n order to fill in a perceivable gap, scholars have started to assess the importance of political structure as a critical variable in death penalty abolition across Western democracies.
In “The Myth of the Dedicated Public Servant,” Gerber and Johnson shift the debate by illustrating how political structure alone can influence death penalty politics (Gerber & Johnson 2007). In his comparative historical analysis of the United States and Europe, Gerber posits that the American democratic structure has historically bound the nation to retention while the European democratic structures have allowed for more flexibility. In general, the process of frequent, open, and direct elections encourages American political candidates to use appeals to pathos in order to capitalize on the public's fear and insecurity. Gerber suggests that once politicians have campaigned as tough on crime, their decisions in office do not give proper weight to any powerful social science data that may contradict their position on the death penalty (Gerber & Johnson 2007, 199). This populist bind is not found in the prototypical European democracy with institutions that remove decision-making from popular demand. Through his evaluation, Gerber suggests that political structure deserves more attention as a variable in the transatlantic study of death penalty abolition.
In “Civilized Rebels: Death Penalty Abolition in Europe as Cause, Mark of Distinction, and Political Strategy,” Hammel adds an important dimension to the political structure theory by contrasting the effects of American populism and European elitism (Hammel 2011). Hammel argues that European intellectuals considered opposition to the death penalty a “mark of distinction” that demonstrated their superiority to the masses (Hammel 2011, 174). In stark contrast, America's populists have always been hostile to any semblance of elitism in politics. In this way, American populist attitudes have minimized the opportunity for strong independent political leadership on the issue, which is often essential on the path to abolition. By building on the findings of Gerber and Johnson, Hammel enhances the political structures theory and further supports its validity as a fresh explanation for variation in a Western democracy's policy on the death penalty.
Together, recent scholars have created the foundation for a hypothesis that is worth exploring. A literature review on this complex issue reveals a provocative idea: is abolition or retention of the death penalty steered by a Western nation's political structure of democracy? Keeping in mind the dimension added by Hammel, political structure theory considers the influence of a) institutional make-up and b) the decision-making practices that accompany these institutions. The theory must be two-fold because both elements inform each other in a cycle. With this relationship in mind, I seek to tighten the corresponding hypotheses presented by Gerber & Johnson and Hammel by examining the influence of differing political structures through a comparative historical analysis of the United States and Great Britain.
The United States has not abolished the death penalty because American political institutions are more democratic in structure than Great Britain. In this hypothesis, “more democratic” refers to a) an institutional make-up that gives constituents immediate control over their representatives and b) populist decision-making practices that encourage respect for public opinion over a public official's individual conscience.
A comprehensive comparative historical analysis of the United States and Great Britain is an appropriate method for substantiating the controversial premise of this hypothesis. A comparative historical analysis is a type of explanatory research that uses systematic comparison between two cases and the analysis of processes over time in order to explain large political phenomena and often predict possible outcomes to current events (Mahoney 2004). As demonstrated in the literature review, many scholars have used comparative historical an