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This research is intended to examine the phenomenon of torture from a perspective as comprehensive as possible. Starting from definitions of torture in international law and discussing a wide range of literature, it focuses on its individual, relational and socio-political aspects. The aim of the research is to contribute to the development of a concise and integrated framework of understanding of torture based on psychoanalytic thinking that enable the examination of different levels of the phenomenon as well as a dialogue between psychoanalysis and human rights on the topic of torture. After a critical review of the literature that addresses the socio-political key features and the relational and individual aspects of social actors involved, the main framework of understanding of the phenomenon of torture is constructed through a selection of psychoanalytic theories on the functioning of self and its main dynamic principles. The main conceptual elements of this framework are those of splintered reflective triangle, monolithic self states and monolithic societal states, which are the original contributions of this .thesis but well grounded on existing psychoanalytic literature. They are an elaboration of selected key themes of psychoanalytic contributions of authors from different theoretical approaches (British Object Relations Theory, Relational Psychoanalysis and Analytical Psychology). These concepts with their emotional, relational and cognitive facets, aim to account for the crucial relational ' dynamics in torture that address the different but interconnected levels of experience in the social actors of torture. This framework is used to initiate a dialogue with the human rights field on the debate of permissibility of torture and other relevant themes, illustrating further lines of possible development for this study.