scholarly journals Historicizing waterboarding as a severe torture norm

2018 ◽  
Vol 32 (4) ◽  
pp. 488-512 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rory Cox
Keyword(s):  
War On Terror ◽  
Bush Administration ◽  
First Century ◽  
Explicit Description ◽  
The Us ◽  
Interrogation Techniques ◽  
History Of ◽  
Interrogation Technique ◽  
Enhanced Interrogation ◽  
Large Sections

The debate on waterboarding and the wider debate on torture remains fiercely contested. President Trump and large sections of the US public continue to support the use of waterboarding and other so-called ‘enhanced interrogation techniques’ as part of the ‘War on Terror’, thus putting the anti-torture norm under pressure. This article demonstrates that the re-imagining of waterboarding as ‘torture-lite’ is contradicted by the long history of waterboarding itself. Examining pre-modern uses and descriptions of torture and waterboarding, this article highlights that the post-2001 identification of waterboarding as a relatively benign interrogation technique radically inverts a norm that has predominated for over 600 years. This historical norm unequivocally identifies waterboarding not only as torture but as severe torture. The article highlights the value of historically contextualizing attitudes to torture, reviews how and why waterboarding was downgraded by the Bush Administration, reveals the earliest explicit description of waterboarding from 1384, and argues that the twenty-first-century re-imagining of waterboarding as torture-lite is indicative of the fragility of the anti-torture norm.

Torture as normal work: The Bush Administration, the Central Intelligence Agency and ‘Enhanced Interrogation Techniques’

Organization ◽  
2015 ◽  
Vol 22 (4) ◽  
pp. 493-511 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michele Chwastiak
Keyword(s):  
Formal System ◽  
Bush Administration ◽  
Central Intelligence Agency ◽  
Political Elites ◽  
Intelligence Agency ◽  
Federal Program ◽  
The Us ◽  
Interrogation Techniques ◽  
Enhanced Interrogation ◽  
Normal Work

During the War on Terror, the Bush Administration authorized the US Central Intelligence Agency to employ ‘enhanced interrogation techniques’ to extract intelligence from alleged terrorists. Many organizations contended that ‘enhanced interrogation techniques’ were torture. Given that torture is morally reprehensible, the policy was constantly contested. This article argues that the Bush Administration attempted to legitimate the use of ‘enhanced interrogation techniques’ by making torture normal work. The Bush Administration did so by designating torture as legal, thus using a formal system of power that is publicly respected to validate and normalize their actions. Furthermore, by embedding torture in mundane organizational practices and rationalities, ‘enhanced interrogation’ was made to appear to be as ordinary as any other federal program. Hence, the article demonstrates how the legal system, as well as commonplace aspects of organizations can be employed by political elites to attempt to manage controversy around extreme policies by making them appear normal. However, a discourse of normality did not necessarily remove the taint from torture or create the results the political elites desired.

scholarly journals The Adaptability Paradox: Constitutional Resilience and Principles of Good Government in Twenty-First-Century America

2019 ◽  
Vol 18 (2) ◽  
pp. 354-369
Author(s):  
Stephen Skowronek ◽  
Karen Orren
Keyword(s):  
Institutional Arrangements ◽  
Structural Approach ◽  
First Century ◽  
Institutional Adaptation ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Us ◽  
Good Government ◽  
History Of ◽  
Us Constitution ◽  
Twenty First Century

Faith in the resilience of the US Constitution prompts many observers to discount evidence of a deepening crisis of governance in our day. A long history of success in navigating tough times and adapting to new circumstances instills confidence that the fundamentals of the system are sound and the institutions self-correcting. The aim of this article is to push assessments of this sort beyond the usual nod to great crises surmounted in the past and to identify institutional adaptation as a developmental problem worthy of study in its own right. To that end, we call attention to dynamics of adjustment that have played out over the long haul. Our historical-structural approach points to the “bounded resilience” of previous adaptations and to dynamics of reordering conditioned on the operation of other governance outside the Constitution’s formal written arrangements. We look to the successive overthrow of these other incongruous elements and to the serial incorporation of previously excluded groups to posit increasing stress on constitutional forms and greater reliance on principles for support of new institutional arrangements. Following these developments into the present, we find principles losing traction, now seemingly unable to foster new rules in support of agreeable governing arrangements. Our analysis generates a set of propositions about why the difficulties of our day might be different from those of the past in ways that bear directly on resilience and adaptability going forward.

Definition of Torture in US Law

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Metin Başoğlu
Keyword(s):  
Learned Helplessness ◽  
Scientific Evidence ◽  
Scientific Basis ◽  
Committee Report ◽  
The Us ◽  
Interrogation Techniques ◽  
Us Senate ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
Enhanced Interrogation ◽  
Torture Memos

In the light of the US Senate Intelligence Committee Report on the Central Intelligence Agency’s detention and interrogation program confirming the use of “enhanced interrogation techniques” to induce “learned helplessness” in detainees, this chapter reviews the scientific basis for the US definition of torture and its interpretation in the “Torture Memos.” These memoranda clearly indicate that “enhanced interrogation techniques” are designed for use in combination with specific intent to induce learned helplessness. Abundant research evidence shows that learned helplessness is mental harm that is severe enough to qualify as torture even by US standards. Although the US definition of torture seems to create potential loopholes for impunity, it suffers from certain logical inconsistencies, scientifically unfounded assumptions, and perhaps even “loopholes” that may well render legal cover for use of “enhanced interrogation techniques” difficult, if not impossible—at least not possible in a way that can be justified by logical reasoning or scientific evidence.

