Torture and the UK’s ‘War on Asylum’
Medical Power and the Culture of Disbelief
abstract
This chapter explores medical power in the UK’s ‘war on asylum’, examining how medical expertise has been undermined in the asylum process when this expertise is utilised to add weight to asylum seekers’ claims to have experienced torture. It examines how there have been attempts to narrow the definition of torture in ways which exclude people from the protections to which torture survivors are entitled. It explores the extent to which medical power has been complicit in riding roughshod over existing safeguards to prevent further harm to those who have experienced torture, and also, crucially, how this form of power has been and continues to be challenged.
Keywords: Immigration detention • Border control • Asylum seekers • Torture • Medical power