The Cost of Torture: Evidence from the Spanish Inquisition

• In Event: Empirical Contributions to the Study of Torture

Abstract

The scholarship on interrogational torture is underdeveloped not merely because the topic is morally fraught but also because reliable data are hard to come by. The vast archives of the Spanish Inquisition provide a particularly promising source of information. The Inquisition tortured systematically, inflicting suffering on large swaths of the population, regardless of age or sex. It tortured dispassionately, willing to torment all who were deemed to withhold evidence, regardless of how egregious their heresy was or how significant the evidence was that they were withholding. This torture yielded information that was often reliable: Names, locations, events, and practices provided by witnesses in the torture chamber matched information provided by witnesses that were not tortured. Nonetheless, and despite the tremendous efforts in time, money, and manpower that the Inquisition invested in institutionalizing torture, its officials treated the results of interrogations in the torture chamber with skepticism. This systematic, dispassionate, effective, and meticulous torture stands in stark contrast to the “ticking bomb” philosophy that has motivated U.S. torture policy in the aftermath of 9/11. Evidence from the archives of the Spanish Inquisition suggests that “successful” torture affords no middle ground: One cannot improvise quick, amateurish, and half-hearted torture sessions, motivated by anger and fear, and hope to extract reliable intelligence.

Author

• Ron E. Hassner, University of California, Berkeley