Trading Justice for Peace? Reframing Reconciliation in TRC Processes in South Africa, Canada and Nordic Countries

Volume editor
Sigríður Guðmarsdóttir
Volume editor
Paulette Regan
Volume editor
Demaine Solomons

Synopsis

Conflict in its various manifestations continues to be a defining feature in many places throughout the world. In an attempt to address such conflict, various forms of a Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) have been introduced to facilitate the transition from social conflict to a new dispensation. The introduction and subsequent proceedings of TRCs in South Africa, Canada and Norway are widely regarded as good examples of this approach. Against this background, a number of researchers from VID Specialized University and the University of the Western Cape had an exploratory meeting in Oslo in 2018, where the possibility of a joint research project under the broad theme of ‘discourses on reconciliation’ was first discussed. This led to two further research symposia in Cape Town and Tromsø in 2019. With the inclusion of specialists working on the Canadian Truth and Reconciliation process, these meetings demonstrated common ground and a shared understanding of the issues at stake. Moreover, it pointed to the differences between the South African, Canadian and Norwegian Commissions. In comparing the South African, Canadian and Norwegian experiences, researchers identified that these countries were, in fact, at different stages of their respective truth and reconciliation processes. This has prompted scholars to revisit and problematise these processes in relation to ongoing societal challenges. In all cases, it is quite apparent that reconciliation between individuals and groups remains a significant challenge. 

Chapters

  • Introduction
    Trading justice for peace? Perils and possibilities
    Demaine Solomons, Paulette Regan, Sigríður Guðmarsdóttir
  • Part One: Negotiating truth, justice and reconciliation: TRC mandates, processes and legacies
  • Chapter 1
    Negotiating the meaning of ‘TRC’ in the Norwegian context
    Tore Johnsen
  • Chapter 2
    Canada’s TRC: An ‘unsettling’ Indigenous-centred relational justice and reconciliation model
    Paulette Regan
  • Chapter 3
    Reconciliation recommended: On the anchoring of TRC proposals
    Kjell-Åke Nordquist
  • Chapter 4
    Reconciliation as an outcome rather than an intention
    Stanley Henkeman
  • Part Two: No reconciliation without justice: Indigenous rights, resurgence, self-determination and territorial lands
  • Chapter 5
    Justice twenty-one years post-TRC! Can a theology of reconstruction assist us to regain our focus on reconciliation and justice?
    Christoffel H. Thesnaar
  • Chapter 6
    When justice has borders: Some reflections on national borders in relation to the TRC in Norway
    Lovisa M. Sjöberg, Mikkel N. Sara
  • Chapter 7
    Prospects and challenges for reconciliation: Implementing the TRC calls to action
    David B. MacDonald
  • Chapter 8
    Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada: An invitation to boldness
    Sheryl Lightfoot
  • Part Three: Re-storying national histories: Counter-narratives of social memory and justice
  • Chapter 9
    Narrative and truth and reconciliation
    John Klaasen
  • Chapter 10
    Reburial of Sami human remains as ritualised reconciliation
    Daniel Lindmark
  • Chapter 11
    Records as instruments of truth, justice and reconciliation – Disrupting colonialism in archival praxis
    Elizabeth Shaffer
  • Part Four: Histories of violence and trauma: negotiating identity, responsibility and accountability for redress and reconciliation
  • Chapter 12
    Steve Biko as a ‘Christian’: A contribution to ethnic and racial reconciliation in post-apartheid South Africa
    Eugene Baron
  • Chapter 13
    Social justice, white beneficiaries and the South African TRC
    Wilhelm Verwoerd
  • Chapter 14
    Unsettling ‘perpetrators’: Comrade memories of complex violence and the South African TRC
    Kim Wale
  • Chapter 15
    Building thin sympathetic engagement to foster truth commission success
    Joanna R. Quinn
  • Conclusion
    Forging transnational pathways for reconciliation
    Paulette Regan, Demaine Solomons, Sigríður Guðmarsdóttir

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Publication date (01)
2021

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