Mercy and the Construction of Social Control: A Four-Site Analysis of Clemency

Abstract

Executive clemency is a discretionary power to grant legal mercy and is rarely given. Using data from contemporary clemency hearings in four states, I explore how state actors use commutation hearings as sites to exert social control and communicate hegemonic ideology. Clemency board members use hearings as sites to communicate the behaviors and attitudes they desire from applicants, aiming to generate compliance and consent. These state actors use the ritual of the clemency process and the hope afforded by the possibility of legal mercy as tools to motivate desired behaviors and beliefs among those in prison both explicitly and implicitly in these hearings. Such behaviors and beliefs, accordingly, are those that serve to reinforce the control and power of the state.