The Death Penalty, Self-Emancipation and Progressive Politics: Paradigms in Conversation

In this paper, we centre the application of the death penalty in comparative perspective, and consider rejection of the death penalty as a universal principle for justice and democracy. The analysis considers the normalization and acceptance of the death penalty as a mode of governance that serves as an indicator of oppressive state practices widely, here focusing on a specific context often identified as a pivotal, defining moment of global transformation.

We suggest a close reading of debates about the death penalty as a form of state governance from the early years of the Russian Revolution. One of its first acts in 1917 was to abolish the death penalty. But by 1918 state sanctioned capital punishment had been re-established by the communist government, and legal – as well as extra-legal – executions, became commonplace. In 1918, this policy regression was forcefully challenged by Iulii Martov, a leading activist and socialist from a Jewish background. This is a key theorist whose writings have been, however, epistemically erased from the historical record, receiving scant scholarly attention. Martov’s critique of Soviet death penalty policies, barely accessible other than in the original Russian language, anticipates, we argue, many of the themes of contemporary critical scholarship regarding the death penalty in current times.

The argument is conceived as an interface of paradigms – intentionally placing in creative conversation critical scholarship about the death penalty, contemporary and historic. The paper suggests that death penalty policies provide an important insight into the shape of politics in general, and effective critique can serve as a window to imagine an alternative, emancipatory future.

The argument is developed through a mixed methodology, and in three sections (i) framing the question epistemologically, through autoethnographic reflections based on forty years (1973-2013) of shared experience among the co-authors in socialist activism, and related extensive personal archives; (ii) a review of selected currents in critical literature through a close reading of contemporary critiques of death penalty policies and relevance to theories of self-emancipation; and (iii) a detailed analysis of debates on the death penalty in the early years of the Russian revolution (February 1917 – early 20s) through original translations of writings by Martov and his contemporaries. We suggest that such a reading of legally sanctioned execution and related debates can illuminate insights essential to progressive politics in the 21st century.