February 18, 2010
Class Notes: Guantanamo and its Legacy
Class title: Law, Societies and Justice 490/Political Science 401 — Guantanamo and Its Legacy. Taught by Jamie Mayerfeld, associate professor of political science.
Description: (From the class syllabus.) The U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba is a potent symbol of diametrically opposed views on the global war against terrorism. But the general public is often uncertain or misinformed about fundamental questions:
- Who are the Guantanamo detainees?
- How have they been treated?
- What policies have governed detention and treatment?
- How should those policies be evaluated on legal, moral and political grounds?
Instructor’s goals: Clearer understanding of what has happened, Mayerfeld said, but also a consideration of issues that will outlast projected closure of Guantanamo. Is terrorism a crime or an act of war or both? In protecting human rights, how does U.S. law compare with international law? In detention of terrorist suspects, should standard norms of due process and habeas corpus be relaxed or even suspended? How can we explain the abuses of human rights?
Assignments: Readings include memoirs, news accounts, court cases and policy debates.
Along with those assignments and two five-page essays on legal, moral, and policy controversies, each of the 47 students is required to keep a journal about one Guantanamo prisoner. The idea is to study the experience of one individual, thereby gaining deeper understanding of U.S. policies. Since experiences vary, students are required to do six journal assignments and periodically share their findings in class.
Some questions:
Who is the prisoner and how was he captured?
- Is the government’s summary of evidence credible, and do the alleged facts, if true, justify detention?
- Was the prisoner subjected to ill-treatment or torture?
- What charges have been brought against him, if any?
- According to international human rights law, what should happen to the prisoner?
- What lessons for U.S. law and policy should be drawn?
Students may choose their prisoner from several sources, including The New York Times Guantanamo Docket, the Washington Independent, which is one of a network of state-based online news sites founded by the Center for Independent Media, and Human Rights First, a nonprofit focused on international human rights.
Toward the end of the quarter, each student will use his or her journal for a five-page case study.
Unexpected experiences:
“Students are remarkably engaged,” Mayerfeld said. “There are some factual and legal puzzles we’ve had to work out, and that’s been very productive. I’ve also been surprised by how seriously they have taken their prisoner journals. They have been going the extra mile to learn the full story. Several times they have corrected me in lecture, based on what they’ve learned in their case studies. — a welcome bonus. I’ve learned a huge amount from teaching the course.”
Student views:
Chavir Singh: “I took the course because I studied human rights at Evergreen College. I’m from India, and I have family there, in the U.S. and in Canada. It’s been interesting to hear them talk since the Bush administration. Their views have changed so much. I feel for the detainees. Many of them have been scapegoats.”
Stephanie Haire: I didn’t know anything about Guantanamo. I’d heard that the worst of the worst detainees were there but wanted the real truth. I’d thought people had been tortured but didn’t know the extent of it. I didn’t know much about the similarities between Guantanamo and the American criminal justice system. I also didn’t know how little authority human rights bodies like the U.N. and various commissions actually have.”
Kearstyn Takemoto: “I want to be a human rights lawyer so wanted a class grounded in an actual problem. I wanted to see how a current human rights system can impact cases of abuse.”
Rachael Podesfinski: “I’ve studied domestic approaches to human rights so wanted to study international approaches.”
Class notes is an occasional column highlighting interesting and unusual class at the UW.
