Reforms and Media Depictions of the Death Penalty in Malaysia

Abstract

Malaysia has retained the death penalty for violent crimes and some nonviolent drug offenses. Major news dailies, controlled by political parties in the ruling coalition, have helped justify this stance in the past. This situation changed over 22 months when a new coalition, which campaigned on abolishing capital punishment, took office and sparked renewed public discussion on this issue. Depictions of the death penalty debate were analyzed by conducting a content analysis of two major English-language newspapers, The Star and New Straits Times. Our findings suggest that The Star provided more international coverage and the New Straits Times prioritized domestic coverage. While both outlets provided comprehensive, and sometimes, critical coverage of executions elsewhere, they downplayed the fact that Malaysia engages in the same practice. There was no evidence to indicate that they were pushing an agenda as neither took a formal position on the issue. Content to transmit the differing views on the subject, neither functioned as forums to air nor shaped policy positions. This posture was possibly shaped by preconceived notions of what their readership wants and/or self-censorship—a legacy of past subjugation that will hopefully change when press freedom is perceived as a right, not a privilege.

Keywords

death penalty media deterrent Malaysia drug trafficking

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Abdul Rashid

H. R

. (2018, October 16). Death penalty abolishment won't diminish the severity of punishment. New Straits Times. https://www.nst.com.my/news/nation/2018/10/421820/death-penalty-abolishment-wont-diminish-severity-punishment

AIPA. (2019). Malaysia Country Report on Drug Issues 2019. https://www.parliament.go.th/ewtadmin/ewt/aipa2019/download/article/AIPACODD/Annex%20M%20-%20Country%20Report%20of%20Malaysia.pdf

Amnesty International. (2023a). Malaysia: Death Penalty Abolition . https://www.amnesty.my/abolish-death-penalty/

Amnesty International. (2023b) A Brief History of the Death Penalty in Malaysia. https://www.amnesty.my/abolish-death-penalty/a-brief-history-of-the-death-penalty-in-malaysia/

Bandes

(2004). Fear factor: The role of media in covering and shaping the death penalty. Ohio State Journal of Criminal Law, 1(2), 585–597.

Baumgartner

F. R.

De Boef

S. L.

Boydstun

A. E.

(2008). The decline of the death penalty and the discovery of innocence. Cambridge University Press.

Beale

S. S.

(2006). The news media’s influence on criminal justice policy: How market-drive news promotes punitiveness. William and Mary Law Review, 48, 397–482.

Bedi

R. S.

(2020, February 12). Committee on alternatives to mandatory death penalty hands over report to government. The Star. https://www.thestar.com.my/news/nation/2020/02/12/committee-on-alternatives-to-mandatory-death-penalty-hands-over-report-to-govt

Chan-Gonzaga

M. N. T. V.

(2023). Authoritarian regimes and the Media: How they shape perception and support for capital punishment in ASEAN. In Petcharamesree

Capaldi

M. P.

,, & Collins

(Eds.), Unpacking the death penalty in ASEAN (pp. 85–108). Springer.

10.

Cohen

(1972). Folk devils and moral panics. Routledge.

11.

Entman

R. M.

(1989). How the media affect what people think: An information processing approach. The Journal of Politics, 51(2), 347–370. https://doi.org/10.2307/2131346

12.

Freedom House (2020) Freedom in the World 2020: Malaysia. https://freedomhouse.org/country/malaysia/freedom-world/2020

13.

Geraldine

(2019, January 18). No refendum on abolishing death penalty, says minister. New Straits Times. https://www.nst.com.my/news/nation/2019/01/451886/no-refendum-abolishing-death-penalty-says-minister

14.

Goode

(2015). Drugs in American Society (9th ed.). McGraw Hill.

15.

Greenberg

D. F.

West

(2008). Siting the death penalty internationally. Law & Social Inquiry, 33(2), 295–343. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1747-4469.2008.00105.x

16.

Greer

A. M.

Ritter

(2019). It’s about bloody time”: Perceptions of people who use drugs.

17.

Hammel

(2010). Ending the death penalty: the European experience in global perspective. Springer.

18.

Harm Reduction International (2021). The Death Penalty for Drug Offences: Global Overview 2021 . https://hri.global/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/HRI_Global_Overview_2021_Final-1.pdf

19.

Harring

S. L.

(1991). Death, drugs and development: Malaysia's mandatory death penalty for traffickers and the international war on drugs. Columbia Journal of Transnational Law, 29, 364–405.

