In recent years, there has been an increased interest in psychoanalytic views on wider social topics. In this book, the author examines how and why torture exists from a broadly psychoanalytic perspective. She argues that torture performs a hidden emotional function within society, and it is only by understanding this function that strategies of prevention and recovery for victims can be formulated most effectively. Drawing on various analytic schools as well as analytical psychology and human rights, Luci offers a framework to understand torture as a concept and to work most effectively with its victims.