Humanity's Histories Evaluating the Historical Accounts of International Tribunals and Truth Commissions

Politix ◽  
2007 ◽  
Vol nº 80 (4) ◽  
pp. 31 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard Ashby Wilson
Keyword(s):  
Truth Commissions ◽  
International Tribunals ◽  
Historical Accounts

scholarly journals Excesses of Responsibility: The Limits of Law and the Possibilities of Politics

2011 ◽  
Vol 25 (4) ◽  
pp. 407-431 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kirsten Ainley
Keyword(s):  
War Crimes ◽  
Individual Responsibility ◽  
Truth Commissions ◽  
Legal Responsibility ◽  
State Responsibility ◽  
Criminal Enterprise ◽  
Joint Criminal Enterprise ◽  
Collective Actors ◽  
International Tribunals

Since 1945 responsibility for atrocity has been individualized, and international tribunals and courts have been given effective jurisdiction over it. This article argues that the move to individual responsibility leaves significant ‘excesses’ of responsibility for war crimes unaccounted for. When courts do attempt to recognize the collective nature of war crime perpetration, through the doctrines of ‘command responsibility’, ‘joint criminal enterprise’ and ‘state responsibility’, the application of these doctrines has, it is argued, limited or perverse effects. The article suggests that instead of expecting courts to allocate excesses of responsibility, other accountability mechanisms should be used alongside trials to allocate political (rather than legal) responsibility for atrocity. The mechanisms favored here are ‘Responsibility and Truth Commissions’, i.e. well-resourced non-judicial commissions which are mandated to hold to account individual and collective actors rather than simply to provide an account of past violence.

Justice, Acknowledgment, and Collective Memory

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrew Valls
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Human Rights ◽  
Collective Memory ◽  
The United States ◽  
Truth Commissions ◽  
Place Names ◽  
The Past ◽  
Regime Transitions

In regime transitions, a number of mechanisms are utilized to memorialize the past and to reject the ideas associated with human rights abused of the prior regime. This is often done through truth commissions, apologies, memorials, museums, changes in place names, national holidays, and other symbolic measures. In the United States, some efforts along these lines have been undertaken, but on the whole they have been very limited and inadequate. In addition, many symbols and memorials associated with the past, such as Confederate monuments and the Confederate Battle Flag, continue to be displayed. Hence while some progress has been made on these issues, much more needs to be done.

Contemporary International Tribunals

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Antonio Augusto Cançado Trindade Trindade
Keyword(s):  
Ad Hoc ◽  
International Criminal ◽  
Case Law ◽  
Nuclear Disarmament ◽  
International Human Rights ◽  
International Criminal Tribunals ◽  
The Icj ◽  
The Common ◽  
International Human ◽  
International Tribunals

In the course of 2016, international human rights tribunals (ECtHR, IACtHR and ACtHPR) kept on making cross-references to each other’s case-law, as well as to that of other international tribunals. The same has taken place on the part of international criminal tribunals (ICC and ICTFY), at a time of special attention to the preservation of the legacy of the ad hoc tribunals (ICTFY and ICTR). One could have expected the same from the ICJ, as to the case-law of other international tribunals, in its recent decisions in the cases concerning the Obligation of Nuclear Disarmament (2016), keeping in mind the common mission (of realization of justice) of contemporary international tribunals from an essentially humanist outlook.

Contemporary International Tribunals

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Antônio Augusto ◽  
Cançado Trindade
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
International Law ◽  
Ad Hoc ◽  
International Criminal ◽  
International Human Rights ◽  
International Criminal Tribunals ◽  
International Human ◽  
International Tribunals ◽  
Cross Fertilization

More recently, jurisprudential cross-fertilization has kept on being pursued in particular by international human rights tribunals and international criminal tribunals. This is reassuring, as, despite their distinct jurisdictions, their work is complementary, in their common mission of imparting justice, in distinct domains of international law. Jurisprudential cross-fertilization fosters cohesion and the unity of law. Particularly attention is currently devoted to the preservation of the legacy of the ad hoc international criminal tribunals.

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