Do you really think torture is acceptable in any circumstances?
The controversial arguments of Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz supporting the legalisation of torture in so-called "ticking bomb" scenarios represent the most sophisticated and visible of recent attempts to make torture an accepted weapon in the war on terror.
States and other agents engage in torture, as both sides of the debate accept. According to Bob Brecher, it is precisely because the general public are taking the "new realism" of Dershowitz and others seriously that there is a pressing need to expose the fundamental flaws in their arguments, lest the peoples of democratic societies lose their moral compass and fail to be vigilant in holding their governments properly to account.
This timely and passionate book is the first to address itself directly to the arguments for legalising the limited use of interrogational torture. Brecher confronts those arguments head-on, examining the efficacy of torture and drawing out the practical implications for policy as well as the ethical implications of these proposals for the kind of society we live in.