Measuring the impact of punishment and forgiveness: a framework for evaluating transitional justice

2006 ◽  
Vol 88 (861) ◽  
pp. 19-47 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pierre Hazan
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Cold War ◽  
Transitional Justice ◽  
International Criminal ◽  
International Community ◽  
Truth Commissions ◽  
Human Rights Violations ◽  
Post Cold War ◽  
International Criminal Tribunals ◽  
The Impact

Truth commissions, international criminal tribunals, reparations, public apologies and other mechanisms of transitional justice are the new mantras of the post-cold-war era. Their purpose is to foster reconciliation in societies that have experienced widespread human-rights violations and to promote reform and democracy, the ultimate aim being to defuse tension. But to what degree are these mechanisms, which are financially and politically supported by the international community and NGOs, truly effective? Very little, in fact, is known about their impact. By examining the underlying hypotheses and workings of transitional justice and proposing a series of indicators to evaluate its results, this article helps to fill the gap.

Conclusion

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Karen J. Alter ◽  
Laurence R. Helfer ◽  
Mikael Rask Madsen
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Final Section ◽  
International Criminal ◽  
Ic Design ◽  
Design Features ◽  
Post Cold War ◽  
Limited Impact ◽  
International Criminal Tribunals ◽  
Context Shapes ◽  
Over Time

This concluding chapter returns to the conjectures developed in Chapter 2, extracting insights from the book’s empirical chapters to explore how context shapes the authority of ICs. While several of the conjectures were confirmed, others were not. We focus in particular on the limited impact of IC design features, the distinctive challenges faced by international criminal tribunals, and by ICs created during the post-Cold War era. The final section revisits the distinction between IC authority and IC power. We explain why IC authority is likely to remain fragile, and we revisit our claim that authority can not only increase but also stagnate or diminish over time.

The Justice Facade

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alexander Hinton
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Cold War ◽  
Civil Society ◽  
Transitional Justice ◽  
Khmer Rouge ◽  
International Justice ◽  
Crimes Against Humanity ◽  
Critical Importance ◽  
Post Cold War ◽  
Post Conflict

Is there a point to international justice? This book explores this question in Cambodia, where Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouge revolutionaries committed genocide and crimes against humanity in an attempt to create a pure socialist regime (1975–1979). Due to geopolitics, it was only in 2006 that a UN-backed hybrid tribunal, the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (“Khmer Rouge Tribunal”), commenced operation, one of a growing number of post-Cold War transitional justice interventions. The Justice Facade argues that there is a point to such tribunals, but it is masked by a set of utopian human rights and democratization ideals. Instead of projecting this transitional justice imaginary onto post-conflict peacebuilding efforts, we need to step behind the justice facade to examine what tribunals mean in terms of everyday life and practices—such as the Buddhist beliefs and ritual interactions with the spirits of the dead that are critical to Cambodian victims and survivors. In making this argument, The Justice Facade focuses on civil society outreach efforts to “translate” the court in terms meaningful to Cambodians, the majority of whom are rural villagers, as well as the experience of Cambodian civil parties who testified. This ground-breaking study of transitional justice and demonstration of the importance of examining “justice in translation” is of critical importance not just to those working in the field of transitional justice and law, but in related fields such as development, human rights, anthropology, and peacebuilding.

scholarly journals Transitional justice: (re)conceptualising the field

2007 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 81-88 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christine Bell ◽  
Colm Campbell ◽  
Fionnuala Ní Aoláin
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Transitional Justice ◽  
International Criminal ◽  
Violent Conflict ◽  
Truth Commissions ◽  
Legal Research ◽  
Policy Makers ◽  
The Past ◽  
Legal Methodology ◽  
Practical Implications

Transitional justice discourse is generally accepted as having its foundations located in the theoretical, policy and practical implications of dealing with past human rights violations in societies that have experienced either repressive politics or violent conflict. Many theorists and policy-makers resolutely assume or defend the notion that ‘dealing with the past’ is where the debates about, and contribution of, the transitional justice paradigm uniquely lie.2Understood in this way, transitional justice as a field of study has grown exponentially, comprising theoretical debates, the comparative assessment of domestic accountability schemes, international criminal justice, the study of truth commissions, and ethical-legal debate concerning the morality of compromise on accountability for gross and systematic violations of human rights.This foreword, building on the previous work of its authors,3extends and expands our contention that transitional justice in this narrow sense must be located in a broader and more problematised understanding of justice in contemporary transitions. We also use the opportunity provided by this symposium to highlight an expansion of conceptual horizons being carried out at the Transitional Justice Institute (University of Ulster), and the innovative approach to the transitional justice field being advanced by a group of diverse inter-disciplinary scholars. The approach advocates both drawing on other disciplines, and firmly supporting parallel disciplinary fields to work alongside a legal research agenda; affirming the importance of rigorous cross-jurisdictional comparisons; and utilising empirical and socio-legal methodology to advance legal inquiry.

scholarly journals Archives and Transitional Justice in Chile: A Crucial Relationship

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anita Ferrara
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Transitional Justice ◽  
Multiple Roles ◽  
Transitional Period ◽  
Truth Commissions ◽  
Human Rights Violations ◽  
Unique Case

