Dear colleagues, My name is Fernando Vera and I am a psychologyst working at Amnesty International in Lima -Peru. This year we have set up a project with goverment cooperation to apply a human rights educational program to police officers due to the high number of violence and torture to the general population by police. This program is sponsored by the Peruvian goverment to install freedom and democracy in Peru. As a psychologyst I am determined in thinking that education alone will not guarantee a permanent change in police behavior when it comes to violence, because of this I am planning to conduct a research (aside from the educational program) with police to examine the personality profile of peruvian police. Once we know the personality characteristics and the direct relation to aggresive behavior then we will determine ahead what individuals are most probable of violating human rights standards. Through this I will provide certain recommendations to install new police selection programs and a monitor system looking to detect certain characteristics. Please find attached a proposal for a research project. I would appreciate it if list members could share ideas on the project itself, maybe you have bibliography on such matters. I also would like to know if you know of institutions that would be interested in funding such research. Any comment, critic or idea is welcomed! Thanks for your attention Sincerely Fernando Vera ----------------- PROJECT PROPOSAL April 07 / 2002 Research Project Author Fernando Vera B.S. Clinical Psychology Address Av. Benavides 441 Dpto.702 Miraflores 18 Lima - Peru Phone (51- 1) 858 0239 Fax (51- 1) 445 8953 Email fvera@millicom.com.pe Organization - Amnesty International Lima Peru Amnesty International is a Nobel Prize- winning organization with one million members in more than one hundred countries dedicated to freeing prisoners of conscience, gaining fair trials for political prisoners, ending torture, political killings and "disappearances," and abolishing the death penalty throughout the world. Our general Executive Director is Dr. William f. Shulz and the Peruvian sector Director is Mrs. Teresa Carpio. Brief Project Description Within this organization in which I serve as a volunteer and in concordance with its mission, which is to preserve and uphold all human rights, I as a social scientist propose a research project entitled: ¨A psychological approach to understand and prevent acts of police torture on Peruvian citizens¨ This project responds to an alarming nationwide social issue, which is the high number of citizens tortured by national police officials. Stand-alone politics have failed to deliver a solution to this ongoing issue, focusing only on external constraints. Torture as a human phenomenon, not only needs to be addressed from a political or legislative approach but also requires from a psychological approach that considers individuals as the integration of all external and internal constraints. Our research objective is to generate a global psychological profile to identify characteristics that predispose a police officer to inflict torture upon citizens. We then can integrate this knowledge with other fields of study to provide a real solution to this issue. Total Program Cost $ 6,430.00 US Dollars Brief History and Purpose of Amnesty International In November 1960, London lawyer Peter Benenson read about a group of students in Portugal who were arrested and jailed for raising a toast to "freedom" in a public restaurant. This incident prompted him to launch a one-year campaign called "Appeal for Amnesty 1961" in the London Observer, a local newspaper. The "Appeal for Amnesty" called for the release of all people imprisoned because of peaceful expression of their beliefs, politics, race, religion, color, or national origin. Benenson called these people, "prisoners of conscience." His plan was to encourage people to write letters to government officials in countries, which had prisoners of conscience, calling for their release. The campaign grew enormously, spread to other countries, and by the end of 1961 the organization, Amnesty International (AI), had been formed. Amnesty was founded on the principle that people have fundamental rights that transcend national, cultural, religious, and ideological boundaries. It worked to obtain prompt and fair trials for all prisoners, to end torture and executions, and to secure the release of prisoners of conscience. (Prisoners of conscience, as Amnesty defines them, are people imprisoned solely because of their political or religious beliefs, gender, or their racial or ethnic origin, who have neither used nor advocated violence.) Amnesty International's Mandate was based on the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human-Rights. Most of these early principles and types of work remain unchanged, although the organization has grown to over 1 million members in over 150 countries as of 1993. Amnesty International is effective because of its accuracy and impartiality. Research departments at the London headquarters, the International Secretariat (IS), devote substantial resources to obtaining accurate information about prisoners of conscience. AI has established a reputation as a credible source of information. This credibility is tied to its independence from all governments, political or religious factions, and economic interests. Volunteers still carry out most of AI's work. They write letters to governments that are abusing the human rights of those who hold opposing viewpoints, whether through imprisonment, harassment, threats, physical mistreatment, torture, "disappearances", or politically motivated murder. They staff tables at public events, passing out information to the public on prisoners of conscience and human rights issues. They organize demonstrations, write press releases, found letter-writing groups at their churches or synagogues, and exercise their intelligence and imagination in almost unlimited ways. Project Description The research project is to generate a global psychological profile of the Peruvian police officer. This profile is the integration of three major psychological areas that play and extremely important role in police behavior. These areas are: - Personality: The unique organization of stable characteristics that define an individual and determine the individual's pattern of interaction with the environment. Evaluation consists of detailed analysis of thirty characteristics ranging from hostility to altruism and trust. - Attitudes: These are believes and feelings an individual has of people and life events. Evaluation of stereotypes and other cultural beliefs are considered to play an important role in police decisions. - Psychopathology: Mental disorder is a main factor when dealing with torture. Evaluation in this area seeks for symptoms associated with ten major mental disorders such as depression and psychosis. Each area is to be evaluated using a well-researched and highly reliable psychological instrument, as