犯罪是一种复杂的社会现象，不仅影响着世界的和平，同时也是困扰我国现代化建设的突出问题。为了有效地遏制犯罪的升级和蔓延，各国的执政党、政府等采取了很多措施。死刑作为惩罚和预防犯罪的一种手段，从奴隶社会以来一直为统治阶级所使用，并被毫无怀疑的使用了几千年；直到西方启蒙运动的兴起，死刑才逐渐成为一个社会热点问题。1764年意大利著名刑法学家贝卡利亚首次明确提出了废除死刑和限制死刑适用的主张后，死刑的存废之争一直延续至今，但并没有从根本上真正解决死刑问题。随着人权观念的日益弘扬，生命权利已经被视为不可剥夺、不可克减的“天赋人权”。目前，已全面废除死刑和实际上废除死刑的国家已达100多个，但死刑在我国法律上的规定和司法实践中的适用还比较广泛，对我国现行死刑制度的认识和理解，在法学界和司法界中还存在着诸多的争议。究竟应如何看待和认识死刑，如何正确地把握我国死刑制度的合理发展方向，本文试作探讨，谈些自己粗浅的看法。

Crime is a complicated social problem, which not only affects the peace around the world but also troubles the modernization programme in our country. To effectively prevent crime upgrading and spreading, the party in power or government of each country has taken many measures. Since from slave society, execution, a means of punishing and preventing crime, has being used without doubt for thousands of years by ruling class. Execution did not turn into a social hot issue until the rise of western Enlightenment Movement. In 1764, Cesare Beccaria, a famous Italian jurisprudent, first definitely put forward the proposition of abolishing and restricting the application of execution, and from then on, the argument about the keeping and abolishing of execution has continued, but the problem of execution hasn’t been solved once for all in deed. With the increasing development of human right, right to life has been considered as “natural right” that can’t be deprived or reduced. So far, as many as over 100 countries have abolished execution in the round or in practice. However, execution still widely exists in our law prescription and judicatory application. About the comprehension of the existing death penalty system, there are still many arguments in law. In this paper, I will present my own opinion on how to understand execution and how to accurately control the reasonable developing direction of our death penalty system.