Muse

2011 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
pp. 48-50
Author(s):  
barbara koenen
Keyword(s):  
War On Terror ◽  
Pomegranate Juice ◽  
Weapons Of Mass Destruction ◽  
Mass Destruction ◽  
Religious Symbol ◽  
Fertile Crescent ◽  
The Us ◽  
Us Government ◽  
History Of ◽  
Ancient Times

Muse is a personal investigation into the historical and contemporary correlations between pomegranates and hand grenades by the author, an artist based in the Midwest. The essay begins with her reminiscences of witnessing a red-stained feast of the “exotic” pomegranate that was hosted by a friend of Armenian descent; then it chronicles the fruit’s historical associations as a fertility and religious symbol in many cultures since ancient times and its cultivation, beginning in the Fertile Crescent and extending across Asia and into Europe and North America. Upon her realization that hand grenades are named after pomegranates, the author describes physical comparisons between the bomb and the fruit, provides a brief history of grenades and grenadiers, and then muses on the contemporaneous marketing campaigns for the War on Terror that paved the way for the 2003 United States invasion into Iraq, and for POM Wonderful beverages that “defy death” as an “Antioxidant Superpower™.” As the hyperbolic claims of both marketing campaigns were later debunked—Saddam Hussein had no weapons of mass destruction and pomegranate juice does not cure cancer—the essay concludes by noting a recent, modest investment by the US government into the cultivation and exporting of pomegranates in Afghanistan as a hopeful sign.

Three Presidents, Three Conflicts

2020 ◽  
pp. 296-319
Author(s):  
Michael W. McConnell
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Nuclear Weapons ◽  
Separation Of Powers ◽  
Bush Administration ◽  
The United States ◽  
Islamic Republic ◽  
Donald Trump ◽  
Interrogation Techniques ◽  
Islamic Republic Of Iran ◽  
Enhanced Interrogation

This chapter proposes an approach to the separation of powers that can be applied to presidents of all ideological stripes and personal dispositions. It cites George W. Bush and the authorization of torture, in which the Bush Administration authorized a written list of enhanced interrogation techniques, such as the notorious practice of water-boarding. It also covers President Obama's agreement between the United States and the Islamic Republic of Iran, along with certain other countries, under which Iran agreed to certain limitations on its development of nuclear weapons in exchange for the lifting of economic sanctions. The chapter describes the impeachment and acquittal of Donald Trump by the Senate as the most acrimonious separation-of-powers conflict in the tumultuous Trump years. It talks about the House vote on impeachment and the Senate vote on removal that surpassed the partisan impeachment and removal proceedings for President William Jefferson Clinton.

12. War and law in the twenty-first century

2021 ◽  
pp. 267-286
Author(s):  
Nicole Scicluna
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
War On Terror ◽  
Use Of Force ◽  
First Century ◽  
Cyber Warfare ◽  
Military Operations ◽  
The Us ◽  
Terrorist Groups ◽  
New Type ◽  
The Right

This chapter explicates the various ways in which contemporary warfare challenges post-1945 international law on the use of force and the conduct of war. It begins by exploring the rules governing the use of force against non-state actors. This is one of the most pressing issues of the war on terror, much of which has involved military operations against terrorist groups operating from the territory of states that cannot or will not suppress their activities. In particular, campaigns by the US and several other states against ISIS in Syria have seriously undermined the international law framework governing self-defence and the right of states to have their sovereignty and territorial integrity respected. The chapter then looks at another trademark policy of the war on terror: the use of targeted killings, often carried out by unmanned drones, to eliminate suspected terrorists. It also considers a new type of warfare altogether: the emerging phenomenon of cyber warfare, which, too, has implications for both jus ad bellum and jus in bello.

A Blighted History

ORBIT ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 1-27
Author(s):  
Laurence J. Alison ◽  
Neil D. Shortland ◽  
Frances Surmon-Böhr ◽  
Emily K. Alison
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Real World ◽  
The United States ◽  
Reliable Information ◽  
Terrorist Attacks ◽  
Underlying Theory ◽  
The Us ◽  
History Of ◽  
Enhanced Interrogation

This chapter outlines the history of “harsh” interrogation methods based on coercion and torture. This includes discussion of the US “Enhanced Interrogation” Program and the British military’s development and use of the “Five Techniques,” along with real-world examples, including the interrogation of two detainees thought to be associated with the 2001 9/11 terrorist attacks on the United States. The chapter discusses the underlying theory behind the use of torture and coercion and explains why these interrogation methods are ineffective at obtaining reliable information from detainees. It also describes the reasons why torture continues to be used. Such reasons relate to revenge, dehumanization, and hatred.

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