Transitional Justice and Youth Formerly Associated with Armed Forces and Armed Groups

BackgroundWorldwide, thousands of children are acting in different roles in armed groups. Whereas human rights activism and humanitarian imperatives tend to emphasize the image of child soldiers as incapable victims of adults’ abusive compulsion, this image does not fully correspond with prevailing pedagogical and jurisprudential discourses, nor does it represent all child soldiers’ own perceptions of their role. Moreover, contemporary warfare is often marked by fuzzy distinctions between perpetrators and victims. This article deepens on the question how to conceptualize the victim-perpetrator imaginary about child soldiers, starting from three disciplines, children’s rights law, psychosocial approaches and transitional justice, and then proceeding into an interdisciplinary approach.DiscussionWe argue that the victim–perpetrator dichotomy in relation to child soldiers needs to be revisited, and that this can only be done successfully through a truly interdisciplinary approach. Key to this interdisciplinary dialogue is the growing awareness within all three disciplines, but admittedly only marginally within children’s rights law, that only by moving beyond the binary distinction between victim- and perpetrator-hood, the complexity of childhood soldiering can be grasped. In transitional justice, the concept of role reversal has been instructive, and in psychosocial studies, emphasis has been put on the ‘agency’ of (former) child soldiers, whereby child soldiers sometimes account on how joining the armed force or group was (partially) out of their own free will. Hence, child soldiers’ perpetrator-hood is not only part of the way child soldiers are perceived in the communities they return to, but equally of the way they see themselves. These findings plea for more contextualized approaches, including a greater participation of child soldiers, the elaboration of accountability mechanisms beyond criminal responsibility, and an intimate connection between individual, social and societal healing by paying more attention to reconciliation.SummaryThis article deepens on the question how to conceptualize the victim-perpetrator imaginary about child soldiers through an interdisciplinary dialogue between children’s rights law, psychosocial approaches and transitional justice. With this interdisciplinary perspective, we intend to open up narrow disciplinary viewpoints, and contribute to more integrated approaches, beyond a binary distinction between victimhood and perpetrator-hood.

According to Dina Dajani Daoudi’s paper on Transitional Justice and Reconciliation in Intractable Conflicts, the relationship between reconciliation and transitional justice is so complex as the practices have been adopted as substitutes rather than complementarities. Her paper explores the interdependent relationship of both defining transitional justice and reconciliation through their mechanisms that at times overlap, proving their converging nature and interdependence and diverge, requiring an over-compassing approach to reconciliation that can nurture the process of changing relationships without solid institutional structures and expectations. In her conclusions, the author argues that it is futile to pursue transitional justice without addressing the psychological needs of a given society. In order to build sustainable peace, they cannot be ignored, and they can only be addressed through a comprehensive process of reconciliation, incorporating institutional mechanisms of transitional justice.

As countries emerge from periods of authoritarianism and armed conflict, they face the often monumental task of engaging past human rights violations. Determining which transitional justice mechanisms—ranging from trials and truth commissions to amnesties, reparations, and the construction of monuments—to pursue and how to implement them are some of the most difficult choices domestic actors face in times of transition. Moreover, transitional justice choices can have significant ramifications for the future of society, ranging from avoiding renewed conflict and achieving reconciliation to strengthening the rule of law and consolidating democracy. Yet increasingly transitional justice is not solely a domestic process. International actors now play a sizeable role in shaping the trajectory of transitional justice processes in countries around the world, and societies are no longer able to come to terms with their own pasts without taking into account the interests of external actors. This external influence can take a variety of forms. In its most benign form, states may feel pressure to comply with international or regional norms, and, in turn, take a particular type of approach to transitional justice. In other cases, international actors provide important support, including advice, expertise, funding, and technical assistance for domestic transitional justice efforts. Yet in some cases, external actors take control of transitional justice efforts directly, by operating mechanisms themselves, blocking the pursuit of specific transitional justice efforts, or applying coercive pressure to force states to pursue specific mechanisms.

