Featured Dialogue: Truth and Reconciliation Processes: Aiding Community Healing through Addressing Impunity March 26 – April 1
Table of Contents
The following table of contents was developed to make the dialogue easier to navigate. Important themes and different discussions have been highlighted for archival purposes and for new users. The preferred method of viewing the comments is with "Thread list - expanded" option, which is explained here. Resources mentioned in the Dialogue can be found on this page.
Intro
New Tactics in Human Rights’ featured online discussion for March will focus on ways in which Truth and Reconciliation processes have and are being implemented to aid community healing.
Some fundamental concepts behind Truth and Reconcilation (TRC) processes include: 1) future reconciliation is necessary for there to be a peaceful co-existence in a country or community; 2) that reconciliation and peaceful coexistence rest upon knowing as complete a picture as possible of the nature, causes and extent of gross violations of human rights that have been committed; and 3) there must be public recognition of the truth that had been hidden for so long by a multitude of falsehoods.
This dialogue seeks to share experiences transitional justice processes known as Truth and Reconciliation Commissions, instituted with the aim of exploring the truth hidden behind pasts characterized by gross abuses of human rights. The conflicts experienced in the countries and contexts of our resource people have unique and particular characteristics. However, we believe that the sharing of these experiences and those of the broader New Tactics community who take part in this dialogue will yield useful lessons for other contexts considering the use of TRC process. Because the effects that violence has on people are always devastating - rippling from the individual to the family to the community to the nation; they demand a treatment that is not only individual, but collective.
There are many questions of importance for our dialogue and we look forward to the many questions that will be raised by the participants. A foundational, and often contentious, question is "What do we mean by ‘truth’?" and as a result, "How do TRC processes deal with the unraveling of differing histories, truths and memories?"
Join our featured resource people and share your own experiences, insights and questions. (Click here for help on how to participate in the dialogue)
Our featured resource people include:
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Row1 L-R: Galuh Wandita, Jose Caetano Guterres, and Patrick Burgess (East Timor TRC); Jennifer Prestholdt, Ahmed K. Sirleaf II, and Laura Young (Liberia Diaspora Project Team) Row2 L-R: Sofia Macher (Peru TRC); Greensboro TRC process team; Glenda Wildschut, and Paul Haupt (South Africa TRC); Neneh Barry (Sierra Leone TRC) |
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Carrying on the work of T&R post-commission
I'm interested to hear from folks who have been involved in other T&R processes about how their respective communities have managed to carry on the work of T&R after the commission has closed its doors and finished its work.
A little context to my question: the Greensboro Truth and Reconciliation Commission was seated from 2004-2006. We're now in the "Post-Commission" phase and the Greensboro Truth and Community Reconciliation Project (the group that gave the commission its mandate and formed a selection panel to identify the commissioners) seeks to continue this work, using the Truth and Reconciliation Process as a tool. This is clearly a new and different challenge than the pre-commission phase and the commission itself. For many the T&R Commission provided a concrete goal, something achievable. However, the initiators of the process here in Greensboro have seen the T&R Commission as a tool in a larger struggle for social, economic and racial justice.
So, in this transition from concrete activity to a more expansive movement for social change, how do we build on the effort and energy toward and during the Commission? In your community, how did you make the case for the need for continued work? How did you overcome the fatigue and trauma that survivors, supporters, allies, and the general public experience after having gone through the Commission process?