionality of the death penalty for  white and  black offenders alike (Haines p. 13-14).

The success of the anti-death penalty movement was short-lived, however, for the dominant legalistic strategy during the period prior to the Furman ruling came with a significant cost. The dominant role played by the lawyers during this stage of the anti-death penalty movement had “contributed to the withering away of whatever was left of citizen-based, political abolitionism” (Haines p. 45). The movement’s size was very small during this time and protest against the death penalty did not begin to grow again until after the 1976 Gregg decision, which ruled that appropriate legal safeguard, could ensure the constitutionality of the death penalty.

Resistance to the death penalty in the US is experiencing a renaissance unseen since its  1960s heyday when it influenced a  1972 United States Supreme  Court  decision  that  stated  capital  punishment  could  not  be imposed arbitrarily and unfairly. The self-imposed state moratorium on executions that followed this decision ended in Utah with the 1977 firing squad death of Gary Gilmore. Prior to Gilmore’s execution The Supreme Court had in 1976 approved a model it thought would avoid death penalty unfairness in future cases.

Unfairness Continues

Another aspect which has aroused controversy for the death penalty is the racial discrimination which has been widely discussed. Today there is little faith in the idea that the death penalty is imposed fairly. Racial discrimination continues at the jury level. All white juries are still convicting blacks  (Yardley). Not surprisingly current data indicate that since the death penalty was reinstated in 1976, 11 white defendants have been executed for killing black victims, while 161 black defendants have been executed for murdering white victims (Death Penalty Information Center 2001).

The scale on which death penalty defendants have had inept defense attorneys is well documented, and a key to the current resistance. Recently a federal judge stated that it was a legal fiction that death penalty defendants receive a full measure of effective assistance of counsel.

Closely related to the issues of disproportionality and inept representation is the question of executing offenders with an intelligence quotient (IQ) of 70 or below, that is, mentally retarded. In Kentucky this refers to defendants  with  significant  sub-average  intellectual  functioning  existing concurrently  with  substantial  deficits  in  adaptive  behaviour  manifested during the developmental period. Thirteen years ago in 1989 when The Supreme Court ruled that the Constitution permitted the execution of mentally retarded people only two of the 38 death penalty states prohibited execution of the retarded  (Rimer). The Court revisited the issue during its 2001/2002 session, first with McCarver v. North Carolina, a death case in which the defendant has an IQ of 67. This case became moot in late 2001 when North Carolina banned executions of the retarded.

Later in mid-summer 2002, the court declared in the first of two rulings, Atkins v. Virginia, that it was excessive and inappropriate to execute mentally retarded offenders  (Greenhouse L.). In its 6-3 landmark vote the court accepted the argument that the national mood had indeed changed since its 1989 ruling. Now the number of states barring execution of the retarded is 18 (Greenhouse L). The impact of Atkins v. Virginia is highly debatable. The court did not offer guidelines on how to apply the new prohibition – that is now up to the individual states. The strength of the national consensus is also questionable. Less than half , 47%, of the 38 states with capital  punishment  have  banned  it  for  mentally  retarded  offenders. Coupled with the fact that state-level political opposition to court’s decision is strong in some states where capital punishment is popular, this leaves open the issue of the number of people who will be removed from death row, or prevented in the future being sentenced to death. When in 2000, Governor  ‘W’  Bush  was  campaigning  for  the  presidency  he  opposed banning the execution of retarded people. His successor in Texas vetoed a bill prohibiting such executions based on the logic that Texas already had provisions to prohibit executing the retarded, despite the fact that in recent years Texas has executed six mentally retarded convicts, and now has seven more on death row.

The second decision, Ring v. Arizona, decided that juries rather than judges must make the crucial factual determination that subjected an offender to the death penalty. This decision ‘invalidated the death penalty laws in five states and cast doubt on the laws of four others’ (Greenhouse 2002c). Coming only four days after Atkins v. Virginia, this ruling at first gave the appearance of a new momentum within the Supreme Court against the death penalty. It was instead addressing an issue raised previously when a New Jersey hate-crime law permitted the imposition of a higher sentence than the statutory maximum if a judge found that a crime was committed with a biased motive.  Together Atkins and Ring are expected to save hundreds of lives of those now on death row.

