The Purpose of the Literature Review
There is ongoing controversy as to whether the death penalty prevents other people from committing crimes. Some claim that by sentencing offenders to death will deter others from becoming engaged in criminal activities. Opposing viewpoints insist that the death penalty only raised homicide rates and begs for reform, given the many cases of people that have been falsely sentenced to death that have come to the light.
The literature review will discuss whether the death penalty has a deterrent effect on people from committing crimes. In order to be able to reach conclusions, panel studies and empirical research will be reviewed, and their findings will be critically reviewed. Some researchers have concluded, after discussing the current norms in regards best practice in the panel data analysis that the recent panel literature is rather inconclusive. This shall be investigated to a greater extent throughout the literature review with further research. Other than that, the deterrence effect of capital punishment on homicides and whether a death penalty statute increases homicide, will also be evaluated through partial identification analysis with repeated cross sections and by projecting the views of leading criminologists. Furthermore, religious and demographic factors will also be considered as per their relation to death penalty attitudes and sentencing verdicts. It will be discussed whether, and to what extent, death penalty sentencing verdicts are affected by fundamentalism, gender, beliefs about where God stands in terms of death penalty, literal interpretism and how one’s religious group feels about the death penalty. Finally, the claims that capital punishment is in serious need for reform, which will also be discussed with the help of evidence and data collected from other studies and research.
