Transitional Justice and Development: Partners for Sustainable Peace in Africa?

Abstract

This article argues that transitional justice processes should strive to incorporate development considerations in their scope as a means of ensuring that distributive justice is achieved. Distributive injustices – social, political, economic or cultural rights violations – are often the root causes of conflict, but transitional justice processes often do not give sufficient attention to them. This has been the case in countries such as South Africa, Kenya, Liberia and Sierra Leone. Through an examination of truth commissions in Africa, the article argues that without adequate acknowledgement of the conceptual and practical synergies between transitional justice and development, transitional justice will have limited remedial utility as a means for contributing to sustainable peace.