Transitional Justice Mechanisms for Somalia

Abstract

Transitional justice (TJ) can be conceptualized as a set of eclectic approaches that are used to tackle systematic or widespread violations of human rights that typically occur during authoritarian rule and/or in times of war. While there is now a substantial literature on the approaches to TJ utilized by various countries to address massive rights abuses in their recent histories (Rwanda, South Africa, Yugoslavia, Chile, etc.), almost nothing has been written about the possibilities of applying similar models to Somalia. The Somali case is unusual because, unlike other cases where a robust state has assumed responsibility for overseeing the processes of TJ, Somalia suffered a complete state collapse followed by a protracted civil war that continues in various forms to the present day. At the same time, the need to rebuild the country’s institutions from the ground up offers unique opportunities for scholars and advocates of TJ: to gather empirical data on past human rights abuses; to survey Somali opinion on the most practical and acceptable modes of addressing those abuses; and to help guide planners and policy makers in assessing the potential costs and