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The American Psychological Association was formed in 1892 and spread quickly after World War II. The APA is one of the largest scientific and professional organisation representing psychology in the United States. In 2017, the APA (American Psychology Association) settled a case against two psychologists who allegedly utilised the CIA’s ‘enhanced interrogation’ techniques in the aftereffect of 9/11 and violating some of their professional ethics. This horrific event took place in Guantanamo bay, a secret prison outside of the United States where suspected terrorists were kidnapped and tortured. In 2002, the APA changed its ethics code to allow psychologists to abandon their ethical obligations under pressure from legal authority, which could include military orders to participate in torture. Article 4 of the UN’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights clearly states “no one shall be held in slavery or servitude; slavery and the slave trade shall be prohibited in all their forms”. Similarly, Article 5 states “no one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel; inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment”. The two psychologist who used the CIA’s interrogations techniques breached these human rights and did not uphold the APA’s ethics code. In this essay, I will critically analyse the different types of techniques used and they breached some rights listed in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the APA’s code of ethics. The legal obligations of psychologists, the criticism for the experiments and the response which the APA took to correct these issues.
Under the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the term ‘torture’ translates to “any act which severe pain and suffering, where physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person for such purposes as obtaining from him or a third person information or a confession….when such pain or suffering is inflicted by or at the inspiration of or with the consent or acquiescence of a public official or other person acting in an official capacity”. The definition excludes “pain or suffering arising from only from, inherent in or incidental to unlawful sanctions”. Torture is not an effective means to use in interrogations and does not gather useful or truthful information. It can, however, be successful when controlling large numbers of population. Prisoners who were held captive at Guantanamo Bay had their own religious used against them as a physical means of torture. After the 9/11 attack the United States extended their military base in Cuba to incorporate a detention where they kept men linked to terrorism. Detainees were given permission to keep a copy of the holy book, but it was used to torture them. Guards saw this as an opportunity to agonise prisoners by tossing the Quran into the toilet or by breaking the binding under the guise of searching for weapons. Official reports confirm that 23 detainees participated in a mass-suicide attempt from August 18-26, 2003. President Barrack Obama tried multiple attempts of closing down Guantanamo Bay while serving his term, but in 2018 Donald Trump signed an executive order in January 2018 to keep the detention centre opened indefinitely. 40 detainees remain at the off-shore island.
There were 13 ‘enhanced interrogation techniques’, which the CIA used on detainees and they include: “abdominal slap, attention grasp, cramped confinement, dietary manipulation, the facial hold, the facial slap/ insult slap, nudity, stress positions, sleep deprivation, wall standing, walling, waterboarding and water dousing”. Detainees who were tortured by sleep deprivation were required to wear diapers and if they weren’t available, guards constructed substitutes with duct tape, or prisoners were chained naked in their cells. The cells were pitch black night and day, with no heating and loud music constantly being blasted. The interrogation techniques were written by Bruce Jessen and James Mitchell, two contracted psychologists who created such approach to resist against Al-Qaida fighters. Jessen, one of the psychologists, was sent to spent 10 days in a secret prison near Kabul, and 5 days after he had left, one inmate, Rahman, was found dead in his cell due to hypothermia. Rahman was continuously interviewed for two weeks with minimal food and sleep and was always naked waist down or wearing socks and a diaper throughout his time there.
The right to freedom from torture is embedded in many human rights documents and protects all people from becoming subject to torture. Whether it be psychological, emotional or physical. The administering of torture is a serious violation of fundamental international law under the Geneva Conventions which were created to minimise the effects of armed conflicts. This resulted in, infliction of torture being constituted as a war crime. Under International Criminal Law, torture can initiate a ‘crime against humanity’ or ‘war crime’. As stated in the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Courts. The concept of non-refoulment prevents leaving a victim of persecution to their aggressor and applies to states in the conditions of their extradition and immigration policies. Persecution includes actions that do not fall within the overly restricted definition of torture. Article 33 of the United Nations Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees, proposes that “ [n]o Contracting State shall expel or return a refugee in any manner whatsoever to the frontiers of territories where his life or freedom would be threatened on account of his race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion”.
Psychologist James Mitchell and Bruce Jessen settled a case filed by the American Civil Liberties Union on behalf of three former CIA prisoners. They were accused of creating, performing and supervising the CIA’s experimental torture and abuse program. There was staggering evidence against the psychologists including: a detailed Senate report, multiple depositions, newly declassified documents and even Mitchell’s memoir. Before deciding to settle, Mitchell and Jessen refused to acknowledge any involvement in the experiment and their legal preventatives pleaded their guiltiness by comparing them to the low-level technicians whose employers provided lethal gas for extermination camps during the Holocaust. The Psychologists involvement in the interrogation program was of high importance because it allowed the Justice Department to determine whether the program was legal and did not consist of torture, since the interrogations were conducted with health professionals present to make they were safe. The interrogation program has now been shut down, just last year the Senate Intelligence Committee issued a thorough report which outlined the program as ineffective and abusive. The APA used this critical moment to re-evaluate the psychologists actions and making beneficial changes to the interrogation program and ethics code of the APA.
The new policy imposed by the APA does not allow psychologists to get involved in any policy consultants involving human interrogations. The council of representatives almost came to a unanimous vote to inhibit psychology professionals from getting involved with national security interrogations. The new policy states that psychologists “shall not conduct, supervise, be in the presence of, or otherwise assist any national security interrogations for any military or intelligence entities, including private contractors working on their behalf, nor advise on conditions of confinement insofar as these might facilitate such an interrogation’. The new policy also aims to align with APA’s stance regarding cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment of punishment with that of the U.N Convention Against Torture . They are forbidden from participating in at least 19 different interrogation techniques, including waterboarding, hooding, forced nudity and stressful positions. Additionally, the APA reached out to the Department of Defence and Congress to continue looking into the mistreatment of prisoners at Guantanamo Bay and other sites to ensure all ethical standards are being followed. The APA also supports the Supreme Court decision upholding that Guantanamo prisoners have a fundamental right to have a legal review of their detentions.
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