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Justice, Context, and Violence: Law Enforcement Officers on Why They Torture

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2024

Rachel Wahl
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Abstract

How do police explain their support for torture? Findings from 12 months of fieldwork with police in India complicate previous researchers’ claims that violence workers tend to morally disengage and blame circumstances for their actions. The officers in this study engage in moral reflection on torture, drawing on their beliefs about human nature and justice to explain their support for it. They admit that they use torture more widely than their own conceptions of justice allow, but see this as an imperfect implementation of their principles rather than as a violation of them. Previous research on the spread of human rights norms has focused on how these norms can be adapted to the local beliefs that support them, rather than on understanding the beliefs that conflict with human rights. I argue that illuminating the self-understanding of state actors who support or engage in torture is crucial to building theory on why such violence occurs, as well as to designing interventions to prevent it.

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Articles
Information
Law & Society Review , Volume 48 , Issue 4 , December 2014 , pp. 807 - 836
Copyright
© 2014 Law and Society Association.

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Footnotes

I gratefully acknowledge the valuable feedback provided by the following people: Dana Burde, Assistant Professor of International Education at New York University; Jack Snyder, Robert and Renee Belfer Professor of International Relations at Columbia University; Jinee Lokaneeta, Assistant Professor of Political Science at Drew University; Benjamin Gregg, Associate Professor of Government at the University of Texas at Austin; Rene Arcilla, Professor of Philosophy of Education at New York University; and Danya Reda, Acting Assistant Professor of Lawyering at New York University School of Law.

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