Abstract Energy dependence and rising pollution from the energy sector have compelled states to re-evaluate their energy policies and legal frameworks in favour of sustainable energy development. In this context, energy transition emerges as a strategy to achieve global climate goals while ensuring energy security. However, making the energy transition a “just transition” presents numerous challenges. These challenges are growing as innovation in the energy sector accelerates, with digitalisation presented as a tool to drive the energy transition and optimise current energy systems. This trend has been integrated into the EU’s policy objectives and regulated by the EU’s legal framework. However, this political decision has sparked ethical and legal debates about the digital transformation of the EU energy sector, particularly regarding energy justice. By analysing instruments in the EU’s policy and legal framework, this paper addresses the intersection of the twin transitions through the lens of energy justice. Therefore, this study assesses the EU policy and legal framework of twin transitions from an energy justice perspective. The geographical scope of this research covered the EU. The methodology includes doctrinal legal research. The conclusions of this research encompass an assessment of selected EU policy and legal instruments applicable to the twin transitions.

The article reports the trajectory of the Aparecidos Políticos Collective (APC) in the urban interventions carried out at the former Castelo Branco Mausoleum, in Fortaleza, culminating in its transformation into the Liberty Gallery in 2025. This fifteen-year experience articulates public art, memory, and politics, questioning the persistence of tributes to figures linked to Brazil’s civil-military dictatorship. The text outlines the monument’s historical and symbolic context and the artistic actions that re-signified the space, from projections and performances to artistic residencies. Grounded in thinkers such as Benjamin, Didi-Huberman, Seligmann-Silva, and Safatle, the account highlights art as a device of counter-memory and resistance, proposing de-monumentalization as a critical and pedagogical practice. By examining the creation of the Liberty Gallery, the article discusses the disputes over public memory and the importance of transitional justice in the fields of art and citizenship.

Scholars have demonstrated how transitional justice mechanisms, such as criminal courts and truth commissions, often foster contestations over victimhood. Yet existing scholarship has failed to examine cases in which such victim hierarchies have not emerged in transitioning societies. This article examines why strong victim hierarchies did not emerge in Sierra Leone following its 11-year civil war, despite its extensive transitional justice program. It does so through an examination of the intergenerational transmission of knowledge between individuals who experienced the violence and newer generations. Drawing upon over 100 interviews with educators, parents, and educational and peacebuilding experts, this article identifies three key factors that disrupted the formation of rigid victim classifications. First, the war’s factional fluidity and lack of identity-based violence complicated binary distinctions between victims and perpetrators. Second, the concurrent implementation of a criminal tribunal, truth commission, and general amnesty generated disparate narratives of the violence. As a result, educators and parents selectively draw on these narratives to construct inclusive understandings of victimhood. Third, limited state capacity and regime continuity have led to a lack of material and symbolic affirmation for victims, muting incentives for contesting victim status. These findings contribute to the literature on victim hierarchies by presenting a negative case and highlighting how the nature of violence, the combination of transitional justice mechanisms, and state ambivalence shape memory transmission, thereby influencing the construction (or absence) of victim hierarchies.

ABSTRACT Ethnic conflicts in Ethiopia have led to widespread displacement, particularly of ethnic Amharas who have been evicted from various regions and settled in the Amhara region. This study investigates the preferences for durable solutions and the challenges that displaced persons face as they seek durable solutions to their displacement. Through a qualitative phenomenological approach, data were collected through interviews, focus group discussions, and document analysis. The data were analyzed thematically and presented in a narrative form. The research reveals a conflict between IDPs’ desire for local integration or relocation and the opposing views of regional government’s and host communities’ claim for return. This discord leaves IDPs in a protracted state of uncertainty. The study identifies various barriers to durable solutions, including gaps in legal and policy frameworks, lack of political will and complicity, resource constraints, disrupted livelihoods, exclusion from decision-making processes, insufficient recognition of displacement impacts, security risks, absence of reparatory and transitional justice, and psychological trauma. By situating these findings within structural conflict theory and the politics of othering, the study demonstrates how exclusion based on identity influences displacement trends and hinders the development of durable solutions.

ABSTRACT This study examines transitional justice in rehabilitating ex-Boko Haram fighters in Northeast Nigeria through qualitative research involving key informant interviews with Operation Safe Corridor members and community leaders, in-depth interviews with former fighters and victims, and focus group discussions with internally displaced persons. Findings reveal that victim-offender dialogues, community visitations, and participatory mechanisms cultivate trust, empathy, and acceptance, enhancing reconciliation prospects. Framing transitional justice through social capital theory, this research emphasizes rebuilding trust and strengthening social bonds alongside institutional reforms, contributing to post-conflict reconciliation discourse in Africa.

