This timely and passionate book is the first to address itself to Harvard Law Professor Alan Dershowitz's controversial arguments for the limited use of interrogational torture and its legalisation.

* Argues that the respectability Dershowitz's arguments confer on the view that torture is a legitimate weapon in the war on terror needs urgently to be countered

* Takes on the advocates of torture on their own utilitarian grounds

* Timely and passionately written, in an accessible, jargon-free style

* Forms part of the provocative and timely Blackwell Public Philosophy series