Another problem involves what has become known as geographical unfairness. In August 2001, a new study confirmed that in Nebraska, capital punishment was applied unequally in rural and urban areas, a discrepancy with subtle racial implications (because more blacks live in urban areas). The same study reported that in Nebraska the death penalty flowed down-ward – defendants whose victims were affluent were more likely to get the death penalty  (Belluck). In late December 2001, the Kansas Supreme Court ruled that its death penalty was unfair and had to be changed. At issue was ‘the requirement that defendants be sentenced to death even if the aggravating factors . . . [did] . . . not outweigh the mitigating circumstances …’ (New York Times).

The specter of executing those wrongfully convicted is probably the major reason that opposition to capital punishment is growing in the US. Since the death penalty was reinstated in 1973, 98 innocent death row inmates have been freed, 16 between April 2000 and July 2001  (More death-penalty doubts). According to a Columbia University report, June 2000, for 28 states between 1973 and 1995 that had death penalty appeals, 68% of the death sentences were found to be so legally flawed as to be reversed (Barton 2000). A follow-up study reported that states and counties that used the death penalty the most were the ones most likely to make flawed verdicts  (Court finds death penalty used unfairly in Kansas).

Combined with surveys reporting that as many as 67% of North Carolina’s population think innocent people have been executed within the last 25 years, it is unsurprising that support for capital punishment is waning  (Taylor D). Indeed, public support for capital punishment while still high has declined to a 19-year low. It is within this context that resistance to the death penalty is flourishing.

Death Penalty Abolition

Abolition is an oft-cited alternative to the death penalty; however, few organised voices of resistance put this on their ‘meet the public’ presentations because of the relative strength of the population that still supports capital punishment. Abolitionists’ arguments based on the immorality of state-sponsored executions have little plausibility with the public. More purchase for the resistance movement has been found on ‘practical’ grounds, which has helped to strengthen arguments for death penalty alternatives.

Life without parole

Life without parole (LWOP) is an option that is already available in 46 states and the federal courts (USA Today 2001b). Its appeal is based on the idea that life without parole provides certitude of punishment, discourages grandstanding by prosecutors who use death penalty cases for career enhancement, avoids allowing painful real and symbolic confrontations between unrepentant criminals and victims’ families and their supporters, and it eliminates the risk of deadly errors (USA Today 2001b). Recently a national poll found that support for capital punishment dropped to 55% when LWOP was offered as an alternative. LWOP does not appear to have much attraction to prosecutors  and  judges,  who  according  to  some  observers  seek  death  penalty sentences because they see them as saleable fodder for election and re-election campaigns. In one well-documented instance a judge repeatedly denied telling a jury it could use LWOP, when in fact it could use it.

Public opinion: Growing bipartisan support for moratoriums has occurred in recent years at city, state and federal levels more so than for calls for abolition. A Kentucky Catholic priest opposed to capital punishment stated: ‘I’ll support a moratorium as a strategy in order to get the issues of capital punishment before the public; we’ll use it to educate the public’ (Dalehanty).  Just what moratorium supporters hope to accomplish varies greatly. Some states favour them so that a commission can study death penalty flaws so as to fix them. Groups in other states, including Texas, favour provisions to ensure DNA testing for capital defendants and death-row inmates. There is fairly wide agreement that indigent capital defendants should have improved legal representation, especially those whose crimes are most likely to get death sentences. The most talked about ‘fix it’ measure has concerned executing the mentally retarded.

In a surprising show of bi-partisan cohesion in early 2000 (before the November presidential election) the US Senate saw the introduction of the Innocence Protection Act (IPA). It was designed to create legislation that would require those facing the death penalty to be represented by a qualified attorney, and give defendants access to DNA testing that may not have been available at the time of their trial. Later the same year and still before the national elections and the Florida recount debacle, another bi-partisan group of Senators and Representatives released a poll that they claimed demonstrated overwhelming public support for significantly reforming the nation’s death penalty system. According to the poll, 80% of Americans supported reforming or abolishing the death penalty. The report also found that 64% of the nation favoured suspending executions entirely until issues of fairness in capital punishments could be solved. Clearly, according to a Senator Patrick Leahy (D-Vt): ‘The people are ahead of the politicians -they know the death penalty machinery is broken’  (Stout).

