How do societies seek to come to terms with legacies of large-scale abuses in order to ensure accountability, serve justice and achieve reconciliation? And what role can victims play in this process? These are crucial questions for scholars and practitioners of transitional justice (TJ).
TJ practitioners and scholars alike have increasingly been turning to victim-centric, participatory approaches to increase the legitimacy and “efficacy” of TJ processes.
By giving victims centre stage, stakeholders hope to better address victims’ needs, enhance local ownership and transform victims into agents of change who can carry forth processes of justice seeking after international actors leave.
But what do we really know about how to best organize this victim participation, or what its long-term effects are?
This website brings you the results of, amongst other things, an ERC-funded research project (VictPart 804154) that examines this question.
Rights2LIFE: Towards a Responsive Criminal Justice System in the Philippines is a capacity-building and research project between Ghent University and the University of Cordilleras in Luzon, the Philippines. The Filipino nation currently faces worsening disregard for the rule of law and disrespect for human rights, as evident in glaring extra-judicial killings, illegal arrests and detentions, etc. […]
Read MoreTine Destrooper joined the Advisory Board of ‘Can the Arts Save Human Rights’ hosted at the University of York’s Center for Applied Human Rights (CAHR) The project seeks to map new and emerging human rights languages or idioms at the intersections between major contemporary crises (attacks on global democracy and human rights, COVID-19, global poverty and […]
Read MoreEl equipo de investigación Justice Visions de la Facultad de Derecho y Criminología de la Universidad de Gante (Bélgica) busca un socio de investigación en Guatemala para facilitar una encuesta (en línea) para la población general. Los servicios requeridos incluyen el reclutamiento de encuestados, manejo de incentivos, coordinación, programación de la encuesta, etc. Descripción general […]
Read MoreIn October 2021, the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia issued a Call for Contributions from relevant stakeholders with respect to the ECCC’s Residual Functions Related to Victims. The Call for Contributions asked for the provision of “… explanations for and recommendations on possible undertakings appropriate to and meaningful for victims encompassed in the jurisdiction […]
Read MoreJustice Visions colleague Marit de Haan participated in a class about transitional justice at the School of Psychology of the Universidad de Valparaíso, Chile on Friday the 15th of October 2021. During the class with bachelor students of the course ‘Psychology and Human Rights’ she presented her project about the victims of the Chilean military […]
Read MoreMuch has been written about the potential of participatory approaches to entrench and expand transitional justice processes. Yet, evidence-based research on how to understand, organize and evaluate victim participation has lagged behind. Empirical research, moreover, often lacks an explicit conceptualization of participation or adopts existing models that start from an institutional perspective and that normatively […]
Read More‘Using restorative justice to rethink the temporality of transition in Chile’ Questions about when transitions are over prompted the writing of this article. The Chilean transition towards democracy seems to be characterized by ongoing dynamics, illustrated by a recent protest movement, a push to reform the constitution and continuous truth and justice efforts. How can […]
Read MoreOn the 29th of December 2020, twenty-four years after the signing of the Peace Accords, Gretel Mejía, Ph.D. researcher of the Justice Visions team at the Human Rights Centre, submitted an amicus curiae brief before the Guatemalan Constitutional Court on the international standards on reparations and victims’ rights. The amicus brief, available in Spanish, was […]
Read MoreOn November 18th at 17:00 (CET) Gretel Mejía, PhD Research Fellow of Justice Visions, will be doing an interview about her research project on Voces de Mujeres, a feminist radio show based in Guatemala City.
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