Description
Book SynopsisThis volume offers diverse insights on how the practice of torture has impacted society and how we view human nature. After the Second World War, it was hoped that torture had been permanently vanquished among modern liberal states, and was only practiced by brutal totalitarian regimes. However, events after 9/11 revealed that the re-emergence of torture is an ever-present threat, even among leading democracies. Drawing from their knowledge of the humanities and social sciences, the contributors offer their expertise on the deleterious effects of torture and reveal that its trauma is interwoven into the fabric of modern society, requiring constant diligence to be rooted out and kept at bay. Contributors are William Fitzhugh Brundage, Federico Ciavattone, Noora Virjamo, Toni Koivulahti, Diana Medlicott, Stuart Molloy, Lon Olson, Martin Previsic, David Senesh and Hedi Viterbo.
Table of ContentsAcknowledgements Notes on Contributors Introduction Lon Olson Part 1 Criminological, Legal and Psychological Perspectives 1 Death Row Inmates: Victims of Torture in the Land of the Free Diana Medlicott 2 Torture’s In/ Visibility Hedi Viterbo 3 Facing Evil: Can We Professionally Evaluate Torture? David Senesh Part 2 Philosophical and Theological Perspectives 4 The Ambiguity of Sovereignty: the Passion Narrative as a Paradox Toni Koivulahti 5 Barbarians at the Gate: Reasserting a Natural Law Definition of Torture Lon Olson 6 Beyond the State: Human and Animal Positions Outside the Law Noora Koivulahti Part 3 Historical and Literary Perspectives 7 Torture, Slavery, Civilisation and Human Rights in the United States 1820–1860 W. Fitzhugh Brundage 8 Torture and Anti-Partisan War: the Case of the Italian Social Republic 1943–1945 Federico Ciavattone 9 The Goli Otok Camp: Torture Justified by External Threats? Martin Previšić 10 ‘A Real Show of Horrors’: Reading Representations of Torture in A Clockwork Orange and American Psycho Stuart Molloy Index