One nationally respected editor argued in mid-May 2002, that it might be politically advantageous for the Democrat party to call for a national moratorium before the next presidential election. Such a move, he argued, might not only attract conservative Republicans disturbed by their party’s continued pro-death and anti-abortion agenda, it might also attract stronger voter turnout from African-Americans because they have been the disproportion-ate victims of capital punishment. A Democratic call for a national moratorium would also likely appeal to former party members who switched to the Republican party because, in part or whole, presidential candidate Bill Clinton flew home from campaigning to execute a mentally retarded murderer in Arkansas  (Beinart)

City council

In addition to national bi-partisan support for IPA several organisations are calling for moratoriums. Of particular note because it comes out of the south and because it was supported by clergy, civic leaders, lawyers and citizen’s groups, is Charlotte, NC’s city council. Urged by a Republican supporter of the death penalty in a state that sentences about 25 people a year to death – more per capita than other states including Texas -in Fall 2000 the council adopted a moratorium on executions. Charlotte became the seventh and largest municipality in NC to pass such a resolution since mid-1999. More than two dozen other municipalities had adopted moratorium resolutions by November 2000, including Philadelphia, Atlanta, Baltimore and San Francisco  (Rimer). It is doubtful that the city moratoria reflect a rural-urban split as much as it reflects civil rights activism that has a long history of being grounded in urban politics.

States

In January 2000, Illinois Governor George Ryan, a Republican who supports capital punishment cited the exoneration of 13 death row inmates since Illinois had re-adopted the death penalty in  1977, as the reason he would approve no more executions until the system had been studied. His reassessment coincided with the intense media coverage scrutiny given to Governor George W. Bush’s presidential campaign and his unflinching support for capital punishment in Texas, which leads the nation in executions. Nebraska’s Legislature approved of a moratorium in 1999, but its governor vetoed it. Later the legislature approved financing for a study of the death penalty system, as have Legislatures in Illinois, Maryland and Indiana. North Carolina’ Governor James B. Hunt, a Democrat, however thinks that his state’s death penalty system works fairly, and that a moratorium is unnecessary.

Church-based groups: Nationally both Catholics and Quakers have created specific organisations opposed to the death penalty, but spiritually based resistance is also found among personnel in secular organisations. In midsummer 2000, the Quixote Center, an interfaith organisation that tracks death-penalty issues, stated that at least 860 grass-roots organisations were lobbying for a moratorium on executions  (Barton)

Prison writers: Within the last 25 years a promising and abundant crop has emerged from the oppressive and barren confines of US prisons – prisoner writers. They have in no small measure brought a significant, authoritative and persuasive voice to abolition and moratorium camps. An exemplary example is Mumia Abu-Jamal, whom  (Davis) called ‘the country’s most well-known death row prisoner’. In 1995 he published Live From Death Row (Abu-Jamal 1995), which links capital punishment to racism and classism. He and other prisoner writers have placed their work in scholarly and popular journals, books and prison publications including the Angolite from Louisiana’s Angola Prison and Prison Legal News from Washington State Prison.

Pros and Cons of Death Penalty

Pros

Undoubtedly, taking a life is the supreme expression of a state’s power over its citizens. It should not be used without offering the accused every possible opportunity to present evidence that may keep the state out of the unimaginable position of executing the innocent.

Today, science provides the criminal justice system with a means of definitively answering many questions of guilt or innocence without eyewitness testimony or circumstantial evidence. There have been great, new, scientific and technological advances in DNA and forensic evidence testing that can explore evidence previously unusable.

However, we should not overemphasize technology. Minorities and the poor often cannot pay for adequate or competent representation. They cannot afford “dream teams” who negotiate with prosecutors to eliminate the possibility of a death sentence before a trial begins — as with O.J. Simpson. Innocent people are often unable to adequately address their legal problems with definitive evidence of their innocence.

In the past, many complained that death row inmates were given too many chances to appeal a conviction, dragging out the process for years and tying up the courts. So, Congress passed the Anti-terrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act (AEDPA), limiting an inmate’s right to appeal a capital conviction. However, in doing so, Congress also limited the ability of Americans wrongfully convicted to prove their innocence.

