The author postulates that the probability of a legitimation crisis in government and a concomitant rise in penal severity will occur when rulers cannot meet the standards emanating from their own self-justification and when the power gap between rulers and subordinates grow and power is concentrated among a few. To evaluate penal severity, cross-national data were obtained on incarceration rates of 47 countries as of 1972. Information on whether a country retained capital punishment was taken from the penal codes of 23 nations and from numerous international surveys. There was a very strong negative association between development (per capita national income) and the retention of capital punishment. Dictatorships were more punitive than other forms of government. Unemployment and income concentration explained a substantial amount of variance in incarceration rates. The data indicate that high power concentration at the governmental level or in the form of unequal income distribution is associated with more severe punishment and that unemployment seems to result in higher incarceration rates. The concept of legitimation crisis is appealing because it allows researchers to account for cross-sectional as well as temporal variations in penal severity. 45 footnotes and 2 tables