DEATH FOR RAPE: CONNECTING ABOLITION TO FEMINIST POLITICS

Abstract

In instituting death penalty for rape, law signals its own limitation. An execution is supposed to be perceived as the conclusion of justice. This sense of closure however, does not translate to the survivor for whom, the justice that she accrues shall continue to shape the contours of possibilities for the rest of her life. The spectre of death does not symbolise a singularity but instead, represents a complex of procedures through which meaning and parametres of identity are modulated and fixed. Death Penalty operates in a modern society in a medicinal capacity that is, it functions to eliminate proven and potential threats that endanger the very fabric of the society. Tackling social threats as matters of social health represents a certain form of power that is relational in nature and depends on organizing social bodies in particular orders. As such, reflection on death penalty itself, accrues as a feminist critique.