The Death Penalty Information Center reported that the average time between a capital conviction and execution is eight years. The average time that innocent people have spent on death row before proving their innocence is seven years. The provisions in AEDPA effectively cut the time between sentencing and execution in half, thus, virtually guaranteeing that innocent people will be executed.

 Cons

In this world of laws, our justice system will inevitably have some flaws. However, capital punishment is not one of them. If there is a defect, it is in the way we administer it.

From before the 1972 Supreme Court decision that outlawed it, to after the 1976 decision that reinstated it, the death penalty has been a topic of debate. It is described as racist, unreliable and ineffective. But no matter how detractors twist the issue, the vast majority of Americans continue to support this type of punishment.

It must be remembered that there is another party besides the murderer involved in every murder, and that is the victim. By the unjustified taking of another’s life, the murderer has forfeited his own.

We are not obligated to support murderers for the rest of their natural life. If one murderer is granted life in prison while another is executed, it is only because of the extraordinary degree of leniency that we have in our American system of jurisprudence, and not because of any intrinsic unfairness.

Critics of capital punishment have sought to hobble it in every way possible. And the statistics they use to try and justify its abolition are misleading. As Mark Twain once said, “First get your facts; then you can distort them at your leisure.” The fact is, however, the facts are just not there.

Some charge that capital punishment is racist. But the rates of execution reveal that white murderers are twice as likely to be executed as their black counterparts.

Others say that no deterrent effect is produced by capital punishment. The rub here is that it is impossible to prove the effect of something that didn’t happen. Common sense tells us that some people refrain from murder because they fear death themselves, many others refrain from it because they consider it socially reprehensible; one of the reasons they consider it reprehensible is because people are put to death for it.

We don’t need a moratorium on the death penalty. What we need is a death penalty applied in a more consistent and timely manner that will serve as a more effective deterrent to would-be murderers.

The skepticism and hesitancy currently found in the US regarding the death penalty is a hopeful sign that America is well on its way to joining most of the world’s countries on this ancient form of punishment. Clearly international pressure on this subject puts the US in an awkward and untenable position as a world leader  (Hood). At the moment, however, there are two reasons why it is not clear whether domestic doubt and international pressures are enough to abolish capital punishment. Firstly, death penalty resistance is not the beneficiary of a broader movement such as the civil rights movement of the 1960s to 1970s when voting rights, opposition to the Vietnam War and other issues helped fan the flames of moral indignation and demands for reforms. Today it seems that death penalty resistance is a one-off subject that struggles to get attention in the face of dropping crime rates and the economic attractiveness of prison growth (Kilborn). Secondly, capital punishment still has core appeal in a nation with more guns per capita than any nation in the world. If, however, LWOP can be shown to be good for local economies, safe for various forms of political careers, capital punishment just might disappear for lack of use (Kilborn).

An exception might be created for political criminals whose behaviour is as horrendous as that of Timothy McVeigh. Some observers have argued that McVeigh makes a strong case for capital punishment – a well represented guilty white killer who came from a caring family ostensibly free of any of the mitigating factors so often found in the background of those on death row  (Mcgrory). Such arguments fail to be persuasive because they ignore, or at the very least they minimise the fact that state-based executions are no different from the wrong-headed sense of ‘duty’ that drove McVeigh to kill 168 people. More directly, until there is a spiritual thirst in the US to abolish capital punishment, abolitionists will, rightly, continue to argue that in executing murderers the state and its citizens lower themselves to the same moral level as the murders

Works Cited

Barton, P. “Efforts to put death penalty on hold continues to grow.” USA Today 6 July 2000: 5A.

Beinart, P. New Life. The New Republic, 2002.

Cole, D. No Equal Justice: Race and Class in the American Justice System. New York: The New Press, 1999.

“Court finds death penalty used unfairly in Kansas.” New York Times 30 December 2001: A-18.

Current Information on the Death Penalty-Death Sentences and Executions in 2000. 10 May 2008 <http://www.amnest.org>.

D, Taylor. “New Poll finds North Carolinians overwhelmingly support death penalty moratorium.” North Carolina Academy of Trial Lawyers 29 June 2001.