The United States spends 250 percent more than any other developed country on health care services, yet we are ranked below 16 other countries in overall life expectancy. A less frequently discussed statistic, however, is the degree to which the U.S. under-invests in social services: for every dollar spent on health care, only 50 cents is invested in social services. In comparison, other developed countries spend roughly $2 on social services for every dollar spent on health care. The U.S. is 10th among developed countries in its combined investment in health care and social services. This imbalance has ramifications for the nation’s Medicaid program, where just five percent of beneficiaries with complex health and social problems drive more than 50 percent of all program costs. Many individuals in this high-cost group have chronic complex medical, behavioral health, and/or supportive service needs, and in the absence of coordinated intervention, they tend to be frequent visitors to emergency rooms and have high rates of avoidable hospital admissions.

Forest plantations’ investments in social services and local infrastructure: an analysis of private, FSC certified and state-owned, non-certified plantations in rural Tanzania

While most Third World countries, particularly in Africa and Latin America, have experienced a deterioration in child welfare as a result of the severe economic downturn in the 1980s, Southeast Asia in general managed to sustain improvements in the situation of its children because it has maintained satisfactory rates of economic growth. However, there were exceptions within Southeast Asia. The Philippines, Vietnam, Dem. Kampuchea and Laos had unsatisfactory growth rates and, consequently, unsustained nutritional gains from the 1970s through the 1980s. Economic factors exerted a big impact on the Philippine nutrition situation, particularly on the dietary status of the households and the nutritional status of children. As a result of the economic dislocation occurring in the country, the nutritional gains of 1978-82 were not maintained in succeeding years. Unlike the case of Thailand, it has been estimated that the solution to nutritional problems in the Philippines is far from being achieved in the immediate future (Villavieja et al. 1989). On the other hand, the nutrition improvements in Thailand have been as remarkable as the economic growth over the last decade. Long-term investments in health, nutrition and other social services in Thailand (as well as in Indonesia) have paid off according to the assessment by the United Nations (1990). It appears, therefore, that the nutrition situation in developing countries is highly dependent on the economic situation, globally and nationally (Cornia et al. 1987), as well as on investment in social services. Adjustment policies should, therefore, consider their implications on distribution and poverty in order that they could positively contribute to the improvement of the nutrition of the people.

The recent proliferation of external investigations into military operations raises important questions for the conduct of military operations and the interpretation and implementation of international law. The impact of such investigations and their reports, however, extends beyond how they influence the military and the implementation of the law of armed conflict. As countries and societies embroiled in lengthy conflicts begin to explore the value and effectiveness of undertaking transitional justice efforts during conflict, rather than only after conflict, investigations into military operations and specific incidents can play an important – and perhaps unexpected – role. This article focuses specifically on the inter-relationship between investigations and transitional justice efforts. As investigations into military operations become a common tool in the international and national arsenal, understanding how they interact with and affect broader transitional justice efforts and goals becomes important, both for the conceptualisation of investigations and the development of transitional justice mechanisms. This article addresses the relationship between investigations and the truth-telling aspect of transitional justice mechanisms, as well as the impact of the use of law and legal analysis on the legitimacy of the investigations and on potential transitional justice mechanisms.

Exploring Linkages of Traditional and Formal Mechanism of Justice and Reconciliation in South Sudan

This chapter outlines the origins of Kenya’s transitional justice agenda and the role of civil society in shaping it, with a focus on Kenya’s Truth, Justice and Reconciliation Commission (TJRC) process. The chapter demonstrates that the Kenya Transitional Justice Network (KTJN) had a significant impact on the TJRC process in line with a broader civil society legacy of shaping Kenya’s journey through the process of democratisation and transition politics over the years. Through KTJN’s experience, the chapter highlights critical lessons on the operations of civil society networks seeking to influence transitional justice processes. The critical components of governance structures, sustainability and victim empowerment are discussed.

