Roger Hood Research Articles

Review of Roger Hood and Surya Deva (Eds), Confronting Capital Punishment in Asia: Human Rights, Politics, and Public Opinion

This is an important book. With the Johnson and Zimring (2009)book of a few years back, it is one of the two most eye-opening books on the death penalty in Asia ever published. Anyone interested in the worldwide movement away from executions will be glad to have a copy in his or her hands. The volume is edited by Roger Hood, emeritus professor at Oxford and unquestionably among the top death penalty scholars in the world, and Surya Deva, a law professor at the City University of Hong Kong. Included are 14 original chapters written by an all-star cast of 15 authors. Earlier drafts of the papers were presented at a conference in Hong Kong in 2011. The chapters are divided into four sections: “Situating Asia in an International Human Rights Context,” “The Progress So Far,” “Public Opinion and Death Penalty Reform,” and “The Politics of Capital Punishment in Practice.” Four of the chapters focus on China, three on India, two on Japan, one on Singapore, and four on issues that can be applied more generally to Asia as a whole. Each chapter utilizes a numbered outline, making it easy for readers to follow. The editors turn to Saul Lehrfreund of The Death Penalty Project in London to set the table for the volume. For the past quarter century, Lehrfreund and his team have represented scores of death row clients from Africa, Asia, and the Caribbean in courts in their home countries and before international tribunals. His chapter outlines various international treaties and agreements that have served to limit or outright ban the death penalty, such as the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) which was adopted by the UN General Assembly in 1966. International agreements call for all countries that still use the death penalty to provide information on the frequency and scope of its use (an obligation that China, for one, continues to ignore), to restrict the death penalty to the most serious offenses, and to eliminate provisions that call for mandatory death sentences. Unquestionably, these international agreements are part of the reason why the death penalty worldwide has been increasingly restricted in the past 30 years. Indeed, two additional chapters in the book focus on efforts by abolitionist countries (principally Australia) and national human rights organizations in helping to pave the way for abolition. While it is generally agreed that China continues to carry out more executions than the rest of the world combined, the chapter by Liu Renwen from the Chinese Academy of Social Asian Criminology (2015) 10:251–253 DOI 10.1007/s11417-014-9192-8

The Death Penalty: A Worldwide Perspective (review)

Reviewed by: The Death Penalty: A Worldwide Perspective Prof. William A. Schabas, OC, MRIA (bio) Roger Hood & Carolyn Hoyle, The Death Penalty: A Worldwide Perspective( 4th ed., Oxford Univ. Press 2008) 350 pages, ISBN 9780199228478. Perhaps no single issue better illustrates progress in the protection and promotion of human rights than the progressive limitation and abolition of capital punishment. Unlike so many norms, where assessments are vulnerable to much subjectivity and are not prone to quantitative measurement (is there less torture? is there less racial discrimination? are trials fairer?), the death penalty can be readily examined using simple statistics. Thus, while only a handful of the sixty-odd states in the world had abolished capital punishment at the time the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was adopted in December 1948, sixty years later approximately two-thirds of the nearly 200 countries that exist today have put this barbaric practice behind them. Since the beginning of the 1980s, the pace of abolition has been a fairly constant two to three states per year, with virtually no backsliding. If these trends continue, we can look forward to universal abolition by about the year 2030. How fitting, then, that the most recent edition of The Death Penalty: A Worldwide Perspectiveshould appear literally weeks after the adoption of a resolution by the United Nations General Assembly, asking states to “progressively restrict the use of the death penalty and reduce the number of offences for which it may be imposed.” The resolution called for a moratorium on capital punishment with a view to its subsequent abolition. Twice before, in 1994 and 1999, European states had attempted but failed at such an initiative, even at a time when already a majority of United Nations members had abandoned the practice. By 2007, things had reached a tipping point, when it became clear that within the General Assembly there was now a clear majority on the subject. In the end, the vote wasn’t even close, with 104 voting in favor to 54 against. Diplomats who campaigned in favor of the resolution in the General Assembly in October and November 2007 kept well-thumbed copies of the third edition of this book at their sides. It has been two decades since Roger Hood was initially requested by the United Nations to prepare a report on capital punishment. Subsequently issued as a monograph by Oxford University Press, his work formed the first edition of this book. Hood’s stocktaking built on the work of two earlier consultants, Marc Ancel and Norville Morris, whose studies were published in the 1960s. His work figured as part of a process within the United Nations, both informing and contributing to the ongoing discussion. Hood’s research has provided a vital benchmark on capital punishment around the globe, facilitating measurement of a number of relevant parameters since that time. But it has also, in its own way, contributed to progressive development as a fundamental text for use by advocates and activists in their campaigns. The study has both debunked myths and half-truths, and it has also inspired those who seek reform in this area. [End Page 537] Roger Hood is now emeritus professor in criminology at the University of Oxford, as well as an emeritus fellow of All Souls College. He remains extremely active in the discipline, lecturing around the world on this and other topics. For the fourth edition, he has taken on a co-author, Carolyn Hoyle, who is also a distinguished academic at Oxford. Presumably she will take the lead in the fifth, sixth and seventh editions until, with universal abolition, further updates of this book become unnecessary and it loses its interest. The authors are of course courteous and respectful towards their colleagues, but they observe that many have sometimes shown unwarranted pessimism. They point to the distinguished German criminologist, Günther Kaiser, who wrote in 1986 that there was “little hope that international bodies” could succeed in initiatives on the death penalty. Another great specialist, Leon Radzinowicz, felt that by 1999 an abolitionist plateau had been reached, and that virtually all countries likely to abolish capital punishment had already done so. Both could not have been more...

