In Times Of Trouble: Gareth Peirce Speaks Out On Human Rights At 1st James Mackeith Memorial Lecture, UK

Main Category: Psychology / Psychiatry
Article Date: 19 Dec 2008 - 0:00 PDT

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Friday 30 January 2009 at The Institute of Psychoanalysis, London

Leading human rights lawyer Gareth Peirce, renowned for cases such as the Birmingham Six, Guildford Four and for representing detainees held at Guantanamo Bay as well as the family of Jean Charles de Menezes, will analyse the true picture of the UK's compliance with its human rights obligations at the 1st James Mackeith Memorial Lecture, Institute of Psychoanalysis on 30 January 2009.

Peirce will consider how legal standards intended to be absolute have been attacked and undermined in various ways but in particular by legislation during the past seven years. She will also discuss the appropriate kinds of responses from individuals and professional organisations involved with human rights.

The lecture, which will take place at the Institute of Psychoanalysis at 7.00pm, is the first to commemorate the life of James MacKeith OBE, an outstanding forensic psychiatrist who dedicated himself to human rights. Among his achievements was his work on false confessions and the psychiatric effects on detainees interned at Belmarsh without trial.

The lecture is organised by the Institute of Psychoanalysis. All proceeds will be donated to the Helen Bamber Foundation - caring for victims of human rights violations and the Miscarriages Of Justice Organisation (MOJO) - a human rights organisation set up by Paddy Hill and John McManus dedicated to assisting innocent people both in prison and after their release.

The Institute Of Psychoanalysis is the professional organisation for psychoanalysts in the UK. It is the leading centre of excellence in the provision of psychoanalytic training, education, publication and clinical practice. It administers these activities on behalf of the British Psychoanalytical Society and is a member institution of the British Psychoanalytic Council. http://www.psychoanalysis.org.uk/frontpage.htm

About Psychoanalysis

Psychoanalysis is based on the theory that the experiences of birth, early relationships with parents, sexuality, love, loss and death lay down patterns in the mind which provide unconscious templates, or models of relationships. Such unconscious versions of relationships are often at the root of the problems which lead people to seek help. Regular sessions with a psychoanalyst provide a setting within which these unconscious patterns can be brought into awareness and worked on with a view to change. For more information visit: here.

GARETH PEIRCE is a human rights lawyer who has for 30 years represented men and women on the receiving end of the sharpest edge of state power. In many of the cases she worked closely with Dr James MacKeith; together they explored and developed the interaction of law and medicine, human rights and human behaviour. Those cases included the wrongful convictions of the Guilford Four and the Birmingham Six and the phenomena of false confessions; Sara Thornton and the syndrome of the "battered wife"; Guantanamo Bay and the prohibited use of torture and rendition; internment and the effects of indefinite detention upon the detainee.

JAMES MACKEITH, OBE, who died in 2007, was an outstanding forensic psychiatrist who dedicated himself to human rights. Amongst his numerous achievements was his work on false confessions and more latterly on the psychiatric effects of conditions of foreign nationals interned at Belmarsh without trial. He was medical adviser for the European Committee for the Prevention of Torture (1991-2006) and a founder commissioner of the Criminal Cases Review Commission.

DAVID BELL is President Elect British Psychoanalytical Society. He has a background in psychology, psychiatry and psychoanalysis. A practicing adult psychiatrist and psychoanalyst, he is director of Fitzjohn's Unit a specialist unit for serious psychological disorders at the Tavistock Clinic. He lectures and writes extensively on a variety of subjects including psychosis, personality disorder, suicide, trauma and psychoanalytic perspectives on culture and politics. He is chairman of the scientific committee of the British Psychoanalytic Society and chairs a study group on philosophy and psychoanalysis.

The Miscarriages Of Justice Organistaion (MOJO) is a human rights organisation set up by Paddy Hill and John McManus who are dedicated to assisting innocent people both in prison and after their release. Its main objectives are to help counsel innocent people after they are released from prison and to gradually help them come to terms with the modern world.

The Helen Bamber Foundation is a UK-based human rights organisation, formed in April 2005 to help rebuild lives and inspire a new self-esteem in survivors of gross human rights violations.

Listings Information

1st James MacKeith Memorial Lecture: In Times of Trouble

Speaker: Gareth Peirce

A lecture analysing the true picture of the United Kingdom's compliance with its domestic and international obligations in respect of the human rights of individuals.

Date: Friday 30th January 2009, 7.00pm

Venue: The Institute of Psychoanalysis, 112a Shirland Road, London W9 2EQ

Tickets: £10, available from The Institute of Psychoanalysis. Call 020 7563 5016, email Winnie.Dehaney@iopa.org.uk or visit http://www.psychoanalysis.org.uk/events.htm.

The Institute of Psychoanalysis

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