Kenya, a country with about 45 ethnic groups, is politically and ethnically polarized. The ethnic card is regularly exploited to further polarize society, especially during the election periods. In the aftermath of elections, the political interest in promoting ethnic conflict transformation through transitional justice processes has not succeeded in uniting ethnic groups. Studies have predominantly focused on conflict resolution and transitional justice interventions at the state level. Transitional justice initiatives that focus on dialogue, forgiveness, retribution, reconciliation and healing at the community grassroots level are often overlooked. This chapter assesses the efforts of the Catholic Church and communities in Uasin Gishu County to promote peace initiatives through the church's Amani Mashinani (Peace at the Grassroots) model. The chapter begins with an overview of Kenya's ethnic violence and transitional justice efforts. It then pays attention to the nature and causes of electoral violence that manifests through conflicts between the ethnic groups living Uasin Gishu County, particularly during the election periods. Subsequently, the chapter explores the role of the Catholic Church within a transitional justice framework that deploys processes that encompass dialogue, forgiveness, reconciliation, reparation, social cohesion and healing to address election-related violence. Lederach's analysis of peace from below will be linked to the objectives of this transitional justice framework, so as to illustrate how the Catholic Church and its Amani Mashinani model can play a role in promoting non-formal transitional processes through the redress of the harm endured as a result of election-related violence. The chapter concludes by highlighting the factors that hinder the full realization of transitional justice through grassroots models and offers suggestions on how these can be countered.

The penultimate chapter offers a discussion of the prospects for a genuine transitional justice process in Syria. Chapter 10 begins with a short history of the development of the archetypal tools within the transitional justice toolkit—criminal accountability, truth commissions, reparations, amnesties, lustration, institutional reform, and guarantees of nonrecurrence—and the way in which transitional justice efforts have become increasingly internationalized. This enhanced involvement of the international community in promoting transitional justice reflects the belief—premised on historical case studies and emerging empirical research—that societies in transition must address the crimes of the past in some capacity or risk their repetition. The chapter surveys the most recent research testing these claims, which has benefited from the creation of a number of new databases gleaned from states in transition. The chapter then describes ways in which the international community has tried to prepare for a future transitional justice process in Syria even in the absence of a political transition, including by training Syrian advocates, surveying Syrian communities to understand their knowledge of transitional justice and preferences for Syria, promoting psychosocial rehabilitation and solidarity among victims, and preparing for truth-telling exercises and institutional reform measures. The conclusion suggests ways in which the international community could still promote some form of transitional justice as part of the reconstruction process, even if Assad remains in power, which seems increasingly likely.

More than two decades after the ground-breaking jurisprudence of the ICTY and ICTR, the need for gender-sensitive approaches is now squarely on the transitional justice agenda, resulting especially in attention to sexual violence as a gendered crime. This chapter discusses the main historical and conceptual debates within the field of gender-sensitive transitional justice. It discusses how transitional justice mechanisms have tried to deal with these specific gendered experiences, giving examples from different truth, justice and reparation processes. The chapter concludes by discussing some of the main critiques of gender-sensitive transitional justice and outlining possible strategies to overcome these. The approach identified in the Victims' Law reflects a tendency within 'gendered' analyses of transitional justice to understand gender as women, leading to the inclusion of women and their specific experiences during conflict. Progress has been made in addressing gender in transitional justice.