A Fair Hearing? Ethnic Minorities in the Criminal Courts. By Stephen Shute, Roger Hood and Florence Seemungal. (Devon: Willan Publishing, 2005, 160pp, £35.00 hb)

A Fair Hearing? Ethnic Minorities in the Criminal Courts. By Stephen Shute, Roger Hood and Florence Seemungal. (Devon: Willan Publishing, 2005, 160pp, £35.00 hb)

Book Review: The criminological foundations of penal policy: Essays in honour of Roger Hood

Book Review: The criminological foundations of penal policy: Essays in honour of Roger Hood

Book Review: The Criminological Foundations of Penal Policy: Essays in Honour of Roger Hood

Book Review: The Criminological Foundations of Penal Policy: Essays in Honour of Roger Hood

Racial Disparity in Sentencing: Reflections on the Hood Study

This article analyses Roger Hood’s 1992 study of race and sentencing, which found evidence of possible racial discrimination in certain Crown Courts. Examining recent criticisms of the validity of these findings, it is suggested that an adequate threshold of significance was used in the study; that the exclusion of certain status variables did not invalidate the study’s findings; and that the choice of which sentencing variables to control for is ultimately a normative matter. Next, the article considers what steps – other than alleviating discrimination – would be needed to reduce racial imbalance in the prisons. It is argued that little is likely to be gained by seeking to make ‘social adversity’ a basis for sentencing mitigation; and that policies before the sentencing stage would need to be altered instead – for example, those relating to drug‐law enforcement.

Is Chivalry Colour-Blind? Race-Class-Gender Articulation in the Criminal Justice System

The recent multivariate analysis of sentencing reports and probation reports by Roger Hood makes the controversial claim that the ‘chivalry thesis’ that women are generally treated more favourably than men in the courts is applicable to both white women and black women. The present paper reviews Hood's claim against the background of the literature on chivalry to see if this historically race-specific cultural practice has now become colour-blind as Hood implies. The paper concludes by stating that Hood is mistaken on two major counts regarding the different problems that face black women and white women in court and the different ways that similar problems are experienced by people with variable race, class and gender relations.

PROFESSOR SIR LEON RADZINOWICZ, LL.D, FBA: A Tribute to Mark His 90th Birthday

Journal Article PROFESSOR SIR LEON RADZINOWICZ, LL.D, FBA: A Tribute to Mark His 90th Birthday Get access ROGER HOOD ROGER HOOD CBE, FBA, Professor of Criminology, Univenity of Oxford, Director of the Centre for Criminological Research, and Fellow of All Souls College Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar The British Journal of Criminology, Volume 37, Issue 1, Winter 1997, Page 1, https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordjournals.bjc.a014127 Published: 01 January 1997

