Mass Violence, Environmental Harm, and the Limits of Transitional Justice

Abstract

The relationship between the environment and mass violence is complex and multi-faceted. The effects of environmental degradation can destabilize societies and cause conflict. Attacks on the environment can harm targeted groups, and both mass violence and subsequent transitions can have harmful environmental legacies. Given this backdrop, it is notable that the field of transitional justice has paid relatively little attention to the intersections between mass violence and environmental degradation. This article interrogates this inattention and explores the limitations and possibilities of transitional justice as a means of addressing the environmental harms associated with mass violence. The article makes four key claims. First, that the "dominance of legalism" in transitional justice has produced anthropocentric understandings of harm which exclude environmental harms and victims. Second, that transitional justice’s tendency towards neo-colonialism has led to the disregarding of worldviews that might encourage more environmentally inclusive responses to violence. Third, that transitional justice’s inability to redress structural inequalities has often left environmental injustices intact. And fourth, that the field’s complicity in normalizing neoliberal capitalism both overlooks environmental harm and facilitates future environmental degradation. In light of these claims, the article considers whether, and where opportunities might exist, for "greener" responses to mass violence.