Transitional Justice Readings
Transitional Justice: Core Elements
The purpose of this memorandum is to provide an overview of transitional justice mechanisms.The abuses of former regimes in Latin America and Eastern Europe led to the development of transitional justice in the 1980s and 1990s as a way to address past systematic abuses. Transitional justice is the process of responding to past human rights violations through a variety of mechanisms to ensure accountability, achieve reconciliation, re-establish the rule of law, and prevent repetition of human rights abuse
Click here to read the memorandum, Transitional Justice: Core Elements.
THE PEACE VS. JUSTICE PUZZLE AND THE SYRIAN CRISIS
Peace negotiators often face the difficult decision of whether to pursue peace at the potential cost of achieving justice, or to pursue justice at the potential cost of achieving near term peace. There are abiding ethical and moral debates surrounding this tension between peace and justice. In Syria—where the death toll has exceeded 470,000, 11 million have been displaced, and there are over 14,000 documented cases of torture to the point of death—the peace versus justice debate is a living dilemma with which negotiators are currently grappling. This article strives to examine a timely facet of this multidimensional puzzle: how to successfully accommodate the desire for justice by artfully weaving tenets of accountability into a peace process, without undermining a peace process.
Click here to read the article, The Peace vs. Justice Puzzle and the Syrian Crisis.
“justice and anti-justice” and “Peace versus justice”
These two chapters are excerpted from the book Peace with Justice?: War Crimes and Accountability in the Former Yugoslavia by Paul Williams and Michael Scharf. In this excerpt, the authors provide a definition of justice and discusses the role of justice in the peace process. The authors also describe the debate over peace versus justice in the context of the Yugoslav conflict.
Click here to read the excerpt from Peace with Justice?: War Crimes and Accountability in the Former Yugoslavia.
Micro-Skills Exercise
Access the micro-skills exercise on negotiating with war criminals HERE.
Mini-Negotiation Simulation: Sri Lanka
The purpose of this negotiation is to identify and address the complex challenges related to providing for transitional justice in post-conflict states. The intention is to explore the potential points of agreement or disagreement among the negotiating parties. Through the simulation, the participants will debate their positions, learn negotiation techniques, identify points of conflict, and discuss potential solutions.
The simulation will tee up the conversation in the remainder of the class time focusing on the question of providing for transitional justice in peace agreements, and draw from the relevant chapter in Lawyering Peace as well as the supplementary material, if any, provided on the class website.
The Sri Lankan Civil War was a decades-long conflict between the government and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), seeking an independent Tamil state in the northern and eastern parts of Sri Lanka. The war resulted in widespread human rights violations, displacement, and loss of life on both sides. After years of negotiation and a final military offensive, the conflict ended with the defeat of the LTTE. Now, as the country moves towards peace, the focus shifts to establishing mechanisms of transitional justice to address the past atrocities and promote reconciliation among the different ethnic groups.
Click here to access the mini-simulation on transitional justice in Sri Lanka.
Professional Development
PODCAST: THE STARTUP OF YOU
Listen to the podcast on the startup of you HERE
HARVARD BUSINESS REVIEW: HOW TO ASK GREAT QUESTIONS
Read the HBR How To Ask Great Questions HERE.
Podcast: Alumni in Excellence: Tamer Nagy
Listen to the interview with Tamer Nagy HERE.
Podcast: Lawyering Peace Podcast: michael scharf
Listen to Establishing the International Criminal Tribunal for former Yugoslavia
Additional Optional Material:
Transitional Justice Training for the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) for the Government of the United Kingdom
PILPG Senior Peace Fellows brief the United Kingdom’s Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office on transitional justice in Sudan. The FCDO funds an important element of PILPG's work in Sudan, specifically supporting Sudanese stakeholders in the establishment and implementation of inclusive national, regional, and local transitional justice mechanisms that reflect international best practices and the diverse interests of the Sudanese people. These efforts focus on activating transitional justice mechanisms in Sudan and seeks to provide dedicated support to decision-makers at the national, regional, and local levels on the establishment of national, regional, and local transitional justice mechanisms and facilitate enhanced citizen engagement in the design and implementation of those mechanisms.
Readings
International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY)
The ICTY was a United Nations court of law that dealt with war crimes that took place during the conflicts in the Balkans in the 1990s. The ICTY website now provide access to the wealth of resources that the Tribunal produced over the years.
Please explore the ICTY website to gain a sense of what a tribunal may include and how transitional justice processes use the records produced by tribunals to expand the historical record and support memorialization efforts.
Speakers Notes
Transitional Justice Speaker Notes
The purpose of this discussion is to provide an overview of the concept of transitional justice, including the core pillars of transitional justice and the most common mechanisms that can be used to pursue transitional justice at multiple levels, including local, national, and international TJ.
Click here to read the Transitional Justice speaker’s notes.
Decision Tree
Justice, Accountability, and Reconciliation
This decision tree provides an example of the decisions parties must make regarding the design of transitional justice mechanisms.
Click here to read the decision tree, Justice, Accountability, and Reconciliation.
Other
Overview of International Crimes Crimes
Ambassador Stephen Rapp, former United States Ambassador-at-Large for War Crimes Issues in the Office of Global Criminal Justice, David Crane, former Chief Prosecutor for the Special Court for Sierra Leone, and Robert Petit, former International Co-Prosecutor for the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia, discuss the elements of international atrocity crimes.
To watch the Expert Exchanges video on an Overview of International Crimes, click here.
CASE WESTERN RESERVE UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF LAW 2019 KLATSKY LECTURE: “LAWYERING PEACE: INFUSING HUMAN RIGHTS INTO THE PEACE PROCESS”
Dr. Paul R. Williams gave the Bruce J. Klatsky Endowed Lecture on Human Rights and received the 2019 Cox International Law Center's Humanitarian Award for Advancing Global Justice at Case Western Reserve University School of Law. Dr. Williams spoke about the arc of accountability in peace processes, starting from the era of impunity, to the time of tribunals, and up to the potential denouement we are now experiencing.
Sequencing peace and justice in syria
In this article, PILPG Board Member and Cleveland-Marshall College of Law Professor of Law, Milena Sterio examines the tension between the dual goals of peace and justice in both a theoretical manner, as well as in the Syrian context. The article analyzes existing accountability models in the international community and how these may be applicable in the Syrian situation, with specific focus on the International, Impartial and Independent Mechanism to Assist in the Investigation and Prosecution of Persons Responsible for the Most Serious Crimes Under International Law Committed in the Syrian Arab Republic since March 2011.
Truth Commission Digital Collection, A Publication by the United States Institute of Peace
The United States Institute of Peace’s Truth Commissions Digital Collection is part of the Margarita S. Studemeister Digital Library in International Conflict Management. The collection contains profiles of truth commissions and substantive bodies of inquiry from nations worldwide - offering general background information on the composition of each body, links to the official legislative texts establishing such commissions, and each commission's final reports and findings.
Previous Lecture
Fall 2021
Click here to see the Fall 2021 lecture.
For more information on the discussion of “peace with justice,” including relevant blogs, databases, and tribunals, see the Transitional Justice Resource Page.