Many Latin American countries have faced dictatorships in the second half of the twentieth century. In Chile, the human rights violations that were committed during the dictatorship under General...Show moreMany Latin American countries have faced dictatorships in the second half of the twentieth century. In Chile, the human rights violations that were committed during the dictatorship under General Augusto Pinochet still profoundly impact modern society. The question of how to address these violations has created a situation in which transitional justice gained relevance since the end of the dictatorship. However, traditional conceptualisations of transitional justice have overly focused on judicial dimensions and thereby disregarded other dimensions that are equally as relevant in the transition to a stable democracy. These dimensions include conceptualisations of cultural and linguistic rights that were popularised in the last two decades. This thesis explores the opportunities that an inclusion of effective language policies grounded in the idea of language rights provides to advance transitional justice. This link is investigated through the case of Mapudungun. The findings from this research suggest that the successful implementation of language policies addresses different dimensions of transitional justice and should therefore be included in transitional justice policies, thus aiding the process. The findings from the Chilean case can be beneficial in other transitional contexts in which the inclusion of cultural and linguistic dimensions could contribute to advance transitional justice.Show less
The understanding of life as a complex system is becoming more and more prominent in many academic disciplines. This study applies this systems’ perspective to understand how transitional justice ...Show moreThe understanding of life as a complex system is becoming more and more prominent in many academic disciplines. This study applies this systems’ perspective to understand how transitional justice (TJ) practice contributes to reconciliation. Based on existing literature, a theoretical framework is constructed which theorizes that in the social network of TJ society, there is an emergent process towards reconciliation. This process is based on the value of interconnectedness. TJ practices emerge as part of this process and can serve as a catalysator. This emergent process is impacted by formal TJ structure and the TJ governance network. Consequently, this study applies this theoretical framework to the case of the post-genocide gacaca trials in Rwanda. The findings demonstrate that the model provides insights into the case. However, further research is needed to validate the theoretical framework.Show less
It is only through the acknowledgement of a multitude of truths and perceptions that the myths that war perpetuates, and from which it has stemmed, can be deconstructed. This deconstruction is...Show moreIt is only through the acknowledgement of a multitude of truths and perceptions that the myths that war perpetuates, and from which it has stemmed, can be deconstructed. This deconstruction is essential to reach the goals of transitional justice (TJ), the peace-building effort implemented by a state that has suffered human rights abuses owing to authoritarianism and war during its transition to democracy or after the signing of a Peace Agreement. Photographs that captured the times preceding such transition, might offer a testimony to the violence from which the state seeks to heal through TJ’s mechanisms. These mechanisms are aimed at repairing the profound damages that the country has suffered at legal, political, economic and societal levels (Díaz, 2018, 3-5). These images might offer fragments of evidence that could be adopted to hold perpetrators accountable and facilitate the construction of collective memory of the past. This thesis argues that when photography offers a representation of the conflict capturing its complexity and nuances, it might foment the understanding of its seeds and the nurturing of socio-political narratives to promote its non-recurrence. In this way, photography might contribute to TJ’s peacebuilding goal. By 2018, over 8 million people had officially been registered as victims of the Colombian conflict, which started in 1964 and is Latin America's longest war. Despite the signing of a Peace Agreement with the FARC in 2016 and the ambition to build peace in Colombia, this number is increasing through new waves of violence (Navarro, 2019, 290). Considering the country’s historical and contemporary context, this thesis aims to explore how Colombia's war photographers reflected and contributed to its transitional justice efforts. It will focus on the significant photographic works of Jesús Abad Colorado, Federico Ríos, and Stephen Ferry, produced between the 1990s and the post-2016 period. This research is inspired by two beliefs. First, considering Colombia’s forthcoming presidential elections and its candidates’ need for fomenting an effective peace process to end its violence, it is contemporarily relevant to understand the Colombian conflict (Sardiña, 2022). Second, war photography is not a mere objective reflection of conflict, but it is rather a mirror of the perceptions of image-makers on it. Consequently, their subjectivity is worth being researched as it crucially affects how conflicts are represented, remembered, and perhaps even resolved. 4 Chapter 1 reviews literature debating the connection between TJ, photography, conflict, and peace. Chapter 2 contextualises the Colombian conflict from the 1990s and the 2016 Peace Agreement (2.1 and 2.2), introduces the photographers that have documented it (2.3) and presents the qualitative methodology, i.e iconological analysis and interviews, used to analyse their works (2.4). The images used derive from the exhibition “El Testigo” (2020) by Jesús Abad Colorado, the book "Verde" (2021) by Federico Ríos and the book and exhibition "Violentology: A Manual of the Colombian Conflict" by Stephen Ferry (2012). Chapter 3 analyzes the images of the photographers, which are organized around the themes of violence (3.1), conflict's complexity (3.2) and armed actors (3.3). The conclusion of the thesis reflects on photography's potential as a tool for TJ.Show less