AbstractThe article, through the case study of Chile, explores the interconnections between archives, human rights and transitional justice. Chile represents a unique case globally for the early creation of thousands of records documenting the human rights violations committed under Pinochet’s 17-year dictatorship. In post-Pinochet Chile, the human rights archives have provided extremely important sources of evidence that have proven crucial in the development of transitional justice mechanisms. Truth commissions have, in turn, created their own archives, which have strongly contributed to later processes of reparation, justice and memory. The article aims to develop a better understanding of the multiple roles that archives have played as tools for achieving truth, justice and reparation over the long transitional period in Chile. The article argues that a combination of several factors and the intervention of different actors led to the archives having a significant impact in the development of subsequent transitional justice mechanisms.

scholarly journals The International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia: The Promise and Reality of Reconciliation in Croatia

2009 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sara Parker
Keyword(s):  
Transitional Justice ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
International Criminal ◽  
Local Level ◽  
International Criminal Tribunal ◽  
International Community ◽  
Former Yugoslavia ◽  
Truth Commissions ◽  
Post Conflict ◽  
State And Local

The international community is increasingly interested in promoting post-conflict reconciliation in a variety of forms, with trials and truth commissions featured most prominently. The contemporary academic discussion over transitional justice (and the practice of transitional justice itself) is largely focused on whether and how these types of large-scale national transitional justice mechanisms contribute to reconciliation. This article examines the promise and reality of the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) to contribute to national reconciliation. Ultimately, the ability of state-wide policies to contribute to reconciliation rests on the active participation of local level actors. This requires political backing at the state and local level beyond that of just the international community. More attention needs to be paid to domestic cultural factors in the initial decision to implement state-wide transitional justice procedures, and bottom-up mechanisms must be built into any large scale approach to reconciliation.

scholarly journals Ditadura e Democracia: o impacto da conciliação sobre as memórias e a constituição da Justiça de Transição no Brasil

2018 ◽  
Vol 1 (38) ◽  
Author(s):  
Alexandre Garcia Araújo ◽  
José Alves Dias
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Transitional Justice ◽  
Truth Commission ◽  
Human Rights Violations ◽  
Special Committee ◽  
Porto Alegre ◽  
De Se ◽  
The Military ◽  
The Impact

Ditadura e Democracia: o impacto da conciliação sobre as memórias e a constituição da Justiça de Transição no Brasil Dictatorship and Democracy: the impact of conciliation on the memories and constitution of Transitional Justice in BrazilAlexandre Garcia Araújo* José Alves Dias**  REFERÊNCIA ARAÚJO, Alexandre Garcia; DIAS, José Alves. Ditadura e Democracia: o impacto da conciliação sobre as memórias e a constituição da Justiça de Transição no Brasil. Revista da Faculdade de Direito da UFRGS, Porto Alegre, n. 38, p. 121-139, ago. 2018. RESUMOABSTRACTO propósito do artigo é demonstrar como o mecanismo da conciliação foi utilizado para superar a ditadura e retornar à democracia, impactando as memórias construídas sobre o período autoritário, e limitando a conformação de uma Justiça de Transição no Brasil. Os debates em torno do tema se acentuaram, sobremaneira, com a formação da Comissão Especial de Mortos e Desaparecidos Políticos, em 1995, a proposição de revisão da Lei de Anistia, em 2010, e a instituição da Comissão Nacional da Verdade (CNV), em 2011. Neste processo, as vítimas e familiares dos atingidos, e os governos de Fernando Henrique Cardoso, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva e Dilma Rousseff intentaram, em graus e modos diferentes, promover a investigação e responsabilização pela violação de direitos humanos durante a ditadura militar. No contraponto, permaneceram os participantes do Clube Militar que obliteravam quaisquer iniciativas nesse sentido. Diante da correlação de forças, as memórias registradas, inicialmente contrapostas, foram cedendo lugar a um enquadramento gradativo ao ponto de se tornarem difusas no processo de definição da Justiça de Transição. The purpose of the article is to demonstrate how the conciliation mechanism was used to overcome the dictatorship and to return to democracy, impacting the memories built on the authoritarian period, and limiting the conformation of a Transitional Justice in Brazil. The debates on this theme were especially marked by the formation of the Special Committee on Political Deaths and Disappearances in 1995, the proposal to revise the Amnesty Law in 2010 and the establishment of the National Truth Commission (CNV), in 2011. In this process, the victims and relatives of those affected, and the governments of Fernando Henrique Cardoso, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and Dilma Rousseff, tried in different degrees and in different ways to promote investigation and accountability for human rights violations during the dictatorship military. In counterpoint, the active and reserve military (through the Military Clubs) remained that obliterated any initiatives in this direction. Faced with the correlation of forces, the recorded memories, initially counterposed, gradually gave way to a gradual framework to the point of becoming diffuse in the process of defining the Transitional Justice. PALAVRAS-CHAVEKEYWORDSDitadura. Democracia. Memória. Justiça de Transição.Dictatorship. Democracy. Memory. Transitional Justice.* Professor Substituto da Universidade do Estado da Bahia - UNEB: Campus XX, Brumado-BA. Mestre em Memória, Linguagem e Sociedade pela Universidade Estadual do Sudoeste da Bahia. Advogado.** Professor Titular no Departamento de História e professor permanente do Programa de Pós-Graduação em Memória: Linguagem e Sociedade (PPGMLS), da Universidade Estadual do Sudoeste da Bahia.

