Sliding off Torture’s Halo of Prohibition

2016 ◽  
Vol 17 (2) ◽  
pp. 227-239
Author(s):  
Adam Henschke
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Cognitive Bias ◽  
War On Terror ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
The United States ◽  
The Other ◽  
Domestic Terrorism ◽  
Liberal Democracies ◽  
Liberal Democratic ◽  
Lesser Evil

Before the Al Qaeda attacks in the us, it was hard to find support for torture in the liberal-democratic world. However, post 9/11 torture (or at least something very close to torture) was used by liberal democracies like the United States (us). Practices like water-boarding were justified by reference to the war on terror. Underneath this lies a reasoning that we have two options, some large scale act of violence and torture, and that torture is a lesser evil, exemplified by ‘ticking time bomb’ scenarios – if you have two options, both bad, but one is far worse than the other, the lesser evil seems a reasonable decision. This article proposes that there is a moral danger through slippage from recognising torture as a generally justified action. It explains this slippage by reference to the ‘halo effect’: a cognitive bias in which something is judged as permissible or good through association with non-relevant facts. Given the current risks of domestic terrorism, the article argues that we need to learn from the us example post 9/11 to ensure that we avoid justifying uses of torture in non-exceptional circumstances.

Race, Ethnicity, and the War on Terror

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kelly Welch
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
War On Terror ◽  
Minority Groups ◽  
Civil Liberties ◽  
The United States ◽  
Domestic Terrorism ◽  
Terror Attacks ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Social Controls ◽  
New Policies

The unofficial War on Terror that began in the wake of the September 11, 2001 terror attacks in the United States expanded a wide range of formal social controls as well as more informal methods of punitive control that were disproportionately directed toward Muslims, Arabs, Middle Easterners, and those who were perceived to be. Although terrorism had been racialized long before 9/11, this event galvanized American support for sweeping new policies and practices that specifically targeted racial and ethnic minorities, particularly those who were immigrants. New agencies and prisons were created, individual rights and civil liberties were restricted, and acts of hate and discrimination against those who were racially, ethnically, and religiously stereotyped as potential terrorists increased. Although research shows that most domestic terrorism is not perpetrated by Muslims, Arabs, or those originating from the Middle East, the racialized stereotype of terrorists had a major impact on how the War on Terror was executed and how its implementation affected members of certain minority groups in the United States.

Economic Superpower in an Age of Limits

2014 ◽  
Vol 21 (3) ◽  
pp. 278-298
Author(s):  
Yu Takeda
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
International Economic ◽  
Economic Policy ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Developed Countries ◽  
The United States ◽  
Policy Coordination ◽  
The Other ◽  
Bilateral Cooperation ◽  
Perceptual Changes

This paper examines macroeconomic policy coordination between Japan and the United States under the locomotive strategy from 1977 to 1979. Previous studies have described the strategy as a fiasco because of its negative economic impact. In fact, the Japanese government, after two years of stimulus packages, quit trying to be a locomotive bringing other developed countries out of their economic difficulties and the u.s. government admitted it in 1979. On the other hand, as this article shows, bilateral cooperation with the United States under this strategy expanded the roles and burdens of Japan, an emerging economic superpower, in international economic policy coordination. Japan’s efforts to implement the strategy made the u.s. government believe that Tokyo would continue to respond to its request to bear larger international responsibilities, while it also increased awareness of Japan’s global role in Tokyo. These bilateral perceptual changes paved the way for subsequent policy coordination and Japan’s assumption of greater burdens, notably the adoption of large-scale stimulus packages under belt-tightening budgets.

The Other Side of the Valley

2011 ◽  
Vol 11 (4) ◽  
pp. 108-111
Author(s):  
Barry Estabrook
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Los Angeles ◽  
Urban Areas ◽  
Food Production ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Central Valley ◽  
The United States ◽  
The Other ◽  
Ground Zero ◽  
Organic Farmers

California's Central Valley is ground zero for large-scale, industrialized agriculture in the United States, and it is paying a high environmental price for that distinction. Its water is contaminated, and its air is more polluted than that in large, urban areas such as Los Angeles. But there is another side to food production in the Central Valley. Small, artisanal, often organic farmers are showing that it is possible to raise crops and animals profitably and sustainability. If it can be done in the Central Valley, it can be done anywhere.

