Just so you don't all think I'm a monster, the "I'd hope so", refers to the natural correlation between the number of murders and the murder rate.

(I'm wasting a lot of posts clarifying myself today.)

Very little has been said about whether we should in fact "encourage our neighbours to abandon the death penalty", which was the original proposition.

The first thing that occurs to me is that if there is no consensus among ourselves - and there clearly isn't, just from this thread - we would look pretty stupid trying to influence another country, one way or another.

The next thing that occurs to me is that even contemplating making representations of this nature to another country smacks of colonialist arrogance. By what right should we even consider lecturing another community on their values?

Further, when we actually do sit down with another country (say, China) and discuss human rights (say, Tienamen Square) the dialogue is drowned out by more practical issues (say, whether they will buy our coal or not). Pragmatism has a way of asserting itself, pretty much at the same time as we are told to mind our own business.

In summary, I'd say that we might get a nice warm and fuzzy feeling talking about how civilized we are and how nice it would be if other people were nice and civilized too, I think we are just kidding ourselves.

Pericles,

I take your point about colonialism - however, just because it seems like an insurmountable problem (encouraging our neighbours to a more humane systemof justice - and yeah, I get the irony in this statement) it doesn't mean we should adopt a defeatist attitude and say there is nothing we can do to change anything.

It is a lot more than just the 'warm and fuzzies', I note from many of your other posts to this forum that you provide well reasoned debate. I am sure that you are fighter in what you believe, therefore why so negative about the fight for human rights and dignity?

Ulitmately I believe we should be discussing human rights with our neighbours (esp. USA), however we really need to clean up our own back yard as well. Perhaps leading by example is an approach to take. However, we won't be getting inspiring leadership with our current fed. gov. Oh, well, onward ever onward.

Xena, I appreciate your point, but being realistic is not necessarily being defeatist, although in this case you are right in that I do believe the cause to be a hopeless one. And you have identified exactly the source of the problem, which is our inability to work out our own issues amongst ourselves, which surely in all fairness should be a prerequisite to "helping" others solve theirs. Especially problems that they don't necessarily recognize as such.

Am I being too cynical? Perhaps. But in order to keep sane as I get older I tend to choose battles where I have at least a small chance of winning. This is a situation where you have to fight your own troops before you can engage the enemy.

We need more executions in this country like in colonial times. Please read the book, The Fatal Shore which provides graphic accounts of the pulling power of public executions in London. This could attract television sponsorship and help pay for some of our institutions like health..think of the deterent effect.
Why not the stocks, public floggings and a few ducking stools in Brisbane mall for politicians who fib.
Pull the other leg... (this has its origins in public hangings) and we are enriched by this black humour.
I think we could export poor and unemployed to the colonies or the Third World...perhaps even the Second World.
I wonder if Mr Howard could talk to Mr Bush about these ideas.

A few posts have referred to executions in the United States, and I certainly agree that the US should be criticised for its record in this regard. And indeed it is. There is a vibrant abolitionist movement across the USA, supported by a great deal of international campaigning and media attention focussed on the use of the death penalty and its concentration in particular states.

My article simply does not focus on the USA. Nor does it suggest we should ignore the question of the death penalty in the USA. It is focused, however, on the fact that we live in the region which is the world's leader in executions - in numbers, in the range of offences and in running counter to the global trend towards abolition - and asks what the Australian government is actually doing (and actually achieving) to advance its stated policy of opposition to capital punishment. If Australia is engaged in "human rights dialogue" with China and Viet Nam, and occasionally with Iran - three of the world's leading executioners - what are these dialogues actually achieving when you look at their records on the death penalty?

Finally, on the number of executions in the USA:
* 59 prisoners were executed in the USA in 2004, bringing the year-end total to 944 executed since the use of the death penalty was resumed in 1977.
* 23 of the 59 executions in 2004 were in Texas. Texas has carried out 345 of the 944 executions in the USA since 1977.
* Over 3,400 prisoners were under sentence of death as of 1 January 2005.
* 38 of the 50 US states provide for the death penalty in law. The death penalty is also provided under US federal military and civilian law.