"There is nothing more foreign to a civilised and democratic system than preventive detention"
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Preventive detention is the kind of policy that sounds like prudence and behaves like panic. In one line, Robert Bourassa draws a hard border around what a “civilised and democratic system” is allowed to do: punish acts, not forecast people. The sentence is built to make “preventive” feel like a category error. Detention belongs to the realm of proven wrongdoing; prevention belongs to public health campaigns and seatbelts. Fuse them, and you smuggle pre-crime logic into a legal order that claims to respect individual rights.
Bourassa’s word choice is doing quiet heavy lifting. “Foreign” is sharper than “wrong” or “unwise.” It frames preventive detention not as a debatable tool but as an import from authoritarian systems, a betrayal of democratic identity rather than a mere policy disagreement. “Civilised” adds a moral hierarchy: the state that cages people on suspicion isn’t just inefficient; it’s degraded. That’s a classic politician’s move with high rhetorical yield: make the opposing option feel not only dangerous but embarrassing.
The subtext is a warning about what crisis does to a society’s self-image. Preventive detention tends to surface when governments are frightened, under pressure to look decisive, or facing unrest and terrorism. Bourassa’s line anticipates the political temptation to trade due process for the optics of control. It’s less a plea for leniency than a defense of the rule-bound state: democracy proves itself precisely when it resists the urge to jail first and justify later.
Bourassa’s word choice is doing quiet heavy lifting. “Foreign” is sharper than “wrong” or “unwise.” It frames preventive detention not as a debatable tool but as an import from authoritarian systems, a betrayal of democratic identity rather than a mere policy disagreement. “Civilised” adds a moral hierarchy: the state that cages people on suspicion isn’t just inefficient; it’s degraded. That’s a classic politician’s move with high rhetorical yield: make the opposing option feel not only dangerous but embarrassing.
The subtext is a warning about what crisis does to a society’s self-image. Preventive detention tends to surface when governments are frightened, under pressure to look decisive, or facing unrest and terrorism. Bourassa’s line anticipates the political temptation to trade due process for the optics of control. It’s less a plea for leniency than a defense of the rule-bound state: democracy proves itself precisely when it resists the urge to jail first and justify later.
Quote Details
| Topic | Human Rights |
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