This study aims to further the understanding on contestation of transitional justice, by looking at Serbian interaction with three transitional justice initiatives that aim to address human right...Show moreThis study aims to further the understanding on contestation of transitional justice, by looking at Serbian interaction with three transitional justice initiatives that aim to address human right violations from the Kosovo War. It builds on the trial of cooperation model, and finds that target states change their response to transitional justice initiatives on the basis of the domestic political landscape, the nature of the initiative, pressures from the international community and to a lesser extent, pressures from the domestic public.Show less
Born in the wake of the Second World War, moulded by the polarisation of the Cold War and diametrically opposed to its Northern counterpart, South Korea’s domestic history and the arising memory...Show moreBorn in the wake of the Second World War, moulded by the polarisation of the Cold War and diametrically opposed to its Northern counterpart, South Korea’s domestic history and the arising memory issues are among the issues that were deemed worthy of addressing by the conception of the 2005 Truth and Reconciliation Commission of South Korea (TRCK). The truth-seeking activities of a truth and reconciliation commission tap into the larger debate on transitional versus punitive justice. This thesis will argue that South Korean politics are polarised along the same moral issues as the debate around the merits of a truth and reconciliation commission and that in the crossroads of the goals of a truth and reconciliation commission and the South Korean political context it tried to operate in lies a reflection of the structural problems of a truth and reconciliation commission.Show less
Concerning transitional justice, the turn towards advocating for localized action and gendered analysis has engendered a focus on female agency. In documentary film studies, a similar pattern...Show moreConcerning transitional justice, the turn towards advocating for localized action and gendered analysis has engendered a focus on female agency. In documentary film studies, a similar pattern emerges: over time, scholars have started to question prevailing representations of women, and to celebrate well-rounded, agentive representations. This thesis, which analyzes representations of female agency and victimhood in documentaries concerning sexual violence during the Yugoslav Wars, utilizes an interdisciplinary approach which draws from both of these fields. It incorporates the aesthetic analytical tools provided by documentary film scholars to analyze Sexual Violence and the Triumph of Justice (2012) and Mission Rape - a Tool of War (2014), while keeping as its main focus the gendered agency framework created by Björkdahl and Mannergren Selimović. Thus, it marries the two disciplines to provide a thorough understanding of prominent issues in transitional justice. This concerns both how transitional justice is practiced and how this practice is portrayed to the public by challengers and proponents of the prominent methods in the transitional justice space. I hope to contribute to knowledge in both fields, and to demonstrate how well-rounded and agentive representations of women’s agency can challenge the traditional narrative of passivity and victimization of women in conflict-zones.Show less
The purpose of this research is to describe how iconoclasm is taking shape in contemporary Italy, by analyzing and comparing the “Mussolini Dux” obelisk in Rome with the statue of Indro Montanelli...Show moreThe purpose of this research is to describe how iconoclasm is taking shape in contemporary Italy, by analyzing and comparing the “Mussolini Dux” obelisk in Rome with the statue of Indro Montanelli in Milan: while the former resisted any form of iconoclasm from the post-war period until the present day, the latter has been recently subject to several iconoclastic acts. The different ways in which the public engages with these two monuments reveal that iconoclasm in Italy is driven by international influence, that is nevertheless resisted when it comes to challenging strong national ideologies like fascism. By adopting an interdisciplinary approach, this research suggests that iconoclasm is not opposite bur rather complementary to collective memory, as it recognizes the importance of remembering rather than forgetting. Iconoclasm is the phenomenon that make us remember that memory must be kept alive by demanding new interpretations of the past. However, this research also shows that this is not the way collective memory and iconoclasm are understood in Italy today.Show less
