Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Foreword
- Preface to the third edition
- Table of cases
- Table of international instruments
- List of abbreviations
- Introduction
- 1 The Universal Declaration of Human Rights and recognition of the right to life
- 2 The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights: drafting, ratification and reservation
- 3 Interpretation of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights
- 4 Towards abolition: the Second Optional Protocol and other developments
- 5 International humanitarian law
- 6 International criminal law
- 7 European human rights law
- 8 Inter-American human rights law
- 9 African human rights law
- Conclusion
- Appendices
- Bibliography
- Index
8 - Inter-American human rights law
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 30 July 2009
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Foreword
- Preface to the third edition
- Table of cases
- Table of international instruments
- List of abbreviations
- Introduction
- 1 The Universal Declaration of Human Rights and recognition of the right to life
- 2 The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights: drafting, ratification and reservation
- 3 Interpretation of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights
- 4 Towards abolition: the Second Optional Protocol and other developments
- 5 International humanitarian law
- 6 International criminal law
- 7 European human rights law
- 8 Inter-American human rights law
- 9 African human rights law
- Conclusion
- Appendices
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
The Inter-American human rights system of the Organization of American States, encompassing the Western hemisphere, is one of two regional systems with a convention abolishing the death penalty. Several years behind the European system in adopting this protocol, the Inter-American instrument only came into force in 1991. Yet Latin American countries such as Uruguay and Venezuela played a pivotal role within the United Nations in promoting abolition of the death penalty. Several Latin American States abolished the death penalty in the nineteenth century or early in the twentieth century. Many Latin American constitutions contain references to the death penalty, usually limiting its scope, or providing for due process in capital cases, or, in some cases, declaring it to be abolished. According to Roger Hood's study, ‘[t]he hundred year tradition of abolition in South America now holds sway over almost all of the region… However, history shows that, in this region at times of political instability, military governments may reinstate the death penalty for a variety of offences against the state and public order’. On the other hand, the membership of the Organisation of American States also includes some of the most enthusiastic retentionist States, including Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago, and the United States.
Inter-American human rights law has drawn on both the United Nations and European human rights traditions.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- The Abolition of the Death Penalty in International Law , pp. 311 - 354Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2002