PsySR Calls for End of Gaza Siege

In advance of the direct peace talks between Israeli and Palestinian leaders in Washington in early September, Psychologists for Social Responsibility (PsySR) has issued a statement below calling on the Government of Israel to end the siege of Gaza and urging health and mental health professionals to join our call.

Psychologists for Social Responsibility Calls on the Government of Israel to Lift the Siege of Gaza

The Israeli government’s siege of Gaza imposes an unacceptable cost to the health and mental health of the citizens of Gaza. Psychologists for Social Responsibility (PsySR) therefore calls upon the Government of Israel to end the siege. We further urge our medical and psychological colleagues in Israel and Palestine to join our call so that those living in the region can return to more normal and secure lives.

The CIA’s Torture Research Program

Stephen Soldz

In the aftermath of World War II the Nuremberg Code and other standards established that all research on people should be based upon two fundamental principles: voluntary informed consent and minimization of harm. “The voluntary consent of the human subject is absolutely essential,” begins that Code. The principles of the Nuremberg Code were widely incorporated, including in the United States, into professional ethical rules and laws governing human research. New evidence suggests that, not only did the CIA torture the detainees in their custody, but they also conducted illegal and unethical research on them.

Experiments in Torture

A new report of which I am a coauthor, Experiments in Torture: Evidence of Human Subject Research and Experimentation in the “Enhanced” Interrogation Program, just released by Physicians for Human Rights (PHR) provides the first strong evidence that the CIA was indeed engaged in research on detainees in its custody. The report, the result of six months of detailed work, analyzes now-public documents, including the “torture memos” from the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) and the CIA’s Inspector General Report and the accompanying CIA Office of Medical Services (OMS) guidelines for monitoring of detainees.

The Conditions for Human Health and Well Being Reside within the Psychosocial Contexts of Human Life

Anthony Marsella

As our concern for human health and well being grows with each day, we find ourselves too often looking to solutions within limitations of the health care system. We speak of the need for more medical services, lower medical costs, more health professionals, better medical technologies, improvements in medical records, greater access to health care, and more research.

While all of these factors are important, they distract us from recognizing and addressing the very psychosocial causes that ultimately limit human health and well being – causes that could be addressed directly and immediately and that would significantly reduce dysfunction, disorder, and disease, and promote human health and well being.

We are infatuated with the physical. We pursue reductionism endlessly, going from limb, to organ, to cell, to gene, to atom and molecular space. All of these pursuits are warranted for they have helped illuminate the substrates and structures of illness. But they cannot in and of themselves address the tolls on human health and well being that are exacted within the psychosocial contexts of our lives. For example, can anyone deny that a reduction in poverty would limit scores of illnesses associated with the deprivations of poverty?

A Prevention Model for Reducing the Federal Debt While Doing Social Good

Neil Wollman

The growing federal debt has become such a looming problem that President Obama appointed a National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform to tackle it. So far, the public discourse has focused on two painful but seemingly necessary solutions — raising taxes and cutting current government programs. If instead, far more funds were put toward preventing problems before they arise, future spending would be reduced, along with the need for as many tax hikes and program cuts. This prevention model is primarily associated with health care (it is cheaper to prevent than treat an illness), but it could be applied across diverse budget sectors. What if all budget administrators were instructed to consider funding preventive measures that might save money in the future? Here are some examples.

Arizona Immigration Laws: A Band-Aid for the Wrong Problem

Jutta Tobias

As we’re moving towards enforcement of Arizona’s new immigration laws, applicable from July 29th, 2010, voices in states as far away as Maryland are calling to import the same legislation into their own communities. They are misguided, because the new Arizonan immigration laws miss the mark, at so many levels.

As psychologists, we know that the relations between groups with social status disparities are problematic. We also know that whenever groups come in contact, they cannot help but categorize. The trouble starts here; and all sorts of social evils follow, such as ingroup preference, depersonalization of the others, intergroup distrust and competition.

What British Petroleum Needs to Do — Now and in the Future

Anthony Marsella

As British Petroleum seeks to develop a favorable image in response to the Gulf Oil disaster, it would be wise to recognize a simple fact: the American people doubt that BP will act in good faith in addressing the disaster it has created.

The American people are increasingly fearful that, like so many corporate offenses of the past, BP may escape blame or financial restitution for the environmental, economic, legal, and medical problems of this disaster.