While children used as soldiers are primarily perceived as victims under internal human rights law and international humanitarian rights law, they also commit war atrocities. In the aftermath of war, the mainstream justice system internationally targets warlords, who abduct and enrol children as combatants, leaving child perpetrators without accounting for their gross, human rights violations. Attempts to prosecute child soldiers through the mainstream justice system have resulted in child rights abuses. Where no accountability measures have been taken, former child soldiers have experienced rejection by their communities. Eventually, some have returned to armed conflict. In other contexts, locally based restorative transitional justice has yielded positive outcomes, such as reconciliation, satisfaction expressed by victims and reintegration into the community. This inquiry used restorative justice peacemaking circles (RJPCs), as a model of transitional justice for former child soldiers. Restorative justice evaluation was based on its outcomes. The intervention was efficient as observed: (1) the greater majority of children below the age of 18 (97.2 %) exposed to RJPCs, who intended to join armed groups before, changed their mind and never joined or re-joined armed groups after seven months; (2) apologies by former child soldiers were accepted and they were forgiven, and (3) support for prosecution of child soldiers dropped after RJPCs. In addition, Baraza emerged as an existing model of accountability, conflict resolution and prevention and reconciliation. Unfortunately, it was not exploited to its fullest capacity. Finally healing former child soldiers was a critical step towards change of identity, the transition from soldiering to civilian life, necessary for meaningful reintegration into society. That implied addressing these child soldiers’ psychosocial well-being and creating an environment where peace prevails and adequate accountability measures are in place and effective. The overall results reveal that RJPC yielded empathy, vicarious justice, forgiveness, reconciliation, and deterrence of child soldiers.

How do we repair and reconcile a society broken multiple times by years of political violence and cyclic mass atrocity events? Reconciliation processes in post-conflict societies tend to favour state-led peace processes to aid individuals and communities alike to heal, make sense of the past while also imagining and forging an interdependent future together. The Burundi Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC), established in 2014, has the mandate to investigate past crimes and mass violence events dating from 1885 to the 4 December 2008 ceasefire with the aim of aiding truth-telling, reconciliation and transitional justice. The paper comments on how the TRC shapes ongoing healing, reconciliation and transitional justice efforts in post-conflict Burundi. This paper uses desk-based research to draw insights from documented works and reports of the TRC between 2018 and 2022. The TRC’s findings sparked multiple narratives and public discourse in the Senate which further led to the re-examination of the 1972‒1973 massacre, the legacy of colonisation and its impact in cementing ethnic divisions that led to cyclic mass violence in Burundi.

ABSTRACTEducation is acknowledged as a component of transitional justice processes, yet details about how to implement education reform in postconflict societies are underexplored and politicized [King, Elisabeth. 2014. From Classrooms to Conflict in Rwanda. New York: Cambridge University Press]. Local and international actors often neglect the complicated nature of education reform in postconflict societies undergoing transitional justice processes [Jones, Briony. 2015. "Educating Citizens in Bosnia-Herzegovina: Experiences and Contradictions in Post-war Education Reform." In Transitional Justice and Reconciliation: Lessons from the Balkans, edited by Martina Fischer, and Olivera Simic, 193–208. New York: Routledge. Transitional Justice]. The role of the diaspora in transitional justice has been increasingly explored as a participatory transnational actor with influence and knowledge about local dynamics [Roht-Arriaza, Naomi. 2006. The Pinochet Effect: Transnational Justice in the Age of Human Rights. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press; Haider, Huma. 2008. “(Re)Imagining Coexistence: Striving for Sustainable Return, Reintegration and Reconciliation in Bosnia and Herzegovina. ”International Journal of Transitional Justice 3 (1): 91–113; Young, Laura, and Rosalyn Park. 2009.“ Engaging Diasporas in Truth Commissions: Lessons from the Liberia Truth and Reconciliation Commission Diaspora Project.” International Journal of Transitional Justice 3 (3): 341–361; Koinova, Maria, and Dženeta Karabegović. 2017.“ Diasporas and Transitional Justice: Transnational Activism from Local to Global Levels of Engagement.” Global Networks 17 (2): 212–233]. This article bridges academic literature about diaspora engagement and transitional justice, and education and transitional justice by incorporating the role of diaspora actors in post-conflict processes. Using empirical data from multi-sited field work in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Switzerland, Sweden, the United Kingdom, and France, it examines diaspora initiatives which aim to influence local transitional justice processes through translocal community involvement in education and youth policy. It argues that diaspora initiatives can provide alternative and intermediate solutions to the status quo in their homeland, with some potential for contributing to transitional justice and reconciliation processes. Ultimately, diaspora initiatives need support from homeland institutions in order to forward transitional justice agendas in post-conflict societies.