20.

Harry

(2021). Rethinking the relationship between women, crime and economic factors: The case-study of women sentenced to death for drug trafficking in Malaysia. Laws, 10(1), 9. https://doi.org/10.3390/laws10010009

21.

Hassan

(2020, January 15). The Death Penalty: Justice or Injustice? The Rakyat Post. https://www.therakyatpost.com/2020/01/15/the-death-penalty-justice-or-injustice/

22.

Hood

(2013). The Death Penalty in Malaysia: Public Opinion on the Mandatory Death Penalty for Drug Trafficking, Murder and Firearms Offences. The Death Penalty Project.

23.

Hoyle

Jabbar

(2021). Indonesians’ support for the death penalty declines with more rigorous survey methods, Social Sciences, University of Oxford, October 8. https://www.socsci.ox.ac.uk/article/indonesians-support-for-the-death-penalty-declines-with-more-rigorous-survey-methods#:∼:text=Indonesia%2C%20like%20its%20regional%20neighbours,public%20supports%20the%20death%20penalty

24.

Ibrahim

Salman

Kee

C. P.

Mustaffa

Ahmad

(2012). Striking a balance between science and arts: Mass media dilemma in reporting health and environmental issues. Asian Social Science, 8(5), 77–84. https://doi.org/10.5539/ass.v8n5p77

25.

Jewkes

(2004). Media representations of the causes of crime. Criminal Justice Matters, 55(1), 26–27.

26.

Johnson

D. T.

Fernquest

(2018). Governing through killing: The war on drugs in the Philippines. Asian Journal of Law and Society, 5(2), 359–390. https://doi.org/10.1017/als.2018.12

27.

Jun

S. W.

(2020, June 19). Over Half of Malaysians Polled in New Survey Feel Death Sentence Still Necessary. Malay Mail. https://www.malaymail.com/news/malaysia/2020/06/19/over-half-of-malaysians-polled-in-new-survey-feel-death-sentence-still-nece/1876815

28.

Kananatu

(2022). Framing death penalty politics in Malaysia. International Journal for Crime, Justice and Social Democracy, 11(3), 57–66. https://doi.org/10.5204/ijcjsd.2476

29.

Kee

C. P.

Ismail

N. S.

Hashim

Nie

K. S.

(2013). Framing Bersih 3.0: Online versus traditional mass communication. Procedia Technology, 11, 161–168. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.protcy.2013.12.176

30.

Leban

Griffin

O. H.

(2020). Disentangling the links between risk factors and adolescent substance use. Journal of Substance Use, 25(6), 644–651. https://doi.org/10.1080/14659891.2020.1760373

31.

Lehrfreund

Jabbar

(2013). Foreword . In Hood

. (Ed). The death penalty in Malaysia: Public opinion on the mandatory death penalty for drug trafficking, murder and firearms offences (p.iii). The Death Penalty Project.

32.

Levine

H. G.

(2003). Global drug prohibition: Its uses and crises. International Journal of Drug Policy, 14(2), 145–153. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0955-3959(03)00003-3

33.

Lim

(2020). Malaysia charts biggest improvement globally for press freedom in 2020 index; best in ASEAN again. Malay Mail, 22 April. https://www.malaymail.com/news/malaysia/2020/04/22/malaysia-charts-biggest-improvement-globally-for-press-freedom-in-2020-inde/1859135

34.

Lipschultz

J. H.

Hilt

M. L.

(1999). Mass media and the death penalty: Social construction of three Nebraska executions. Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media, 43(2), 236–253. https://doi.org/10.1080/08838159909364487

35.

McCombs

Valenzuela

(2020). Setting the agenda: Mass media and public opinion. John Wiley & Sons.

36.

Miao

(2013). The politics of China’s death penalty reform in the context of global abolitionism. British Journal of Criminology, 53(3), 500–519. https://doi.org/10.1093/bjc/azt004

37.

Ministry of Home Affairs. (2022), Findings from recent studies on the death penalty in Singapore. https://www.mha.gov.sg/mediaroom/press-releases/findings-from-recent-studies-on-the-death-penalty-in-singapore/#:∼:text=Overall%2C%20the%20studies%20show%20that,in%20substantial%20amounts%20of%20drugs

38.

Mohd. Azizuddin

M. S.

(. (2005)). Media freedom in Malaysia. Journal of Contemporary Asia, 35(3), 241–367.