Roger Hood's Race and Sentencing

Roger Hood's Race and Sentencing

Girls and the Perception of Sexual Danger in the Victorian Reformatory System

HistoryVolume 78, Issue 253 p. 201-217 Girls and the Perception of Sexual Danger in the Victorian Reformatory System MICHELLE CALE, MICHELLE CALE Balliol College, OxfordSearch for more papers by this author MICHELLE CALE, MICHELLE CALE Balliol College, OxfordSearch for more papers by this author First published: June 1993 https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-229X.1993.tb01578.xCitations: 7 The research for this work has been funded by the ESRC with grants from Balliol College, Oxford. Manuscript sources are quoted with the permission of the archivists of the relevant repositories. Many thanks to Roger Hood, John Prest, and Duncan Greatwood for reading earlier versions of this paper. Read the full textAboutPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd to favoritesTrack citation ShareShare Give accessShare full text accessShare full-text accessPlease review our Terms and Conditions of Use and check box below to share full-text version of article.I have read and accept the Wiley Online Library Terms and Conditions of UseShareable LinkUse the link below to share a full-text version of this article with your friends and colleagues. Learn more.Copy URL Share a linkShare onFacebookTwitterLinked InRedditWechat Citing Literature Volume78, Issue253June 1993Pages 201-217 RelatedInformation

Book Reviews : LEON RADZINOWICZ AND ROGER HOOD, A History of English Criminal Law and its Administration from 1750, Volume 5: The Emergence of Penal Policy in Victorian and Edwardian England. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1990, ix + 839 pp., £22.50 paperback. MARTIN J. WIENER, Reconstructing the Criminal: Culture, Law, and Policy in England, 1830-1914. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990, pp.

Book Reviews : LEON RADZINOWICZ AND ROGER HOOD, A History of English Criminal Law and its Administration from 1750, Volume 5: The Emergence of Penal Policy in Victorian and Edwardian England. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1990, ix + 839 pp., £22.50 paperback. MARTIN J. WIENER, Reconstructing the Criminal: Culture, Law, and Policy in England, 1830-1914. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990, pp.

REVIEWS

Journal Article REVIEWS Get access THE DEATH PENALTY: A WORLD-WIDE PERSPECTIVE. BY ROGER HOOD. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1989; reprinted with correctionsm, 1990. 182 pp. £8.95 pb.) THE DEATH PENALTY IN AMERICA: CURRENT RESEARCH. Edited by ROBERT M. BOHM. (Cincinnati, Ohio: Anderson Publishing Co., 1991. 148 pb. (no price given).) Andrew Rutherford Andrew Rutherford Faculty of Law University of Southampton Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar The British Journal of Criminology, Volume 32, Issue 3, Summer 1992, Pages 392–393, https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordjournals.bjc.a048241 Published: 01 July 1992

Book reviews

Not Just Deserts: A Republican Theory of Criminal Justice. J. Braithwaite and P. Pettit, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1990. 238 pages, £27.50. The case against paramilitary policing, Tony Jefferson, Open University Press, Milton Keynes, 1991, pp. 161 £27.50 HB. £10.99 PB. The Police Function and the Investigation of Crime. J. Brian Morgan. Avebury, £30 Comparative Policing Issues:.The British and American Experience in International Perspective, R. I. Mawby (London: Unwin Hyman, 1990). The Emergence of Penal Policy in Victorian and Edwardian England, Leon Radzinowicz and Roger Hood, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1990. 839pp. 22.50 (pb). Penal Discipline, Reformatory Projects and the English Prison Commission 1895–1939, W. J. Forsythe, University of Exeter Press, 1991. 225 pp. 25.00 (hb).

