Beyond Durkheim: A Comment on Steven Lukes's ‘Liberal Democratic Torture’

Abstract

In a recent article, Steven Lukes offers a thought-provoking reflection on the apparently growing resort to torture by liberal democracies today. Professor Lukes aptly asks whether ‘torture is just another case of dirty hands in politics?’ – that is, the idea that in order to do the right thing or achieve the best public outcome in the circumstances one cannot avoid committing a wrong, such as deceit or cruelty. His answer is that torture differs from other cases of dirty hands in that it cannot be made ‘liberal-democratically accountable’, thus raising the question of ‘how should it be addressed in liberal democracies?’ Here he suggests we can learn from the sociologist Emile Durkheim and, especially, his conception of modern societies as being held together by a ‘religion of individualism’. Allowing state officials to violate basic rights of the individual thus profanes against the religion and threatens the ‘moral disintegration’ of society itself. Lukes argues that Durkheim's account helps us see both the folly in ‘certain ways of thinking and talking about torture’, such as construing it as a ‘lesser evil’ given the competing claims of risk and security, and the damage that liberal democracies inflict on themselves, in responding to the threat of terrorism, by so readily compromising their own principles.There is much that is appealing in Professor Lukes's remarks. I also share his concern about the current erosion of civil liberties in liberal democracies. I wish, however, to raise some doubts about three key aspects of his argument: that torture is not susceptible to liberal-democratic accountability; that the ‘Durkheimian argument’ effectively precludes the practice of torture; and that we cannot rightly speak of torture as a ‘lesser evil’.

The Puzzle of Abu Ghraib: Are Democratic Institutions a Palliative or Panacea?

“…Two other studies, however, report results that challenge those findings (Davenport 1997, Richards 1999), and we further refine that challenge by showing that elections and the successful transfer of power across partiesas measured by Alvarez et al (1996) and Bernhard, Nordstrom and Reenock (2001)-do not reduce the probability that a state uses torture. The work of Wantchekon and Healy (1999), Walzer (2004) and Levey (2007) provides cause to expect this, and when we combine it with the argument that dissidents who use violence are unlikely to vote (much less be members of the winning coalition), we have an explanation that can account for the limited impact of voice.…”

“…In such a situation the state can either instruct the interrogator to use torture or it can accept that it cannot access the information it believes the suspected dissident has. Wantchekon and Healy (1999) show that because [1] the innocent person cannot divulge information and [2] the dissident has an incentive to hide the truth, the state always has a utilitarian incentive to employ torture because there is a chance that doing so will yield useful information 11 Walzer (2004) and Levey (2007) argue that liberal democracy and torture can co-exist comfortably. 12 They argue, in effect, that politicians in liberal democracies are agents hired by the voters to provide protection for the body politic.…”

“…First, the empirical work on states' repressive responses to threats, Wantchekon & Healy's (1999) game theoretic model, Walzer's (2004) and Levey's (2007) arguments about "dirty hands," and the counterinsurgent literature all suggest that states will respond to violent threats with torture. Yet second, the argument above suggests that at least one, and perhaps all three, institutional characteristics of democracies-voice, veto, and freedom of expression-will inhibit the executive's use of torture.…”

“…Those who subscribe to a classical, as opposed to liberal, conceptualization of democracy must confront this argument and finding when considering democratic performance. Of course, they have Walzer (2004) and Levey (2007) to provide philosophical support for the view that torture is justifiable (though not necessarily justified) in a democracy, and that will perhaps satisfy most who wish to advance the classical perspective.…”

Neuroscience v. privacy? A democratic perspective

“…[ , 63, but see Mendus 2008 Or consider recent controversy surrounding torture, and its use by liberal democracies. [Lukes 2006 andLevey 2007;Scarry, 1981 ch. 1;Sussman, 2005] Torture violates its victims' privacy in at least two ways.…”