Public attitudes to the death penalty in Japan


“Increasing majority support?”


According to the 2009 survey, the vast majority (86%) of survey “respondents” support the death penalty. Tese results have been interpreted by the Japanese government, politicians, and the courts as the voice of the Japanese “public”. To say that an XX% of “respondents” support the death penalty and XX% of the “Japanese public” support the death penalty have different meanings. Te former is a descriptive analysis of people who answered the survey, and the latter is an inferential analysis about the Japanese public based on the respondents’ answers.


Large-scale surveys conducted by the government are normally done to find out about the “Japanese public”, and the government survey is no exception. Te problem with the current analyses done on the government survey is that the bias present in the sample is not addressed and corrected to make inferences about the general public. Figure 3 summarises the past government surveys on death penalty attitudes, using officially reported figures. Te chart clearly shows a constant increase in retentionists since the 1975 survey. Te rise in retentionists appears to be solid especially taking into consideration that the same question has been used since the 1994 survey. Te following section, however, argues that when taking into consideration the response rates, what seems to be an unshakable large majority in favour of retention becomes less evident and convincing.


Figure 3: Death penalty attitudes


1956 1967 1975 1980 1989 1994 1999 2004 2009


18 16


21


14 16 14


9


6 6


65 71


57 62 67 74 79 81 86 17 14


23 23


18


13 12 13


9


Note: 1) Question used for 1994, 1999, and 2004, and 2009 government surveys: “Which of the following opinions concerning the death penalty do you approve of?” Options were “the death penalty should be abolished under all circumstances”, “the death penalty is unavoidable in some cases”, and “don’t know/difficult to say.” 2) Question use for 1956, 1967, 1975, 1980, and 1989 government surveys: “Considering the current situation in Japan, do you agree with the view that the death penalty should be abolished under any circumstances?” Options were “agree”, “disagree” and “I don’t know”.


■ abolition (%) ■ retention (%) ■ don’t know (%)


37


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