BOUNDARIES OF ENGLISH PENAL POLICY

The thirty years leading up to the First World War posed new challenges and opportunities for those engaged in the development of penal policy in England and Wales. Among these, the emerging discipline of criminology, focusing on the individual rather than the offence, appeared to hold out the promise of dealing more effectively not only with traditional core problems, such as the habitual offender but also with social concerns located beyond the borders of the criminal law. An assertive confidence developed, deriving its strength from the technological achievements of the nineteenth century and from widespread alarm as to the propensity of the 'residuum', in the words of Charles Booth, to 'degrade whatever they touch'. The result was a series of far-reaching enquiries and considerable legislative activity, all of which gathered pace during the Liberal governments of 1906 onwards. For A. V. Dicey the 'novel character' of the legislation of the early years of the twentieth century was the culmination of a trend dating from the mid 1860s. This reflected the replacement of individualistic ideology by collectivism, which he defined as State intervention, sometimes at the sacrifice of individual freedom, for the purpose of conferring benefit upon the mass of people.1 Certainly, the refinements and extensions of the criminal law must be viewed in the context of the pioneering social welfare legislation of the period. But this perspective should not obscure an appreciation of the limits applicable to reformers of the criminal law. In particular, the concept of the rule of law places constraints upon the criminal law-making process which must be acknowledged in any liberal democratic state. As W. G. Carson has observed: 'To talk of legality as distinct from the substantive content of specific criminal laws leads into realms of legal thought in which contemporary sociologists have not been notably prone to wander'.2 The distinction has an importance which goes beyond any reticence by sociologists. Two recent studies have highlighted the rich nature of the archives of this period for any exploration of the inter-relationship of the criminal law-making process, the wider social structure and historical patterns. Leon Radzinowicz and Roger Hood conclude the fifth volume of A History of English Criminal Law in spirited form. With Michael Foucault in their sights, they write: 'Some penal

A History of English Criminal Law. Volume 5, by Sir Leon Radzinowicz and Roger Hood. London: Stevens and Son, 1986, xv + 778 + (bibliography and indices) 323 pp (hardback £75.00). - Crime and the Courts in England 1600-1800, by J. M. Beattie. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1986, xxiv + 644 + (bibliography and index) 18 pp (hardback £48.00; paperback £15.00)

A History of English Criminal Law. Volume 5, by Sir Leon Radzinowicz and Roger Hood. London: Stevens and Son, 1986, xv + 778 + (bibliography and indices) 323 pp (hardback £75.00). - Crime and the Courts in England 1600-1800, by J. M. Beattie. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1986, xxiv + 644 + (bibliography and index) 18 pp (hardback £48.00; paperback £15.00)

<sc>leon radzinowicz</sc> and <sc>roger hood</sc> . <italic>A History of English Criminal Law and its Administration from 1750</italic> . Volume 5, <italic>The Emergence of Penal Policy</italic> . London: Stevens and Sons; distributed by Carswell, Agincourt, Ontario. 1986. Pp. xv, 1101. $126.50

<sc>leon radzinowicz</sc> and <sc>roger hood</sc> . <italic>A History of English Criminal Law and its Administration from 1750</italic> . Volume 5, <italic>The Emergence of Penal Policy</italic> . London: Stevens and Sons; distributed by Carswell, Agincourt, Ontario. 1986. Pp. xv, 1101. $126.50

The March of Penal Progress? - History of English Criminal Law and Its Administration from 1750. Vol. 5: The Emergence of Penal Policy. By SirLeon Radzinowicz and Roger Hood. London: Stevens, 1986. Pp. 1101. £75.

The March of Penal Progress? - History of English Criminal Law and Its Administration from 1750. Vol. 5: The Emergence of Penal Policy. By SirLeon Radzinowicz and Roger Hood. London: Stevens, 1986. Pp. 1101. £75. - Volume 26 Issue 1

Into the upperworld ? Law, crime and punishment in English society∗

Sir Leon Radzinowicz and Roger Hood, A History of English Criminal Law, Volume 5: The Emergence of Penal Policy (1986), xv+1101 (Stevens and Sons, £75.00). George Rude, Criminal and Victim: Crime and Society in Early Nineteenth Century England (1985), 146 (Clarendon Press, Oxford, £17.50). G. R. Rubin and David Sugarman, Law, Economy and Society: Essays in the History of English Law 1750–1914 (1984), iv+532 (Professional Books, Abingdon, £24.50, paperback £14.50). Thomas A. Green, Verdict According to Conscience: Perspectives on the English Criminal Trial Jury 1200–1800 (1985), xx+409 (University of Chicago Press, Chicago, Ill., £32.25).

Crime, Criminology and Public Policy—Essays in Honour of Sir Leon Radzinowicz. Edited by Roger Hood. [London: Heinemann. 1974. xxii, 635, and (Index) 15 pp. £12.50 net.

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Crime, criminology and public policy : edited by Roger Hood The Free Press (866 Third Avenue, New York, New York 10022), 1975, 650 pp.

Crime, criminology and public policy : edited by Roger Hood The Free Press (866 Third Avenue, New York, New York 10022), 1975, 650 pp.