Using International Criminal Law to Resist Transitional Justice

2016 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 142-159 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mikael Baaz ◽  
Mona Lilja
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Criminal Law ◽  
Transitional Justice ◽  
International Criminal ◽  
International Criminal Law ◽  
Post Cold War ◽  
Justice Process ◽  
Per Se ◽  
Legal Defense

An increasing body of literature focuses on negotiations of transitional justice, but not much has been written so far regarding contestations over its practices and the refusal of states and individuals to participate. Given the remaining legalistic dominance, this is particularly true regarding the field of international criminal law. Very little, if any, work in international criminal law engages with the topic of “resistance.” Departing from this gap in research, focusing on Cambodia and the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC), the objective of this article is to introduce, discuss, and analyze the “strategy of rupture”—as developed by the late French lawyer Jacques Vergès—and the ways in which this legal defense has been applied in practice at the ECCC in order to resist not only the Tribunal per se, but also the entire Cambodian transitional justice process and, by extension, the post–Cold War global liberal project.

Criminal Tribunals

2010 ◽  
Author(s):  
Aaron Fichtelberg
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
International Politics ◽  
International Criminal ◽  
International Criminal Tribunal ◽  
Post Cold War ◽  
International Criminal Tribunals ◽  
Military Tribunal ◽  
International Tribunals ◽  
Heads Of State ◽  
The Impact

One the most dramatic development in international law in the 20th century was the formation of international criminal tribunals. Unlike conventional international tribunals, such as the International Court of Justice and the Permanent Court of Arbitration, international criminal tribunals—such as the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia, the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, and the International Military Tribunal at Nuremberg—are a controversial element of international law and international politics. Precisely because they are aimed at individuals who act under color of law, such as military officials or heads of state, they invoke a number of political challenges. Their combination of international law, human rights, criminal justice, and hotly disputed facts of great moral gravity makes them a subject of intense debate among academics, government officials, and the public at large. Much of the scholarship on international tribunals can be summed up by three periods: pre-Nuremberg, Nuremberg, and post-Cold War developments. Each period reveals shifts in the way that international criminal tribunals were studied and conceptualized in the academic world. In the future, much of the scholarship on international tribunals is expected to be influenced by the impact that the actual tribunals themselves have on international politics.

scholarly journals Consistency of international sentencing: ICTY and ICTR case study

2012 ◽  
Vol 9 (5) ◽  
pp. 539-552 ◽  
Author(s):  
Barbora Holá ◽  
Catrien Bijleveld ◽  
Alette Smeulers
Keyword(s):  
Regression Analysis ◽  
Cold War ◽  
International Criminal ◽  
International Criminal Tribunal ◽  
War Crimes ◽  
Sentence Length ◽  
Crimes Against Humanity ◽  
Post Cold War ◽  
International Criminal Tribunals

The International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia and the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda are the first, post Cold War international criminal tribunals convicting perpetrators of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes. Their sentencing practice has been largely criticized as inconsistent. This quantitative study addresses the criticism and empirically investigates the consistency of international sentencing. The extent to which the selected factors predict sentence length is tested in a multiple regression analysis. The analysis suggests that similar, legally relevant patterns have emerged in the sentencing practice of both tribunals. Sentencing in international criminal practice does not appear to be less consistent than sentencing under domestic jurisdictions.

Moving Into UNchartered Waters: An Emerging Right of Unilateral Humanitarian Intervention?

1999 ◽  
Vol 12 (4) ◽  
pp. 759-786
Author(s):  
Steven Blockmans
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Cold War ◽  
International Law ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Humanitarian Intervention ◽  
Human Rights Violations ◽  
Prior Authorization ◽  
Post Cold War ◽  
Black Letter

With the black letter law of the UN Charter denying states to unilaterally intervene in third states on humanitarian grounds, this article tries to project a picture of the moral controversy of humanitarian intervention as a balance for order and justice. The author argues that some post-cold war armed interventions may be taken as evidence of an emerging rule of international law outside the UN Charter system allowing the use of unilateral humanitarian intervention to keep a third state from committing large-scale human rights violations on its own territory. However, in the absence of prior authorization from the relevant UN organs, it is necessary to address concerns of possible abuse and manipulations of such an emerging rule. The article includes recommendations to this end.To go to war for an idea, if the war is aggressive, not defensive, is as criminal as to go to war for territory or revenue; for it is as little justifiable to force our ideas on other people, as to compel them to submit to our will in any other respect. But there assuredly are cases in which it is allowable to go to war, without having been ourselves attacked, or threatened with attack; and it is very important that nations should make up their minds in time, as to what these cases are.John Stuart Mill, A Few Words on Non-Intervention (1859)

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