The Logic of a Soft Intervention Strategy: The United States and Conflict Conciliation in Africa

2006 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
pp. 317-339
Author(s):  
Donald Rothchild
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Human Rights ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Military Intervention ◽  
Intervention Strategy ◽  
The United States ◽  
Third Parties ◽  
The Other ◽  
Coercive Diplomacy ◽  
Peace Agreements

AbstractWhat forms of U.S. intervention are likely to prove realizable and to be appropriate for facilitating the implementation of peace agreements and protecting human rights in Africa? The choices for action are certainly wider than the polar opposites of disengagement and large-scale military intervention. Because the United States can afford neither prolonged military hegemony nor the indulgence of neo-isolationism, it must find some form of creative engagement that fulfills its obligations to facilitate and protect in ways that are acceptable to both American and overseas opinion. Limited interests in Africa and the nature of public pressures leave little alternative to utilizing soft intervention approaches in most cases. Within the category of soft intervention, there appears to be a continuum of means leading to possible movement into muscular intervention. At one end, there is coercive diplomacy, which is associated with threats of military and economic sanctions; if these sanctions are actually used, the intervening state becomes involved in muscular intervention. At the other end is diplomacy associated not with threats, but with the promise of rewards. Between the two poles lies diplomacy that involves neither threats nor rewards (i.e., conciliation and mediation without the use of pressures and incentives). In real world contexts, third parties tend to apply mixed packages of non-coercive and coercive incentives, with coercive incentives becoming increasingly dominant as the costs of altering preferences and the intensity of conflict rise.

Introduction

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-12
Author(s):  
Jussi M. Hanhimäki
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
The United States ◽  
The Other ◽  
Term Strength ◽  
Liberal Democracies ◽  
Transatlantic Relationship ◽  
Constant State ◽  
The One ◽  
Major Argument

The Introduction outlines the basic paradox addressed in this book. On the one hand, transatlantic relations appear to be in a constant state of crisis; the “death” of the transatlantic partnership has been declared with confidence many times over. On the other hand, the links that bind the United States and Europe together—institutional, cultural, political, military—have so far prevailed. In short, the Introduction asks whether the transatlantic partnership of liberal democracies has become more fragile in the three decades since 1990? The Introduction foreshadows the major argument of the book: that the transatlantic relationship draws its long-term strength from the constant disagreements. Last, the Introduction outlines the book’s structure and defines the conceptual framework used.

scholarly journals Racial Diversity and Union Organizing in the United States, 1999--2008

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
John-Paul Ferguson
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Ethnic Diversity ◽  
Quantitative Research ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Racial Diversity ◽  
The United States ◽  
The Other ◽  
Racially Diverse ◽  
Quit Rate

Does racial diversity make it harder to form a union? Case studies giveconflicting answers, and little large-scale research on the questionexists. Most quantitative research on race and unionization studies trendsin membership rather than the outcome of specific organizing drives, andassumes that the main problem is mistrust between workers and unions,paying less attention for example to the role of employers. I explore therole of racial and ethnic diversity in the outcomes of nearly 7,000organizing drives launched between 1999 and 2008. By matching the NationalLabor Relations Board’s information on union activity with the EqualEmployment Opportunity Commission’s surveys of large establishments, Ireconstruct the demographic composition of the work groups involved in eachmobilization. I find that more diverse establishments are less likely tosee successful organizing attempts. However, I find little evidence thatthis is because workers are less interested in voting for unions. Instead,I find that the organizers of more diverse units are more likely to give upbefore such elections are held. Furthermore, this higher quit rate can beexplained best by the other organizations involved in the organizing drive.In particular, employers are more likely to be charged with unfair laborpractices when the unit in question is more racially diverse. This effectpersists when controlling for heterogeneity among industries, unions andregions.

