ABSTRACT
The torture debate concerns the relationship of liberal democratic sovereignty to force, questioning specifically whether the violence perpetrated by states which democracies hold themselves to higher moral standards than violent guerrilla groups constitutes torture. The post-9/11 torture debate has in large part been a debate over whether liberal democratic states can ever legitimately torture. Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (UNCAT) definition of torture is at once a description and a prohibition; it states that any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person can constitute torture, and that international law is concerned with such acts when such pain or suffering is inflicted by or at the instigation of or with the consent or acquiescence of a public official or other person acting in an official capacity. The state violence carried out against captured and vulnerable bodies in the course of conflict, whether in military contexts or against political prisoners.