Dalehanty, Father Parick. Kentucky Coalition to abolish the Death Penalty J.R Lilly. 24 July 2001.

Davis, Angella. “Writing on the wall: prisoners on punishment’.” Punishment and Society 3(3) (2001): 427-31.

Death Penalty Information Center. Washington, D.C, 2001.

Furman v. Georgia, 408 U.S. 238 (1972).

G. Rabbah, Oukoubat Al-Ihdam. Haal Am Mouchkila? Beirut: Nawafal Coporation, 1987.

Gregg v. Georgia, 428 U.S. 153 (1976).

Haines, Herbert. Against Capital Punishment: The Anti-Death Penalty Movement in America. New York: Oxford University Press, 1972-1994.

Hood, R. The Death Penalty: A World-wide perspective. Oxford: Clarendom, 1996.

Introduction to the Death Penalty. 10 May 2008 <htt.://deathpenaltyinfo.org/history1.html>.

Kilborn, P.T. “Rural towns turn to prisons to reignite their economies.” New York Times 1 August 2001: A-16.

L., Greenhouse. “’Citing “National Consensus”, Justice bar death penalty for retarded defendants’.” 12 Februray 2002b: A-21.

L., Greenhouse. ‘Top court hears argument on execution of retarded’, New York Times, 12 February 2002a: A-21

Mcgrory, M. “New surey shows overwhelming majority supports changing the death penalty.” Press Release, New Orleans, LA 15 September 2000: A-18.

M.H. Reggio. Frontline-History of the Death Penalty. Online: Frontline ,http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/execution/readings/history.html> date accessed 10th May 2008

“More death-penalty doubts.” US Today 5 July 2001a.

New York Times (2001) ‘Court finds death penalty used unfairly in Kansas’, 30 December, A-18

P, Belluck. “Bebraska is siad to use death penalty unequally.” New York Times 2 August 2001: A-13.

Prinzo, K.T. “The United States – ‘Capital’ of the World: An Analysis of why the United States practices capital punishment while the international trend is towards its abolition.” 24 Brooklyn J. Int’l L (1999): 855.

S, Rimer. “Support for moratoriums in executions gets stronger.” 31 October 2000: A-18.

Stout, D. “Law makers see hope for help on death cases.” New York Times 14 September 2000: A-20 col. 1.

United Nations, Capital Punishment, Development 1961 to 1965. (Report Presented by N. Morris) 1967

Walsh, T. J. “On the Abolition of Man: A Discussion of the Moral and Legal Issues Surrounding the Death Penalty.” 44 Cleveland State Law REv. (1994): 23.

When Life Generates Death (Legally)-History. 10 May 2008 <http://library.thinkquest.org/23685/data/history.html >.

Winant, Howard. Racial Conditions. . Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1994.

Yardley, J. “Execution approaches in a most rare murder case.” 10 August 2001: A-10.

[1] Furman v. Georgia, 408 U.S. 238 (1972).

[2] Gregg v. Georgia, 428 U.S. 153 (1976).

[3] Gregg v. Georgia, 428 U.S. 153 (1976). At 231-241

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Write your Thesis Statement:

As a basic step, the dissertation introduction chapter must comprise of the thesis statement. It is very important that through your thesis statement, you may impart a good understanding of your topic to your readers. The introduction is very formal and it provides exact information and certain key points such as thesis statement, research question, hypotheses and aims and objectives of the study. Keeping in view these points, the writer has to expose a lot of information within the very beginning paragraph. Here, you have to make aware the writer about the main theme, the research question, subject matter, research methodology, and the core argument. You may also want to explain your research perspective.

Thus the introduction might pave the way to the entire dissertation. It will serve as a guide for the reader to know about the other chapters of the research work. So, it can be said that the introduction generates the expectations of the reader. Make sure that at the end of the dissertation, you should be able to relate your whole work with the introduction. As the introduction is planned to interconnect the complete dissertation together, so it is written at the last stage of dissertation writing. The reason is that at the final stage, you may better understand the applied research methodologies and research findings.

