Austin Sarat is William Nelson Cromwell Professor of Jurisprudence and Political Science, Amherst College. He is co-author, with Stuart Scheingold, of Something to Believe In: Politics, Professionalism, and Cause Lawyering (Stanford University Press, 2004). Christian Boulanger is Lecturer at the Otto Suhr Institute for PoliticalScience, Free University, Berlin.

"In fifteen chapters, they [Sarat and Boulanger] take the reader on a capital punishment odyssey through not only the US, but also central and south Asia, the Middle East, Kyrgyzstan, India, Israel, Palestine, Japan, Singapore, and South Korea. In a nutshell, this is a book well worth reading for those interested in exploring cross-cultural treatments of the death penalty."—CHOICE

• Contents Contributors000 1. Putting Culture into the Picture: Toward a Comparative Analysis of State Killing000 Christian Boulanger and Austin Sarat Part I: Civilization and Punishment: Self and Other in Europe and the Americas 2. Nineteenth-Century Executions as Performances of Law, Death, and Civilization000 Jurgen Martschukat 3. Seed of Abolition: Experience and Culture in the Desire to End Capital Punishment in Mexico, 1841-1857000 Patrick Timmons 4. The Cultural Lives of Capital Punishment in the United States000 Judith Randle 5. European Identity and the Mission Against the Death Penalty in the United States000 Evi Girling 6. Crime and Punishment/Self versus Other: The Cultural Life of Capital Punishment Comparative Perspective of European and American Film000 Louise Tyler 7. Capital Punishment in Poland: An Aspect of the "Cultural Life" of the Death Penalty Discourse 000 Agata Fijalkowski Part II: State Killing and State Violence in Central and South Asia and the Middle East 8. Capital Punishment in Kyrgyzstan: Between the Past, "Other" State Killings and Social Demands000 Botagoz Kassymbekova 9. Death and the Nation: State Killing in India000 Julia Eckert 10. Imagining the Death Penalty in Israel: Punishment, Violence, Vengeance, and Revenge 000 Shai J. Lavi 11. The Palestinian Culture of Death: Shariah and Siyasah: Justice, Political Power, and Capital Punishment in the Palestinian National Authority000 Judith Mendelsohn Rood Part III: Paternal States, "Asian Values," and Visions of Social Order: Capital Punishment in East and Southeast Asia 12. Saving State Face: Capital Punishment in Japan000 David T. Johnson 13. What Is Wrong with Capital Punishment? Official and Unofficial Attitudes Toward Capital Punishment in Modern and Contemporary China000 Virgil K. Y. Ho 14. Capital Punishment and the Culture of Developmentalism in Singapore000 Alfred Oehlers and Nicole Tarulevicz 15. Ending State Killing in South Korea: Challenging the Asian Capital Punishment Status Quo 000 Sangmin Bae Index

Austin Sarat is William Nelson Cromwell Professor of Jurisprudence and Political Science, Amherst College. He is co-author, with Stuart Scheingold, of Something to Believe In: Politics, Professionalism, and Cause Lawyering (Stanford University Press, 2004). Christian Boulanger is Lecturer at the Otto Suhr Institute for PoliticalScience, Free University, Berlin.

"In fifteen chapters, they [Sarat and Boulanger] take the reader on a capital punishment odyssey through not only the US, but also central and south Asia, the Middle East, Kyrgyzstan, India, Israel, Palestine, Japan, Singapore, and South Korea. In a nutshell, this is a book well worth reading for those interested in exploring cross-cultural treatments of the death penalty."—CHOICE

• Contents Contributors000 1. Putting Culture into the Picture: Toward a Comparative Analysis of State Killing000 Christian Boulanger and Austin Sarat Part I: Civilization and Punishment: Self and Other in Europe and the Americas 2. Nineteenth-Century Executions as Performances of Law, Death, and Civilization000 Jurgen Martschukat 3. Seed of Abolition: Experience and Culture in the Desire to End Capital Punishment in Mexico, 1841-1857000 Patrick Timmons 4. The Cultural Lives of Capital Punishment in the United States000 Judith Randle 5. European Identity and the Mission Against the Death Penalty in the United States000 Evi Girling 6. Crime and Punishment/Self versus Other: The Cultural Life of Capital Punishment Comparative Perspective of European and American Film000 Louise Tyler 7. Capital Punishment in Poland: An Aspect of the "Cultural Life" of the Death Penalty Discourse 000 Agata Fijalkowski Part II: State Killing and State Violence in Central and South Asia and the Middle East 8. Capital Punishment in Kyrgyzstan: Between the Past, "Other" State Killings and Social Demands000 Botagoz Kassymbekova 9. Death and the Nation: State Killing in India000 Julia Eckert 10. Imagining the Death Penalty in Israel: Punishment, Violence, Vengeance, and Revenge 000 Shai J. Lavi 11. The Palestinian Culture of Death: Shariah and Siyasah: Justice, Political Power, and Capital Punishment in the Palestinian National Authority000 Judith Mendelsohn Rood Part III: Paternal States, "Asian Values," and Visions of Social Order: Capital Punishment in East and Southeast Asia 12. Saving State Face: Capital Punishment in Japan000 David T. Johnson 13. What Is Wrong with Capital Punishment? Official and Unofficial Attitudes Toward Capital Punishment in Modern and Contemporary China000 Virgil K. Y. Ho 14. Capital Punishment and the Culture of Developmentalism in Singapore000 Alfred Oehlers and Nicole Tarulevicz 15. Ending State Killing in South Korea: Challenging the Asian Capital Punishment Status Quo 000 Sangmin Bae Index