Preventive Detention and the Democratic State

Preventive Detention and the Democratic State tracks the transformation of preventive detention from an emergency measure into an ordinary law enforcement tool in the democratic world. Historically, democracies used preventive detention only in the extraordinary circumstance in which the criminal justice system was impotent. They preferred criminal prosecution and its strict due process requirements to detaining people for a crime they may never commit. This book shows that major democracies have begun using detention as an insurance policy against dangerous people. In the process, they have embarked on a slippery slope that allows them to use preventive detention to bypass the criminal justice system. Already, detention has established a separate, inferior legal system for certain suspected criminals. Comparing preventive detention in India, England and the United States, the book brings to light its potentially dire consequences for the rule of law, due process rights and democratic principles based on the very real experiences of these countries.

Acknowledgements; List of acronyms and abbreviations; Introduction; 1. The theoretical framework; 2. The policy debates; 3. Preventive detention under international law; 4. The history of preventive detention in India; 5. India's current preventive detention legislation; 6. India: preventive detention and due process; 7. India: the risk society and the slippery slope; 8. Preventive detention in England; 9. England: preventive detention and due process; 10. Preventive detention in the United States; 11. The United States: preventive detention and procedural due process; 12. Preventive detention's slippery slope; 13. Preventive detention and liberal democracy; Bibliography; Index.

Hallie Ludsin is a human rights lawyer and adjunct professor at Emory University School of Law in Atlanta, Georgia. She recently completed her Democracy Research Fellowship at Harvard University's Ash Center for Democratic Government and Innovation. Dr Ludsin is the co-author of Spiral of Entrapment: Abused Women in Conflict with the Law (2005).