Recall those corporate-related disasters of the past few decades (e.g., Bhopal-Union Carbide, Enron, Massey Energy Mining, Exxon Valdez, Vivendi, the Wall Street collapse, World Com). Twenty years later, law suits are still being contested from the Exxon Valdez; Massey Energy has had scores of violations and yet continues to operate, and the Wall Street perpetrators –organizations and individuals — continue to thrive financially.

The past is prologue. The American people have reason to question whether the BP Gulf Oil crisis will be resolved in a timely and fair manner. For this reason, they are angry and distrustful of corporate and government actions and seek a more active and comprehensive response from BP and government offices.

Shocking New Report: The CIA Performed Human Experiments on Prisoners Under Bush

Stephen Soldz

Over the last year there have been an increasing number of accounts suggesting that, along with the CIA’s "enhanced interrogation" torture program, there was a related program experimenting with and researching the application of the torture.

For example, in the seven paragraphs released by a British court summarizing observations by British counterintelligence agents of the treatment of Binyan Mohamed by the CIA, the first two of these paragraphs stated:

It was reported that a new series of interviews was conducted by the United States authorities prior to 17 May 2002 as part of a new strategy designed by an expert interviewer….

BM had been intentionally subjected to continuous sleep deprivation. The effects of the sleep deprivation were carefully observed. [emphasis added]

The suggestion was that a new strategy was being tested and the results carefully examined. Several detainees have provided similar accounts, expressing their belief that their interrogations were being carefully studied, apparently so that the techniques could be modified based on the results. Such research would violate established laws and ethical rules governing research.

Obama’s Afghan Torture Center and the American Psychological Association

Stephen Soldz

A recent pair of articles by Marc Ambinder of the Atlantic has shed new light upon activities in the secret so-called "black jail" on the Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan. Among other aspects, these new revelations suggest that psychologists may be playing a major role inside the facility, raising questions about the reasons for American Psychological Association (APA) lobbying activities in support of the agency that Ambinder reports is running the detention center.

In recent months the Washington Post, New York Times, and BBC reported on a secret prison on the fringes of the Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan. Referred to by former prisoners as the "black jail," this institution is reportedly a site where prisoner abuse is regular and systematic. The BBC reported that all nine former prisoners they interviewed

told consistent stories of being held in isolation in cold cells where a light is on all day and night.

The men said they had been deprived of sleep by US military personnel there.

Thus, we can assume that psychological torture techniques of isolation, sleep deprivation, and hypothermia are routine aspects of treatment inside the facility.

The Nuclear Power TRAP

Diane Perlman

The UN 2010 Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) Review Conference, May 3 – May 28, is in its fourth and final week. Parallel to the official meetings with delegates of states’ parties to the NPT, active members of nongovernmental organizations, NGOs, came to New York to represent the interests of civil society.

Article IV of the NPT states the “inalienable right” to “peaceful uses” of nuclear energy — which is the “third pillar” of the NPT, along with nonproliferation and disarmament. The NPT includes a significant role for the International Atomic Energy Association, the IAEA, which promotes nuclear energy.

On May 20, the Abolition Caucus delivered a statement to UN 2010 NPT delegates stating concerns about the May 14 Report of Main Committee II, the body assigned to address nuclear energy, which made “glowing” claims about nuclear power’s benefits for energy, the environment, health, the economy, and Millennium Development Goals.

Do We Want a Stable Democracy in Afghanistan–Or Just a Short Term Ally to Fight the Taliban?

Neil Wollman and Abdulhadi Hairan

In late March, President Obama paid a surprise visit to Kabul to meet his Afghan counterpart, reportedly asking Karzai to improve governance reform to combat corruption. Since then, the two governments have exchanged jabs.

Karzai has been openly defiant of U.S. concerns, specifically election reform in the wake of a presidential election widely considered fraudulent, and has charged foreign interference in elections. The U.S. has focused on his decrees eliminating UN participants on the Election Complaint Commission (which was followed by a partial retreat).

The reaction by the Afghan Parliament has been mixed, with the Karzai-dominated upper house supporting his decrees and the lower house rejecting them. In March, Karzai told a UN representative that by mid-April there would be a “major and constructive reshuffle of the election commission,” and he did dismiss the head of the Independent Election Commission (IEC).

Most recently, Karzai and the UN worked out a compromise that makes some positive changes in personnel and procedure that will improve election governance, and which has brought the UN and donor nations on board to fund the September parliamentary elections. However, there are complaints from Afghan opposition leaders and some in parliament who say that the reforms are not sufficient. And likely were only enough to win international funding for the election.