Understanding Torture: Law, Violence, and Political Identity

Preface and Acknowledgments

Preface and Acknowledgments The impetus for this book was the use of coercive interrogation and detention tactics by U.S. personnel in the months and years after the September 11, 2001 attacks, and I completed the manuscript in the last days of George W. Bush’s presidency. I was able to take account of some more recent events or disclosures during the editing process. But Understanding Torture is not a book about the Bush administration or the war on terror. It is neither a comprehensive account or chronology of events during those years nor an argument that a change of U.S. presidential administrations will moot the problem of torture. Rather, this is a book about the ongoing relationship of torture and state violence to contemporary liberal democracies and, even more, about the legal and political discourse of torture and the consequences and implications of that discourse. I spend signi‹cant time on the United States, but neither it nor the war on terror is my sole focus. I received an enormous amount of substantive assistance while working on this book and its predecessor articles. People who commented on drafts or assisted me with issues related to this book include Elena Baylis, Harold Bruff, Bobby Chesney, John Grant, Oren Gross, Lisa Hajjar, Andrea Hibbard , Duncan Hollis, Sandy Levinson, Clark Lombardi, Ruth Miller, Sam Pillsbury, Darius Rejali, Alice Ristroph, Brad Roth, Juliet Stumpf, Doug Sylvester, Steve Vladeck, Elliot Young, and two anonymous reviewers for the University of Michigan Press. I also learned a great deal from participants at numerous talks and conferences, as well as members of the “Law of Torture ” discussion list organized by Marty Lederman and Kim Scheppele. Andrea Hibbard’s careful review of the manuscript helped me clarify my arguments and avoid embarrassing errors. I particularly want to acknowledge my debt to my friend and mentor Welsh White. I regret that he will never see this book; his advice and guidance made it possible. Summer grants from Lewis & Clark Law School and, before that, the University of Pittsburgh School of Law helped me write this book and its predecessor articles. I am especially grateful to Lewis & Clark Law School, where I developed the idea for this book, and to my colleagues there for providing me with a warm, supportive, and stunningly beautiful environ- ment in which to write about these issues. Lynn Williams at Lewis & Clark’s Boley Law Library helped me track down sources, and Lisa Frenz and Andy Marion helped me assemble the manuscript. Kate Mertes prepared the index. The support of Melody Herr and Jim Reische at the University of Michigan Press has also been essential. x  Preface and Acknowledgments ...