The Formation:

The dissertation introduction can be written in several ways, but it mainly depends on the type of your research topic. You may start your introduction with a fascinating quotation or an intrepid declaration. The main purpose is to draw the attention of the reader from the very beginning of the write-up. You must keep in mind the point that at the end of reading your written work, the readers may not think of wasting their time and energies. So you have to try your level best to enhance their reading ability. For this, you have to keep a balance between the provided information and the interest of the reader by using flowery language.

Before starting the writing project, you must gather and shortlist all the information. Your style of writing will enable you to create an influential argument. As the introduction consists of a thesis statement, the research questions, an outline of concepts and research methodology, and the scope and significance of work, the main point to arrange all the relevant topics in a sequence.

Review your introduction:

The introduction chapter serves as the base for the remaining chapters and the arrangement of the whole dissertation writing. Here, you may not have to describe the detailed arguments, analyze data, or provide the information relevant to the main body of your dissertation. The introduction is to place up the thesis statement by providing background information to the readers to enable him/her to clearly understand the research objectives. Also, the introduction chapter should be brief and convincing. Generally, the introduction comprises 10% of the entire write up.

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Keep in mind the mental level of your readers: Academic report writing is usually done for extremely learned and educated personnel who are already aware of the basic knowledge of the topic. The readers of such academic minds do not need a thorough introduction and details of the topic. So, the general advice is to write your academic papers by keeping in mind the mental and academic level of your readers. In this way, you can easily convey your viewpoint to the relevant audience without wasting your time and energy.

Relate your academic topic with previous researches: Before writing an academic paper, a lot of research and knowledge is required. By searching for and shortlisting the relevant data and information and already published reports on a selected topic, a student can be able to write up to date and revealing papers that are not only in reliance with the previous research but also present the writer’s ideas and thoughts about the topic.

Stuck to the topic: It is suggested in academic writing that the introductory paragraph of the academic paper should possess a brief introduction to the topic. It should also serve as an outline of the main points that are going to be covered in the whole of academic writing. This part of the paper relates the reader with the topic and from the very first paragraph, the reader can guess about the material being presented in the paper. To serve the purpose of introduction, a brief abstract is written at the beginning of almost all the academic writings so that the readers can easily understand the outline of the topic.

Create a thesis statement: In academic writing, the stage of creating a thesis statement and delineating the underneath facts for the statement is one of the most effectual writing structures. For successful academic writing, the presentation of hypotheses with supportive details to prove its validity is a very basic point to be kept in mind.

Present supporting details and evidence: An important point to be considered in mind in academic writing is to attach the details of all the relevant list of sources and references used to collect the relevant data and information. It is an essential point that academic writing must comprise of the detailed bibliographic list. This list will enable the researchers and readers to easily locate and search for the relevant supporting details used by the author and weigh up the paper’s data and information in a logical way.

Enlighten the readers: The main purpose of writing an academic paper is to enlighten and inform the readers about the research topic. So, all the ideas and opinions of academic writing must be supported with solid evidence. The credibility of an academic mind can be proved by the sources and suggestions used to write a perfect academic publication.

Ignore flowery language: The main object of academic writing is to inform rather than impress the readers. The use of flowery language and irrelevant metaphors and similes’ may add charm to the writing but cannot enable an average reader to understand the main theme easily. So, academic writing may be done in a language that is clear, concise and according to the academic and mental level of the readers.

Be somewhat stylish: The simplicity of academic writings doesn’t mean that you should not follow the requirements of academic writings. Rather, a specific style and format must be adopted to make a paper acceptable by your tutors and institutions. By using the opposite style by following its recommendations, a writer may be able to improve the quality of writing and the acceptance and success of the written document can be ensured manifold.

Editing is must: The process of editing is mandatory in academic writing. Right from vocabulary to format, style and structure, the importance of editing cannot be ignored at any cost. The process of editing will enable a writer to make the written paper succinct and influential. Editing may enhance the serenity and authority of the written paper.

Proofreading makes a paper perfect: Before the final submission of an academic writing project, the writers should make it 100% sure that their written papers are free from all types of spelling or grammatical mistakes. The authority of an academic report can be ensured manifold after getting help from a professional and reliable proofreading service that is capable to offer academic proofreading, dissertation proofreading, essay proofreading, and thesis proofreading.

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