Micheal Ignatieff on Torture

I am not a fan of Micheal Ignatieff, the former academic who wishes to become our next Prime Minister. He has supported the invasion of Iraq, and U.S. hegemony generally, in the name of speading freedom and democracy worldwide.

I was also annoyed by his response to accusations that he`s supported torture in his writings, claiming that of course he does not support torture, because a relation of his was tortured to death by the Nazis. Would he have accepted such an argument if a student had made it in a paper during his years as an academic? Someone could be against the torture practiced by the Nazis against a relative, but be for the torture practiced by the "good guys" (us) against dastardly terrorists for noble ideals- and as we shall see in the next article, Ignatieff excuses a lot in the name of noble ideals.

However, he has a much stronger case when challenges people to actually look at what he`s written. I`ve not read everything he`s written, but I`ve read two pieces of his on the subject of torture (« Evil under Interrogation: Is Torture ever Permissible? » http://www.ksg.harvard.edu/news/opeds/2004/ignatieff_torture_ft_051504.htm) and « If Torture Works » (http://www.prospect-magazine.co.uk/article_details.php?id=7374%60), and they do not support the allegation that he supports torture. In fact, he comes out quite clearly against it- although the way he frames the issue can be misinterpreted.

In the latter article, for example, begins with these words : « The debate over torture is not as simple as it seems. Those of us who oppose torture under any circumstances should admit that ours is an unpopular policy that may make us more vulnerable to terrorism. »

People have, I think, seized on the first sentence and the second part of the last, neglecting to note that he speaks of « those of us who oppose torture under any circumstances should admit that ours is an unpopular policy». Later on, he makes it clear : he opposes torture not because it never works or could not save lives (he thinks it probably could), but because to do so would be a betrayal of « who we are ». The worrying thing he does say here is that « If we are against torture, we are committed to arguing with our fellow citizens, not treating those who defend torture as moral monsters »- suggesting torture should be treated as a reasonable proposal that we may disagree with, but not completely abhor. To my mind, this is too weak- if torture is not monstrous, and if it can save lives, then Ignatieff`s arguments against it look very thin indeed. Thus the problem is not that he supports torture, but that his opposition to it is ineffective.

There`s also the issue of « coercive interrogation ». First of all, it seems to me that the adjective « coercive » is redundant when applied to « interrogration », since interrogation is inherently coercive. When someone is hauled off to the police station to « answer a few questions », that person is being subjected to the coercive power of the state, and as for the detainees at Guantanamo Bay, let`s just say that their whole experience is one of coercion at the hands of Uncle Sam.

Clearly, there are levels of coercion that are not forms of torture. But there are forms of coercian, that, like torture, are designed to « break down » uncooperative suspects. There is also a point at which they become torture.

One problem with breaking people down is that the innocent can be broken down as easily as the guilty. Many wrongful convictions have resulted from people confessing to things they didn`t do under dubious circumstances. You see, if the police were to believe that I`d committed a crime, once it came to interrogation the whole point of it could be to get me to confess to the crime.

We have laws to protect the rights of criminal suspects- and of prisoners of war- precisely to limit the coercive power of the state so that abuses and miscarriages of justice can be prevented. Such laws should not be simply tossed away as inexpediant when a government sees fit to declare war on an evil such as terrorism. Again, Ignatieff is right when he says that of course there is bound to be some coercian involved in interrogation, but is lamentably weak when it comes to arguing for the state`s coercive powers to be limited.