a result we will obtain a wide range of characteristics from each area, that are favorable and unfavorable in police duty certain characteristics such as negative attitude toward women are unfavorable in police duty and thus predispose torture to be inflicted on this target group. Identifying these psychological characteristics and its direct correlation to torture infliction will provide strategies to prevent these inhuman acts. Our research project is divided in ten phases of 15 days each over a five-month period. In each phase we have a specific task and goal that must be completed to reach our project objectives. Our research team consists of one psychologist and three psychology students that volunteer for a 3.5-hour daily shift during a five-month period. In retribution they will receive a small stipend for time donated and transportation expenses. Each member of the team is assigned a task in each phase and required to report any difficulties in performing such task. Members will rotate tasks at the beginning of each phase resulting in efficient teamwork and a comfortable working climate. A representative sample of 200 police officers on duty will be evaluated through three psychological areas during two weeks. No restrictions of age, sex, creed or any other are applied on participants. Project Objectives Main Objective To generate a global psychological profile of the Peruvian police officer through a three phase analysis and identify characteristics that correlate to torture perpetration. Secondary Objectives - The National Peruvian Police will receive our research results to incorporate our findings in a new police selection program for individuals who desire to pursue law enforcement; this selection program aims to filter individuals that do not meet with favorable psychological characteristics for police duty. - Recommend the National Peruvian Police with a monitor system that constantly evaluates police officers on duty seeking to detect unfavorable psychology characteristics that affect police performance. - Written report and Web site publication in Spanish / English / French of the project, phases, results and any other relevant information. All printed and electronic publication will acknowledge DrakNet as our founder helping to protect human rights. Project need and value Peruvian Constitution prohibits torture and inhuman or humiliating treatment. However, in practice, torture and brutal treatment of detainees by security force personnel occur frequently. The victims are both suspected criminals and citizens detained for unknown causes. Torture most often takes place during the period immediately following arrest. Human rights groups report that the incidence of torture is high during police detention, in part because families are prohibited from visiting suspects while they are held in communicated, and attorneys have only limited access to them. A survey by the Legal Defense Institute of 1,250 detainees in high-security prisons, conducted in 1995-96, found that 77 percent of respondents stated that they had been tortured or otherwise abused during police interrogation, while 87 percent of respondents said that no defense lawyer had been present during their questioning and submission of sworn statements. In addition, human rights monitors and other credible eyewitnesses continued to report that security forces still routinely torture suspects at police stations and detention centers. In addition to beatings, common methods of torture and other inhuman or degrading treatment included electric shock, water torture, asphyxiation, the hanging of victims by a rope attached to hands tied behind the back, and, in the case of female detainees, rape. Common forms of psychological torture included sleep deprivation and death threats against both the detainees and their families. Interrogators frequently blindfolded their victims during torture to prevent them from later identifying their abusers. To this date no psychological research has been conducted on this matter generating a lack of scientific knowledge that is vital to put an end to this issue. Geographic area served This project will have a nationwide effect that will mostly favor citizens in higher risk of becoming victims of torture such as women, adolescents, detainees and minorities. Project Outline Phase Date Task Goal First June 01 June 15 Research scientific literature on similar projects Obtain bibliography Second June 16 July 01 Volunteer Training Volunteers will learn to apply and correct all test instruments. Third July 02 July 16 Test application on police Evaluate 200 police officers in three areas Fourth July 17 July 31 Test correction Correct 50 % of tests Fifth August 01 - August 16 Test correction Correct 50 % of tests Sixth August 17 Sept. 01 Data analysis Results analyzed Seventh Sept. 02 Sept. 17 Profile elaboration and correlations Complete Global Profile and correlations Eighth Sept. 18 October 03 Data integration Integrate results with existing psychological theory Ninth October 04 October 19 Report production Final Report Including recommendations and conclusions Tenth October 20 October 31 Print and design Website Printed and Website Publication Evaluation Methods Evaluations will be held every fifteen days at the end of each phase. Our progress is based on goal accomplishment or failure. Each member of the team contributes with observations and suggestions on the results of each phase and with possible solutions when failure to accomplish the required goal. Project Funding Although we have no funding since this is a self-initiative project and it was not considered in the yearly budget set by our organization. We have valuable resources that enable us to apply this research project - Government cooperation providing us with a sample of police officers on duty to evaluate. - Three psychology students serving as volunteers from a local university in Lima who are highly motivated in supporting our research. - A quite and comfortable space to work and hold our meetings equipped with computers and Internet connections. Organization's plan for future project support We have no future plan established in this moment due to the lack of funding for this self-initiative project and it is no considered in the annual budget. Funding Impact The funding organization creates a possibility for this project to be real and thus providing invaluable knowledge that will make a life difference for those men, women and children that could become victims of torture but will not because of our actions. Organization Personnel Personnel that will manage the grant: Mrs. Teresa Carpio Amnesty International Peruvian Sector Bs. Fernando Vera Chief Psychologist and Project Author Financial Information Copies are not in electronic format Addenda This is a division of Amnesty International outside USA ========== Psychology and Human Rights listserv ========== Send mail intended for the list to <psychology-humanrights-l@hrea.org>. 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