National Reconciliation

South Africa’s transition from apartheid government, Rwanda’s response to genocide, and other counties’ efforts to build peace after civil war have featured restorative thinking and programmes

African women mobilize to build peace

from the article by Yvette Moore on United Methodist Women: ….Women from Mozambique described ways they are working to create a culture of peace in their country after years of war. “Since the signing of the peace agreement in 1992, we can live in peace,” Rute Uthui of United Methodist Women of Mozambique said through an interpreter. “In the church since last year we always talk about peace and the maintaining of peace on the radio and in the news. Our women’s group meets every Thursday, and we never walk out without talking about peace and what we can do to maintain it. We are facing now criminality. When those people are caught, some want to beat them, but we say, talk to them—punish them according to what they’ve done—but not the violence, talk to them about peace.”

The gods are angry

from the article by George Ayittey in the Wall Street Journal: ....There are more than 2,000 African ethnic groups but despite the incredible diversity there are striking commonalities among them. Whereas Western jurisprudence emphasizes punishing the guilty, the widespread African tradition stresses restitution and reconciliation or "restorative justice"—the basis of South Africa's Truth and Reconciliation Commissions established after the dismantling of Apartheid. Africa's economic heritage featured free village markets. There were rudimentary free markets in Timbuktu, Kano, Salaga, Onitsa, Mombasa and elsewhere before the advent of the colonial era. Whereas the West practiced majoritarian, or representative, democracy, ancient Africans practiced participatory democracy, where decisions were taken by consensus at village meetings variously called asetena kese by the Ashanti, ama-ala by the Igbo, guurti by the Somali, dare by the Shona, ndaba by the Zulu or kgotla by the Tswana.

Restorative Justice Requires Compensation

I don't know that comepensation is required to make a TC successful or restorative for a couple of basic reasons. One, often there is very [...]

Rwanda: healing for victims

Thank you for publishing this article. It is our view that if victims or the victims' families have experienced some healing from gacaca justice then [...]

Gacaca: A successful experiment in restorative justice?

from the article by Charlotte Clapham on e-International Relations: ....The twofold reparative function of restorative justice is, however, crucial and so the extent to which gacaca’s emphasis on ‘truth-telling’ realised its desired outcome is subject to debate. To draw on Johnstone’s conception of restorative justice once again, the fact that gacaca failed to offer something positive, in the form of compensation, to meet the needs of the victims (Johnstone 2004: 9-10) meant part of its reparative function was undermined. For example, whilst ‘truth-telling’ is believed to be cathartic for victims, evidence of ‘traumatization’ through their testimonies did in many cases incite ‘fear, anxiety and sadness’ (Rime et al 2011: 701; Brouneus 2008). Although this may be unavoidable for crimes of such extreme brutality, in order for victims’ engagement in the process of ‘truth-telling’ between victim and perpetrator to hold a healing quality, adequate compensation is needed to empower victims (see, Baines 2007: 104; Waldorf 2006: 430) as well to avoid a ‘re-victimization’ of those involved (Wielenga and Harris 2011: 20; AI 2000: 8). Gacaca’s reparative qualities were therefore hindered, as its lack of compensation for victims (AI 2000: 9) meant that for many the process failed to ameliorate the damage caused by the crime and instead caused further harm.

Rwanda: Kagame commends Gacaca courts

from the article by Jean-Christophe Nsanzimana on allafrica.com: The 1994 Genocide against the Tutsis and its aftermath, said president Kagame, presented us with challenges that tested us all to limit. Among these challenges was redress for victims, perpetrators' accountability for their crimes and restoring harmony among Rwandans. While Rwanda could have chosen the path of vengeance, or of general amnesty, Kagame said the people had chosen the hard but best way of justice and reconciliation. That is a victory to celebrate, he said on Monday during the official closing of the participative justice of Gacaca courts which started in June 2002.

Taylor war crimes verdict incomplete justice

from the article by Carina Ray in the Bradenton Herald: The conviction of former Liberian President Charles Taylor amounts to only partial justice. While many Sierra Leoneans are relieved to see Taylor finally convicted for his destructive role in their country's brutal civil war, his wanton destabilization elsewhere in West Africa hardly figured in the criminal proceedings against him.

Learning from Rwanda

from the article by John H. Stanfield, II in Tikkun: ....How do you mend a country when intimates killed intimates in such tightly knitted communities? How do you do justice when thousands of people were perpetrators and where you only have so much prison space? How do you do it? Rwanda is doing it through a largely homegrown restorative justice methodology.

Stefaans Coetzee is the face of restorative justice

from the article by Bobby Jordan in The Sunday Times: ....Today is no ordinary day for the 33-year-old who grew up in an orphanage in Winburg in the Free State. Head slightly bowed, he looks up at two imams who have finally been allowed to visit him at Pretoria Central Prison. Their two previous attempts failed. The imams are from Rustenburg, where some of their congregation were nearly blown up by two Wit Wolwe bombs outside their mosque. Now they want to ask Coetzee what it was all about.

