ABSTRACT
This chapter presents more research about the causes of Japan's continuing commitment to capital punishment especially by Japan's own fine scholars. Japan experienced a major regime change after World War Two, but the death penalty endured it. The persistence of capital punishment through a seven-year period of foreign occupation is a puzzle that needs to be researched. The occupation authorities could have abolished the death penalty, and their decision not to neither natural nor inevitable. In Japan, the persistence of capital punishment may be partly explained by the long-term rule of the Liberal Democratic Party, which governed the country almost continuously from its inception in 1955 until 2009 for more than half a century. Japan and the United States are the only two advanced industrial democracies that retain capital punishment and continue to conduct executions. The legitimating effects of American capital punishment are powerful for Japan and for other retentionist nations.
