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What's wrong with torture?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 October 2009

Barrie Paskins
Barrie Paskins
Affiliation:
Lecturer, Department of War Studies, King's College, London
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Extract

In discussing this (understandably?) neglected question, this paper attempts to make clear what is meant by the word ‘torture’; expresses doubts about the best known moral positions on torture; offers what seems a better account of the matter; and demonstrates that the question of what is wrong with torture merits consideration in any worthwhile study of international affairs.

Type
Research Article
Information
Review of International Studies , Volume 2 , Issue 2 , July 1976 , pp. 138 - 148
Copyright
Copyright © British International Studies Association 1976

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References

page 138 note 1. This formulation is adapted from Amnesty International Report on Torture (Duckworth, London, 2nd. edn., 1975), p. 31.Google Scholar

page 139 note 1. Ibid. pp. 17–23.

page 139 note 2. Ibid. pp. 20–1.

page 140 note 1. Ibid. p. 23.

page 140 note 2. For a useful discussion of torture that confines itself to the two obvious moral positions, see Flew, Antony, ‘Torture: Could the End justify the Means?’ Crucible (Jan. 1974), pp. 19–23Google Scholar.

page 140 note 3. Smart, J. J. C. and Williams, Bernard, Utilitarianism; for and against, (Cambridge, 1973), p. 90.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

page 146 note 1. More precisely: There is no way of ensuring that we are not engaging in systematic and deliberate infliction of what is in fact acute pain. I am not claiming that the acute pain is or must be part of what we intend, as distinct from forseen if unwelcome consequences.

page 148 note 1. Amnesty Report, op. cit. p. 18.