In their uptake of the concept of energy justice, we observe a tension between social scientists on the one hand and ethicists and philosophers on the other hand. This tension seems to arise from the contrastive assumptions and expectations that are maintained within the disciplines of social science and philosophy. While philosophers often present theoretical constructions of non-empirical forms of justice that allow for systematic normative reflection, there are social scientists who demand operationalised and measurable conceptualisations in order to come up with clear policy advice. These assumptions show the incompatibility of the descriptive and normative logics that underlie their respective fields of study. With regard to the question of justice in the energy transition, the use of theory-based normative frameworks to qualify empirically established inequalities would provide a more comprehensive and suitable approach.

Transitional justice has emerged as a cornerstone for addressing the legacies of armed conflict, promoting accountability, reconciliation, and institutional reform in post-conflict societies. Despite its widespread adoption, the effectiveness and limitations of these mechanisms remain unevenly understood in African contexts. This study examines transitional justice in Rwanda and Sierra Leone within the framework of Sustainable Development Goal 16 (SDG 16), focusing on how judicial and non-judicial processes contribute to durable peace and governance. The research is theoretically anchored in Liberal Peace Theory, which underscores the role of democratic governance, rule of law, and human rights in sustaining peace, and Institutional Governance Theory, which emphasizes the critical role of institutional capacity, legitimacy, and structural conditions in the successful implementation of justice initiatives. Using a qualitative case-study methodology, the study analyzes legal frameworks, regional and international instruments, and socio-political factors shaping transitional justice processes. Findings reveal that while transitional justice has advanced accountability, strengthened institutions, and facilitated reconciliation, its transformative potential is constrained by political interference, resource limitations, and uneven implementation. The study concludes that integrating transitional justice with broader governance, socio-economic, and institutional reforms is essential to achieving sustainable peace. By linking theory, practice, and SDG 16, this research contributes to a comprehensive understanding of transitional justice’s potential and limitations in African post-conflict settings.

This article examines how transitional justice frameworks can inform climate reparations debates. Drawing on lessons from international criminal and human rights courts, as well as non-judicial reparation programs, it highlights the importance of victim participation, multifaceted redress, and credible guarantees of non-repetition in designing effective reparative mechanisms for climate harms. The analysis looks beyond State-to-State obligations to consider reparations owed to individuals, communities and ecosystems, including through ecocentric approaches and the potential criminalisation of ecocide. It argues that, while transitional justice cannot resolve the climate crisis, it offers guidance for designing reparative mechanisms that are participatory, multi-layered and credible.

ABSTRACT This article explores localised dialogue by examining the Famagusta Dialogues, a Track Two initiative bridging ethno-communal divisions in Cyprus. Anchored in Varosha-Famagusta, the dialogues are analysed through conflict transformation, spatial theory, and memory politics. Drawing on theories of space, memory and dialogue, the article argues that Famagusta functions as both a chronotope and hauntological archive. Five core findings emerge: the inadequacy of binary framings; memory and imagination as dialogical resources; affective belonging; cross-community solidarities; and engaging both commonality and difference. Through critical ethnography, the study identifies three communal constellations including a hybrid third-space cohort embodying alternative reconciliation imaginaries. The article contributes to debates on intercommunal dialogue, place-based identity, and transitional justice by showing how localised interventions can challenge nationalistic paradigms. It repositions Famagusta not only as a symbol of Cyprus’s division but as a living archive where melancholia, memory, and imagination offer resources for a future yet to be articulated.

Abstract Considering that the politics of who counts as a victim of an armed conflict is a starting point for both national reparation programs and truth-seeking mechanisms, this article investigates how the campesino came to be rendered by the Colombian transitional justice system as the main victim of the armed conflict. To investigate the grid of intelligibility informing the work of that system, we first trace the historical encounters between the technocratic fields of conflict resolution, development as a means to durable peace, and transitional justice, an intersection that shaped understandings of war and peace in Colombia. In the second part, we show how this genealogy is key for us to grasp the grammar through which rural spaces and populations have come to be understood as “most affected” by war. Then, we move to a discussion about the work of the Colombian Truth Commission in the context of the 2016 peace agreement implementation, aiming to capture how legibility was produced through the classification and quantification of the rural among the universe of victims of the armed conflict. We thus explore how the political practice of counting things produced campesino victims as a political subject and rearticulated broader understandings of how victimhood can, and must, be counted. In doing so, we contribute to discussions on transitional and transformative justice by analyzing knowledge practices involved in redrawing the boundaries of victimhood in peacebuilding efforts, as well as on the politics of categorization and quantification in the making of peace, development, and justice.

