The Toxicity of Torture: The Cultural Structure of US Political Discourse of Waterboarding.
Drawing on a qualitative analysis of 21 hearings held by the US Congress in 2007 and 2008, this manuscript examines the discursive work that proponents and opponents of waterboarding used to maintain and challenge the legitimacy of the practice. The juxtaposition reveals that US political discourse...
| Publicado en: | Social Forces Vol. 93; no. 1; pp. 383 - 405 |
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| Formato: | Artículo |
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Oxford University Press / USA
Sep2014
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| Acceso en línea: | Ver este registro en EBSCOhost |
| fields | @attributes: recordID: 1 pdfLink: plink: https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=ssf&AN=97894429&site=ehost-live header: @attributes: shortDbName: ssf uiTerm: 97894429 longDbName: Social Sciences Full Text (H.W. Wilson) uiTag: AN controlInfo: bkinfo: jinfo: jid: 00377732 SFR jtl: Social Forces issn: 00377732 maglogo: N pubinfo: dt: Sep2014 vid: 93 iid: 1 pid: 622 pub: Oxford University Press / USA artinfo: ui: 97894429 10.1093/sf/sou060 ppf: 383 ppct: 22 formats: fmt: @attributes: type: P size: 315KB tig: atl: The Toxicity of Torture: The Cultural Structure of US Political Discourse of Waterboarding. aug: au: Del Rosso, Jared affil: University of Denver su: United States. Central Intelligence Agency United States. Congress. House. Committee on the Judiciary Mohammed, Khalid Shaikh, 1965- Zubaydah, Abu Nance, Malcolm Kleinman, Steven Abu Ghraib Prison Torture Human rights Waterboarding War on Terrorism, 2001-2009 United States politics & government, 21st century sug: subj: Torture Human rights United States. Central Intelligence Agency United States. Congress. House. Committee on the Judiciary Abu Ghraib Prison Waterboarding War on Terrorism, 2001-2009 United States politics & government, 21st century Mohammed, Khalid Shaikh, 1965- Zubaydah, Abu Nance, Malcolm Kleinman, Steven ab: Drawing on a qualitative analysis of 21 hearings held by the US Congress in 2007 and 2008, this manuscript examines the discursive work that proponents and opponents of waterboarding used to maintain and challenge the legitimacy of the practice. The juxtaposition reveals that US political discourse of waterboarding orients to a long-standing cultural coding of torture as antithetical to liberal democracy. Specifically, I show that proponents defend waterboarding by narrating its use within a sequence of instrumentally rational actions that begins with the capture of a terrorist, involves the unsuccessful use of traditional interrogation techniques followed by waterboarding, and concludes with the collection of intelligence that frustrates terroristic activities. In this sequence, waterboarding appears to be a last resort in the pursuit of a legitimate state goal. Opponents of waterboarding, conversely, emphasize the practice's illiberal qualities, arguing that waterboarding produces compliant detainees who will say anything to end their torture. Opponents also describe the physical horrors associated with torture and compare waterboarding to practices employed by notorious illiberal regimes. I demonstrate that these opposing depictions of waterboarding derive their resonance from a single cultural code that legitimates instrumentally rational expressions of state violence and abhors ferocious, repressive forms. I conclude by discussing the implications of these findings for the study of torture, state violence, and human rights. pubtype: Academic Journal doctype: Article src: R language: English refInfo: copyright: @attributes: flag: N holdings: @attributes: islocal: N |
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