By all accounts, China is the world leader in the number of legal executions. Its long historical use of capital punishment and its major political and economic changes over time are social facts that make China an ideal context for a case study of the death penalty in law and practice. This book examines the death penalty within the changing socio-political context of China. The authors'treatment of China' death penalty is legal, historical, and comparative. In particular, they examine; the substantive and procedures laws surrounding capital punishment in different historical periods the purposes and functions of capital punishment in China in various dynasties changes in the method of imposition and relative prevalence of capital punishment over time the socio-demographic profile of the executed and their crimes over the last two decades and comparative practices in other countries. Their analyses of the death penalty in contemporary China focus on both its theory - how it should be done in law - and actual practice - based on available secondary reports/sources.