ABSTRACT Global transitional justice (TJ) often reproduces Western, (neo)liberal, and (settler) colonial logics. While global TJ has begun to recognise diverse harms, such recognition does little to challenge the exclusionary foundations on which it rests. I propose two queer decolonial visions for theorising TJ otherwise: recognising intersecting cisheterosexist and colonial harms; and amplifying queer, Indigenous, marginalised, and subaltern communities to own TJ. These visions reimagine TJ futures, offering a queerer and decolonising impetus for global TJ. However, engaging in queer decolonial critique, I also consider the (im)possibility of global TJ to be queered and decolonised, or if it should be dismantled.

It is a long-standing maxim of jurisprudence that peace is not merely the absence of war, but the presence of justice. That being said, the international community too often settles for negative peace—a fragile silence of guns that leaves systemic rot untouched. This paper contends that without Ethical Justice, a peace treaty is little more than a stay of execution for the next conflict. While political realism often treats justice as a negotiable concession, this study argues it is a non-negotiable legal and moral pillar. We must look beyond mere legalism to a framework that honors human dignity and the Responsibility to Protect (R2P). For instance, when accountability is sidelined—as seen in the history of amnesties that fail to address Article 7 of the Rome Statute regarding crimes against humanity—the result is almost invariably a relapse into violence. Statistical trends in post-conflict states suggest that agreements neglecting victim-centered reparations have a significantly higher rate of failure within five years. This paper examines these failures from the perspective of Transitional Justice, arguing that inclusive governance is not just a good idea, but a structural requirement for social cohesion. By analyzing the problems between state sovereignty and the universal protection of human rights, the study concludes that a peace built on impunity is a house built on sand. We must prioritize the moral imperative of justice to ensure that reconciliation is more than a slogan, but a lived reality.

ABSTRACT∞ This essay proposes an epistemic, methodological and political reflection on the collaborative research/creation work carried out over approximately five years in the rural area of the municipality of Icononzo, Colombia. The reflection focuses on the conversations held with Janeth, a signatory of the Final Agreement between the Colombian government and the FARC-EP, who describes themself as ‘a girl-boy.’ This Note from the field also aims to recover the ways in which creative practices (audiovisual, sound and graphic) developed with Janeth and other peace signatories, and with community researchers, have been useful for discussing the past and the present, imagining possible futures and understanding how Janeth’s daily practices can be conceived as cuir pedagogies, within the Colombian context of transitional justice.

Centering disability justice in active transportation transitions: A conceptual counter-cartography

Food systems are characterised by persistent injustices – from exploitative labour and unequal access to healthy food to disproportionate environmental burdens on marginalised communities. These injustices have spurred diverse conceptual frameworks (e.g., food democracy, food sovereignty, food justice), resulting in a fragmented debate around justice that tends to conceptualise it as an ideal outcome, rather than as a process. In this paper, we introduce the concept of “just sustainability transitions” to integrate distributive, recognitive and procedural dimensions of justice within a dynamic, process-oriented approach to food governance. Focusing on Food Policy Networks (FPNs) – i.e., multi‐stakeholder networks operating at the intersection of policy and practice – we conducted 67 semi‐structured interviews across varied institutional and cultural contexts and examined how justice is negotiated, enacted and transformed in everyday governance. Our analysis reveals that distributive justice often remains aspirational rather than structurally embedded, whereas recognitive and procedural justice are pursued unevenly due to local power asymmetries and institutional cultures. Within these constraints, emergent practices – such as reconfigured leadership models and enhanced participatory mechanisms – illustrate how actors experiment with redistributing power and reimagining inclusion. These practices suggest that power redistribution should be understood not merely as a democratic outcome, but as a precondition for achieving meaningful and equitable participation. By framing justice as a plural, contested and evolving process, this study bridges fragmented discourses of justice in food systems research and positions participatory governance platforms such as FPNs as sites where “justice‐in‐the‐making” unfolds.