On Cyber-Enabled Information Warfare and Information Operations

2021 ◽  
pp. 250-272
Author(s):  
Herbert Lin ◽  
Jaclyn Kerr
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
The United States ◽  
Human Cognition ◽  
Information Warfare ◽  
Liberal Democracies ◽  
Production And Consumption ◽  
Communications Technologies ◽  
Rational Thought ◽  
Systematic Biases

The United States has no peer competitors in conventional military power. But its adversaries are increasingly turning to asymmetric methods for engaging in conflict. This paper advances the idea of cyber-enabled information warfare and influence operations (IWIO) as a form of conflict or confrontation to which the United States (and liberal democracies more generally) are particularly vulnerable. IWIO is the deliberate use of information against an adversary to confuse, mislead, and perhaps to influence the choices and decisions that the adversary makes. IWIO is a hostile activity, or at least an activity that is conducted between two parties whose interests are not well aligned, but it does not constitute warfare in the sense that international law or domestic institutions construe it. IWIO takes advantage of systematic biases in human cognition towards non-rational thought. Cyber-enabled IWIO exploits these biases even more through the use of modern communications technologies to facilitate high connectivity, low latency, high degrees of anonymity, insensitivity to distance and national borders, democratized access to publishing capabilities, and inexpensive production and consumption of information content. Some approaches to counter IWIO show some promise of having some modest but valuable defensive effect. But, on the whole, there are no good solutions for large-scale countering of IWIO in free and democratic societies. Development of new tactics and responses is therefore needed.

Guantanamo Bay: The Legal Black Hole1

2004 ◽  
Vol 53 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-15 ◽  
Author(s):  
Johan Steyn
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Human Rights ◽  
Black Hole ◽  
Armed Conflict ◽  
War Crimes ◽  
The United States ◽  
Liberal Democracies ◽  
Liberal Democratic ◽  
Guantanamo Bay ◽  
Excessive Measures

The most powerful democracy is detaining hundreds of suspected foot soldiers of the Taliban in a legal black hole at the United States naval base at Guantanamo Bay, where they await trial on capital charges by military tribunals. This episode must be put in context. Democracies must defend themselves. Democracies are entitled to try officers and soldiers of enemy forces for war crimes. But it is a recurring theme in history that in times of war, armed conflict, or perceived national danger, even liberal democracies adopt measures infringing human rights in ways that are wholly disproportionate to the crisis. One tool at hand is detention without charge or trial, that is, executive detention. Ill-conceived rushed legislation is passed granting excessive powers to executive governments which compromise the rights and liberties of individuals beyond the exigencies of the situation. Often the loss of liberty is permanent. Executive branches of government, faced with a perceived emergency, often resort to excessive measures. The litany of grave abuses of power by liberal democratic governments is too long to recount, but in order to understand and to hold governments to account, we do well to take intoaccount the circles of history.

Working With Interpreters to Support Students Who Are English Language Learners

2016 ◽  
Vol 1 (16) ◽  
pp. 15-27 ◽  
Author(s):  
Henriette W. Langdon ◽  
Terry Irvine Saenz
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
English Language Learners ◽  
Language Learners ◽  
English Language ◽  
First Language ◽  
The United States ◽  
The Other ◽  
Primary Language ◽  
Second Best ◽  
Support Students

The number of English Language Learners (ELL) is increasing in all regions of the United States. Although the majority (71%) speak Spanish as their first language, the other 29% may speak one of as many as 100 or more different languages. In spite of an increasing number of speech-language pathologists (SLPs) who can provide bilingual services, the likelihood of a match between a given student's primary language and an SLP's is rather minimal. The second best option is to work with a trained language interpreter in the student's language. However, very frequently, this interpreter may be bilingual but not trained to do the job.

Quality Control of Data in a Large-Scale Cancer Register Program

1966 ◽  
Vol 05 (02) ◽  
pp. 67-74 ◽  
Author(s):  
W. I. Lourie ◽  
W. Haenszeland
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Quality Control ◽  
Cancer Patients ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
The United States ◽  
Newly Diagnosed ◽  
Related Data ◽  
Cancer Register ◽  
Independent Review ◽  
End Results

Quality control of data collected in the United States by the Cancer End Results Program utilizing punchcards prepared by participating registries in accordance with a Uniform Punchcard Code is discussed. Existing arrangements decentralize responsibility for editing and related data processing to the local registries with centralization of tabulating and statistical services in the End Results Section, National Cancer Institute. The most recent deck of punchcards represented over 600,000 cancer patients; approximately 50,000 newly diagnosed cases are added annually.Mechanical editing and inspection of punchcards and field audits are the principal tools for quality control. Mechanical editing of the punchcards includes testing for blank entries and detection of in-admissable or inconsistent codes. Highly improbable codes are subjected to special scrutiny. Field audits include the drawing of a 1-10 percent random sample of punchcards submitted by a registry; the charts are .then reabstracted and recoded by a NCI staff member and differences between the punchcard and the results of independent review are noted.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document