The death penalty is a term used to describe the act of putting a person to death, after judgment by a legal system, either as an act of retribution, or to ensure they cannot commit future crimes. The death penalty is often described as capital punishment, as well, a term that comes from the Latin capitalis, meaning head, describing the fact that historically capital punishment involved losing one’s head. While historically, most countries have at some point used the death penalty, in the modern world a minority of nations practice it.

The death penalty is often a major topic of debate in countries that still practice it, such as the United States. Many religious ideologies are opposed to putting people to death, and many modern philosophical theories of ethics disagree with the practice as well. Article 2 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union disallows the use of the death penalty in any of its member states, so no European country practices the death penalty.

The early use of the death penalty was often for penal purposes, and as a result the methods used to put people to death were horrific. Drawing and quartering people, for example, or flaying them alive or burning them, were not uncommon in Medieval Europe or in much of the world. A movement began in the late-18th century, however, towards humane punishments. For this reason, the guillotine was developed in France, hanging in many countries was changed from a way of strangling people to death to a way of breaking their neck, and the United States invented both the electric chair and the lethal injection.

There has consistently been a movement towards abolishing the death penalty, as well, although different cultures have arrived there in different times. China, for example, banned the death penalty in the mid-8th century. A public statement in England in the 14th century argued against the death penalty, although England would not actually ban the practice until 1973. In the mid-18th century, an Italian author, Cesare Beccaria, wrote a treatise On Crimes and Punishment, which argued against the death penalty both for moral and practical reasons. This treatise would impact many rulers, including Grand Duke Leopold II of Hapsburg, who would eventually outlaw the death penalty in his lands.

Near the end of the 19th century, a number of nations began abolishing the death penalty. The Roman Republic, San Marino, Venezuela, and Portugal all outlawed the death penalty between 1849 and 1867. The 1970s and 1980s saw a general abolishment in many Western countries, with Canada abolishing it in 1976, France in 1981, and Australia in 1985. The United Nations, in 1977, issued a resolution stating it would be good to abolish the death penalty as widely as possible.

Although most countries on earth do not allow the death penalty, more than 60% of the world’s population live under threat of the punishment. This is because the most populous nations on earth do still practice it. For example, the United States, Indonesia, China, and India all still have capital punishment.