We can write the stories of peace with our lives

from the Fambul Tok website: Fambul Tok (Krio for “Family Talk”) emerged in Sierra Leone as a face-to-face community-owned program bringing together perpetrators and victims of the violence in Sierra Leone’s eleven-year civil war through ceremonies rooted in the local traditions of war-torn villages. It provides Sierra Leonean citizens with an opportunity to come to terms with what happened during the war, to talk, to heal, and to chart a new path forward, together. Fambul Tok is built upon Sierra Leone’s “family talk” tradition of discussing and resolving issues within the security of a family circle. The program works at the village level to help communities organize ceremonies that include truth-telling bonfires and traditional cleansing ceremonies—practices that many communities have not employed since before the war. Through drawing on age-old traditions of confession, apology and forgiveness, Fambul Tok has revived Sierra Leoneans’ rightful pride in their culture.

Agreed

I totally agree, Lisa Rea. I just want to notify you that there ARE restorative justice practices happening worldwide just in different forms. There are [...]

restorative justice processes used in Rwanda

Thank you for posting this excellent article. This is so encouraging. When restorative justice processes can be applied in Rwanda after genocide we know that [...]

Reconciliation Village Hosts Victims, Perpetrators of Rwandan Genocide

From the article by Zack Baddorf on Voice of America News: It's been more than 16 years since the 1994 genocide in Rwanda that left about 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus dead. Rwandan President Paul Kagame, who was re-elected in August with 93 percent of the vote, says now there are no longer Hutus and Tutsis in Rwanda, only Rwandans. As a test of how well the different ethnic groups can live together, victims and perpetrators of the genocide are living side-by-side in a small community known as the Reconciliation Village.

Truth and reconciliation at a price

from the article by Phil Clark on Radio Netherlands Worldwide: The societal impact of gacaca on post-genocide Rwanda has been highly variable. Gacaca’s volatility results from the enormous number of communities involved, which themselves vary greatly in terms of their experiences of the genocide and the nature of inter-ethnic relations today. Over the last nine years, gacaca has recorded two principal successes and confronted two main challenges. First, gacaca has proven remarkably successful at expediting the post-genocide justice process, delivering accountability for hundreds of thousands of génocidaires. In the process, it has commuted many convicted perpetrators’ sentences to overcome the problem of overcrowded prisons and facilitated the reintegration of most detainees into everyday society. Thus, the Rwandan government will soon have delivered on its promise of comprehensive prosecutions of those responsible for committing genocide crimes but without recreating the problem of overcrowded jails that necessitated gacaca in the first place....

Peacebuilding

How can we use the restorative justice help in peacebuilding and conflict management?

Mandela's children

from Alexandra Fuller's feature article in National Geographic Magazine: Coetzee does not talk about his childhood. He speaks about the planning that went into the bombing, how he was chosen for his excellent military skills, the years he has spent in prison. He asks for their questions, and the group responds. How did he learn to hate black people? How did he unlearn this hatred? How does he spend his days now? Is he sorry? And if he is so sorry, what can he give them? Coetzee admits he has nothing material to give the world except the leather belt that holds up his overalls. But, he says, God willing, if he gets out of jail, he can begin to attempt to compensate for what he has done. "There are children now in South Africa," he says, "children without parents. They might be tempted to get into violent gangs, to follow anger instead of love." He says, "I can show them that the first life you have to change is your own."

Zimbabwe: Calls for restorative justice must be heeded now

from an entry on Kubatana.net: This becomes a strong case for the open discussion of what evil has been spawned by political violence and the need for a truth and reconciliation commission so people can move on with their lives. Yet some people in their wisdom think the past can take care of itself by natural processes of time and have been arrogant to calls for a naming and shaming of people behind the raping and killing of wives and mothers since independence. The question for many is that what really can be expected from the people who are accused of heinous political crime and still control state apparatus that would in essence be in charge of letting the law take its course? So does the nation wait for that epoch when they are no longer in government and then they are tracked and shot down like rapid dogs?

Peace is a first measure of justice

I think Oola gets it right. Without peace its unimaginable that justice can be done. If the ICC indeed frustrated the Juba Peace Talks-an i [...]

You cannot compare apples to oranges: Ubushingantahe vs. criminal justice

from Josh Perry's post on Africa Faith & Justice Network: Conflict resolution in Burundi was halted for decades due to the ongoing ethnic strife between the Hutus and the Tutsis. As the Burundian civil war continued, a British based organization named ActionAid helped to rebuild customary institutions that were destroyed by the conflict, and the Bashingantahe council, known also as Ubushingantahe, was one. However, in 2000, the passage of the Arusha Accord settled the civil war, brought about peace negotiations, and formally recognized the Ubushingantahe as a conciliatory judicial mechanism.

Collected essays, 2008-2010: Debating international justice in Africa

from the announcement by University of Oxford Centre for Socio-Legal Studies: Assembling nearly two years of critical debates convened by Oxford Transitional Justice Research, the collection of nearly 60 essays explores the work of the International Criminal Court (ICC) and other judicial processes at a crucial stage in the development of international justice in Africa. The June 2010 review conference of the ICC in Kampala provides an opportunity to identify the successes and shortcomings of these processes and to lay the foundation for more effective approaches in the future. The debates in this volume highlight that there is major disagreement over the performance and legacies of international justice institutions in Africa. The purpose of this collection is to deepen discussions of these issues and to provoke new questions about the past and future directions of international justice in Africa.