Rumsfeld is alleged to have personally approved of the introduction of a variety of coercive interrogation methods including stress techniques such as forced standing and shackling in painful positions.
After more than two weeks of near-constant coercive interrogations, including painful stress positions and repeated waterboarding, Abu Zubaydah had provided none of the lifesaving information the CIA claimed he possessed.
Joseph A. Massad engages recent scholarly debates on nationalism and richly fulfills the analytical promise of Michel Foucault's insight that modern institutions and their power to have productive, not merely repressive or coercive, capacities though Massad also stresses their continued repressive function.
The existing relationship between the coercive field and the internal stress was obtained experimentally as both variables are directly related to the total dislocation density.
But two U.S. officials acknowledged he may well have been subjected to other coercive CIA tactics, possibly including stress positions, sleep deprivation and being slammed into a wall.
Psychologists and at least one doctor designed or recommended coercive interrogation methods including sleep deprivation, stress positions, isolation and waterboarding.
Those critical of the program stress its directive and coercive features which are said to compromise personal autonomy, while those in favor emphasize its efficiency, cultural fit, and the reduction of stigma.
Corresponding studies within adult psychiatric care have mostly focused on ethical issues defined by the researcher and how these were perceived by care staff in relation to coercive care, coercive measures and moral stress.
The disclosures come as the top American commander in Iraq, Lieutenant-General Ricardo Sanchez, announced he has barred all coercive interrogation practices, including forcing prisoners into stress positions for long periods and disrupting their sleep, except in very rare circumstances.
Both the normative literature [ 15] and psychiatric law in, e.g. Sweden and the UK [ 25, 26], stress that reciprocity, even in coercive care, should be seen as a core value in psychiatric care and that staff should involve patients in all stages of care and treatment, also in coercive care.
