Due Process and Homicide: A Cross-National Analysis

• DOI: 10.1177/1065912918785059
• Date: 01 March 2019
• Published date: 01 March 2019
• Author: Erin Terese Huebert,David S. Brown
• Subject Matter: Articles

https://doi.org/10.1177/1065912918785059

Political Research Quarterly

2019, Vol. 72(1) 190 –204

© 2018 University of Utah

Article reuse guidelines:

sagepub.com/journals-permissions

DOI: 10.1177/1065912918785059

journals.sagepub.com/home/prq

Article

Introduction

What explains the variation in homicide rates worldwide?

Recent scholarship finds an empirical relationship

between democracy and violent crime: strong dictator-

ships and strong democracies experience the least crime

while those in between experience the most. This relation-

ship holds for both civil war (Cederman, Hug, and Krebs

2010; Hegre et al. 2001; Mansfield and Snyder 2005) and

ordinary “street crime” (Fox and Hoelscher 2012; LaFree

and Tseloni 2006; Neumayer 2003).

While recent empirical studies imply regime type

influences crime, little is known about how or why. The

contribution of this paper is to identify a set of institutions

or a dimension on which we can reliably order different

countries with very different regimes in a way that effec-

tively explains homicide. We argue that due process is a

more specific mechanism that cuts across regime type

and helps explain violence.

We posit that to understand how regime type matters for

homicide, we must look at institutional factors beyond elec-

tions. While competitive elections have grown in number

worldwide, freedom of the press, freedom of assembly, and

equal protection under the law are in decline. Institutions

characterized as both “democratic” and “authoritarian”—

hybrid regimes—are now the most common form of gov-

ernment. Much of the attention on elections stems from

their impact on the provision of public goods like educa-

tion, health, and welfare. Personal security and justice are,

however, different animals. Despite the benefits associated

with elections, other regime characteristics may be more

important for curbing homicide. We argue one possible can-

didate is due process.

Due process refers to the legal requirement that a state

must respect the legal rights of all its citizens including

the following: “the presumption of innocence and the

opportunity to submit and challenge evidence before pub-

lic proceedings; freedom from arbitrary arrest, detention,

torture, and abusive treatment; and access to legal coun-

sel and translators” (World Justice Project [WJP] 2016).

We argue that due process increases legitimacy by appeal-

ing to expectations and ethical claims regarding fairness.

In turn, citizens are more likely to employ formal chan-

nels to resolve conflict. Moreover, with citizen coopera-

tion, the State can more effectively investigate, prosecute,

and punish criminals, which serves to deter further crime.

In other words, how states fight crime influences

crime itself. Since the reverse could be true—the level of

crime influences how states fight it—our causal claims

are minimal. Our results are presented in the spirit of hav-

ing discovered an important empirical association, one

that suggests states that follow due process witness lower

crime rates. The results not only hold implications for

785059PRQXXX10.1177/1065912918785059Political Research QuarterlyHuebert and Brown

research-article2018

1University of Colorado Boulder, USA

Corresponding Author:

David S. Brown, Department of Political Science, University of

Colorado Boulder, UCB 333, Boulder, CO 80309-0333, USA.

Email: david.s.brown@colorado.edu

Due Process and Homicide: A Cross-

National Analysis

Erin Terese Huebert1 and David S. Brown1

Abstract

As democracy advances in many regions throughout the world, it is often accompanied by increasing violence. Most

cross-national analyses find that an inverted U-shaped relationship exists between homicide and democracy: homicide

rates are highest in hybrid regimes and lowest in authoritarian and democratic regimes. While a fairly robust empirical

result, little is known about why it exists. We identify a specific institution—due process—that cuts across regime

types and effectively explains homicide. Due process generates a legitimacy that encourages individuals to use the

justice system to settle disputes. A more effective criminal justice system also deters crime in the first place. Using a

cross-national sample of eighty-nine countries between 2009 and 2014, we find a strong negative relationship between

due process and homicide. Put simply, how states fight crime explains their success.

Keywords

homicide, democracy, due process, criminal justice, law and society, institutions