ABSTRACT This article presents a qualitative analysis of the EU's approaches to human rights violations in selected states’ ‘troubled pasts’, employing insights from and critiques of the interdisciplinary field of ‘transitional justice’. By viewing the EU's approaches to troubled pasts through the lens of transitional justice, it is possible to trace a complex web of external and internal policies that have been invoked to address them. Whilst in the Common Foreign and Security Policy, there is express engagement with the notion of transitional justice, its engagement with its own Member States’ troubled pasts is more obscure, involving creative use of its ‘competences’ on citizenship to pursue policies of ‘remembrance’ as well as hosting significant debates in the European Parliament about the adoption of European-wide symbolic measures of commemoration. That these policy areas would be invoked in the way that they have been is not self-evident, and so by employing a comprehensive understanding of the EU's complex institutional structure, the article explains both how they were identified and then the range of measures adopted through them. This then facilitates a novel and extensive appraisal of the EU's measures to address the selected states’ troubled pasts through its patchwork of transitional justice interventions.

Despite being physically divided in 1974, no peace agreement has been made in Cyprus since then. Amongst the issues awaiting solution, perhaps the most difficult one is the property issue. Problems related to property rights have been brought to the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) on several occasions. This study focuses on the Immovable Property Commission (IPC), which was established in accordance with the jurisprudence of the ECtHR. In a frozen conflict environment, the ECtHR, although not a transitional justice mechanism for resolving human rights violations in armed conflicts, occasionally plays an effective role in pressuring national authorities to repair the destructive effects of conflict periods. This study assesses the effectiveness of the IPC’s role in addressing property issues in general and within this specific context.

The article examines the dynamics and consequences of violent conflict in eastern Ethiopia. Property rights, greed–grievance, and environmental scarcity theories were employed to explain the violence. Results from interviews and discussions indicate that land-use change, livestock raiding, and contention over regional administration border defined along ethnic lines are the key causes of the conflict. Manipulation by powerful political elites in the federal government in orchestrating inter-regional tension has sustained the violence. The conflict has generated social, economic, and environmental impacts. Attempts to resolve the conflict have undermined customary leaders trusted by community members. Thus, peacebuilding efforts should commence with identifying political elites manipulating relationships, undertaking political reform, and implementing transitional justice system. There is also a need for the federal and regional political institutions to engage trustworthy customary leaders in the peace process.

Forensic investigations of political violence are pursued for retributive and restorative justice purposes, although the relationship between the two processes has been the subject of debate. Alongside these debates are conversations emphasizing the need for actor-, victim-, or survivor-centered agendas for transition after conflict. Using ethnographic data, this article accounts for the viewpoints of 74 Somalilanders who lost a family member during the political violence of the 1980s Siad Barre dictatorship. Discussions with families centered on recent mass grave exhumations, their knowledge of forensic anthropological investigations, and their wider views on local post-conflict processes. During interviews, families highlighted the need for exhumations, formal legal justice activities, and investments in physical and mental health institutions. While most family members want perpetrators tried through formal legal means, many would accept processes to inform the young, the international community, and the historical narrative about the atrocities, as accountability may be beyond reach. Moreover, some relatives are primarily focused on Somaliland's pursuit of international recognition, whereas others view investigations as volatile and believe they may spur renewed clan conflict. This article supports arguments brought forth in response to post-conflict investigations for over 20 years: family needs are complex and must be pursued during forensic work using survivor-centered approaches. Furthermore, this article shows the complex and context-specific needs of families of the dead in Somaliland. Arguably, these needs should be central to further post-conflict work in the region, and they can also inform emerging transitional justice efforts across North Africa and the Middle East.

Given various peace agreements and transitional justice programmes, the gendered aspects of reparations are frequently overlooked, resulting in inadequate retribution for survivors, the majority of whom are women and girls. The paper investigates how African feminist policy ideas might influence reparations frameworks that are both inclusive and transformational. The paper assesses the feasibility of gender-sensitive reparations programmes using empirical evidence from post-conflict settings such as Liberia, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and Rwanda, highlighting key actions such as establishing survivor-centered reparations funds, incorporating psychosocial care into national health services, and ensuring women's participation in reparations design and monitoring. The paper argues that by focusing on survivors' perspectives and feminist ideals of justice, reparations can serve as both a healing tool and a catalyst for gender-equitable peacebuilding and development on the continent. Finally, the paper contends that reparations must go beyond symbolic gestures and offer survivors with material, psychological, and socioeconomic assistance that truly restores their dignity, agency, and opportunity.