39.

Niven

(2002). Bolstering an illusory majority: The effects of the media's portrayal of death penalty support. Social Science Quarterly, 83(3), 671–689. https://doi.org/10.1111/1540-6237.00108

40.

Novak

(2016). The global decline of the mandatory death penalty: constitutional jurisprudence and legislative reform in Africa, Asia, and the Caribbean. Routledge.

41.

Patten

(2016). The mass incarceration of nations and the global war on drugs: Comparing the United States’ domestic and foreign drug policies. Social Justice, 85–105.

42.

Petcharamesree

Boonlong

Breen

(2023). ASEAN and the death penalty: Theoretical and legal views and a pathway to abolition. In Petcharamesree

Capaldi

M. P.

,, & Collins

(Eds.), Unpacking the death penalty in ASEAN (pp. 157–177). Springer.

43.

Pratt

T. C.

Cullen

F. T.

Blevins

K. R.

Daigle

L. E.

Madensen

T. D.

(2006). The emprical Status of deterrence theory: A meta-analysis. In Cullen

F. T.

Wright

J. P.

,, & Blevins

K. R.

(Eds.), Taking stock: The Status of criminological theory (pp. 367–396). Transaction Publishers.

44.

Reuter

MacCoun

(2001). Drug war heresies: learning from other vices, times, and places. Cambridge University Press.

45.

Reyes

D. A.

(2016). The spectacle of violence in Duterte's “war on drugs”. Journal of Current Southeast Asian Affairs, 35(3), 111–137. https://doi.org/10.1177/186810341603500306

46.

Samsudin

Ibrahim

(2010). Framing of ‘terrorism’issues in Indonesia: A study of two Malaysian mainstream newspapers. Journal of Media and Information Warfare, 3, 15–35.

47.

Sani

M. A. M.

(2005). Media freedom in Malaysia. Journal of Contemporary Asia, 35(3), 341–367. https://doi.org/10.1080/00472330580000201

48.

Simangan

(2018). Is the Philippine “war on drugs” an act of genocide? Journal of Genocide Research, 20(1), 68–89. https://doi.org/10.1080/14623528.2017.1379939

49.

Singh

Webb

Griffin

O. H.

Griffin

V. W.

Narayanan

(2021). Examining media coverage of drugs in Malaysian media. Asian Journal of Criminology, 16(4), 377–394. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11417-021-09344-5

50.

Soroka

S. N.

Stecula

D. A.

Wlezien

(2015). It's (change in) the (future) economy, stupid: Economic indicators, the media, and public opinion. American Journal of Political Science, 59(2), 457–474. https://doi.org/10.1111/ajps.12145

51.

Surette

(1990). The media and criminal justice policy: Recent research and social effects. Charles C. Thomas Publisher.

52.

Tan

Rahim

Carvalho

(2023). Nay’ to mandatory death penalty. The Star, 4^th April. https://www.thestar.com.my/news/nation/2023/04/04/nay-to-mandatory-death-penalty#:∼:text=Deputy%20Minister%20in%20the%20Prime,their%20second%20and%20third%20readings

53.

Taylor

Buchanan

Ayres

(2016). Prohibition, privilege and the drug apartheid: The failure of drug policy reform to address the underlying fallacies of drug prohibition. Criminology & Criminal Justice, 16(4), 452–469. https://doi.org/10.1177/1748895816633274

54.

Tong

(2020, November 6). Mandatory death sentence abolition needs further scrutiny – minister. Yahoo!News. https://malaysia.news.yahoo.com/mandatory-death-sentence-abolition-needs-071448886.html

55.

Uggen

Piliavin

(1998). Asymmetrical causation and criminal desistance. The Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology, 88(4), 1399–1422. https://doi.org/10.2307/1144260

56.

US Department of Justice (1994). Fact Sheet: Drug-related crime. https://bjs.ojp.gov/content/pub/pdf/DRRC.PDF

57.

Wilson

Ibrahim

(2010). Dissecting crime news: Capturing the value of stories. Journal of Media and Information Warfare 3, 55–76.

58.

Wright

. (2010). Deterrence in Criminal Justice: Evaluating Certainty vs. Severity of Punishment. The Sentencing Project. https://web.archive.org/web/20171130140441/http://sentencingproject.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/Deterrence-in-Criminal-Justice.pdf