Finding shame in truth: The importance of public engagement in truth commissions

Human Rights Quarterly

Volumn 33, Issue 2, 2011, Pages 431-452

  Mazzei, Julie M ^a  

^a KENT STATE UNIVERSITY   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

GOVERNANCE APPROACH; HUMAN RIGHTS; NATIONAL SECURITY; PARTICIPATORY APPROACH; POLITICAL DISCOURSE; SOCIAL CONFLICT; SOCIAL JUSTICE;

EL SALVADOR [CENTRAL AMERICA];

EID: 80051539416     PISSN: 02750392     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1353/hrq.2011.0026     Document Type: Article

References (167)

1. Julie Mazzei, Death Squads or Self-Defense Forces? How Paramilitary Groups Emerge And Challenge Democracy in Latin America 180 (2009).
2. Michael Humphrey, From Victim to Victimhood: Truth Commissions and Trials as Rituals of Political Transition and Individual Healing, 14 Austl. J. Anth. 171, 176 (2003);
3. Stanley Cohen, State Crimes of Previous Regimes: Knowledge, Accountability, and the Policing of the Past, 20 Law & Soc. Inquiry 7, 12-22 (1995);
4. Mahmood Mamdani, Amnesty or Impunity? A Preliminary Critique of the Report of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of South Africa (TRC), 32 Diacritics 33, 33-34, (2002);
5. Claire Moon, Reconciliation as Therapy and Compensation: A Critical Analysis, in Law and the PoliticS of reconciliation 163 (Scott Veitch ed., 2007).
6. Interviews were conducted in the feld in March of 2003. In some cases, the interviewees will remain unnamed to protect the identities of those who requested confdentiality.
7. Eric Brahm, Uncovering the Truth: Examining Truth Commission Success and Impact, 8 Int'l Stud. Persp. 16, 28 (2007).
8. Margaret Popkin & Naomi Roht-Arriaza, Truth as Justice: Investigatory Commissions in Latin America, 20 Law & Soc. Inquiry 79, 90 (1995).
9. Brahm, supra note 4, at 26-27;
10. Neil J. Kritz, Coming to Terms with Atrocities: A Review of Accountability Mechanisms for Mass Violations of Human Rights, 59 Law & Contemp. Prob. 127, 141 (1996);
11. Popkin & Roht-Arriaza, supra note 5, at 87-89 (regarding El Salvador).
12. Claire Moon, Narrating Political Reconciliation: Truth and Reconciliation in South Africa, 15 Soc. Legal Stud. 257 (2006);
13. Humphrey, supra note 2, at 175-6.
14. André Du Toit, The Moral Foundations of the South African TRC: Truth as Acknowledgment and Justice as Recognition, in Truth v. JuStice: the Morality of truth coMMiSSionS 122, 125 (Robert I. Rotbert & Dennis Thompson eds., 2000).
15. The literature evaluating the success or effectiveness of TCs generally recognizes two broad arenas within which one should look for positive indicators of change: institutional reform and social reconciliation. Institutional approaches look at whether a country post-TC has carried out recommendations given by the TC, and whether these reforms have been meaningful or superfcial.
16. Brandon Hamber & Hugo Van Der Merwe, What is this Thing Called Reconciliation?, 1 Reconciliation in rev. 3 (1998);
17. Brahm, supra note 4.
18. Studies looking at the social outcomes of a TC may focus on varying levels and types of reconciliation. Many refer to the establishment of a "human rights-based" civil society or a "democratized" political arena where rights-often ambiguously defned-are more or less respected.
19. Brandon Hamber, Truth: The Road to Reconciliation?, Cantilevers: Building Bridges For Peace, First Quarter, 1997, at 5;
20. Rachel Sieder, War, Peace, and the Politics of Memory in Guatemala, In Burying The Past: Making Peace And Doing Justice After Civil Conflict 209 (Nigel Biggar ed., 2003).
21. For others, reconciliation is evident in the nonviolent co-existence, or better, of previous adversaries.
22. James L. Gibson, Overcoming Apartheid: Can Truth Reconcile a Divided Nation?, 603 Annals Am. Acad. Pol. & Soc. Sci. 82, 89, (2006).
23. Using South Africa's Truth and Reconciliation Commission as a basis for study, Hamber & van der Merwe, above, identify five levels or types of reconciliation that may indicate reconciliation success.
24. These types are: a macro-reconciliation, defned by the authors as one "dissolving the racial identities arising from the policies of the past;" a pluralist reconciliation, "based on an intercommunal understanding.
25. Bridging the divides of the past;" a spiritually-based shift, involving a "new conscience of individuals and society through moral refection;" and a micro-level reconstruction defned by Hamber and van der Merwe as "generally concerned with individual relationships rather than with. national political tolerance.
26. Id. at 3-4.
27. Thus most studies conceive of "reconciliation" as the culmination of a commission's success with the third prerogative noted above: establishment of a dominant narrative of the past that then allows bridging between groups who were previously defned by divisions over that very history.
28. Studies have, for the most part, not evaluated the dynamic through which a TC is able to facilitate political tolerance and acceptance among previously embattled factions.
29. Priscilla B. Hayner, Fifteen Truth Commissions-1974-1993: A Comparative Study, in
30. Transitional justice: how emerging democracies reckon with former regimes 225, 228 (Neil J. Kritz ed., 1995)
31. (Quoting Aryeh Neier, What Should be Done About the Guilty?, n.y. rev. of bookS, 1 Feb. 1990, at 34).
32. Id.
33. (Quoting Juan E. Méndez, A Miracle, A Universe: Settling Accounts with Torturers: By Robert Weschler, 8 n.y.l. Sch. J. huM. rtS. 577, 583 (1991) (book review);
34. Cohen, supra note 2, at 15-18.
35. Hamber, supra note 9, at 6.
36. Popkin & Roht-Arriaza, supra note 5, at 113-14;
37. Neil J. Kritz, The Dilemmas of Transitional Justice, in Transitional justice: how emerging democracies reckon with former regimes, supra note 10, at 18-26.
38. Popkin & Roht-Arriaza, supra note 5, at 114.
39. Sieder, supra note 9, at 210.
40. Mamdani, supra note 2, at 34.
41. Gibson, supra note 9, at 90.
42. Id.
43. This is not to fully discredit the value of testifying at the commission. Clearly testifying is a valuable process for the victim. To be heard and to have one's claims believed, and even validated, is a crucial step in the process.
44. However, this article argues that while testifying is benefcial for the victim, it is not the dynamic that alters public discourse. Altering public discourse requires not only that the commission hear and validate the victim, but also that the public engage, accept, and validate the victim.
45. Cohen, supra note 2, at 18.
46. Teun A. Van Dijk, Principles of Critical Discourse Analysis, 4 Discourse & soc'y 249, 254-55 (1993);
47. Norman Fairclough, Discourse and social change 91 (1992).
48. van Dijk, supra note 21, at 257.
49. Tracey Skillington, Politics and the Struggle to Defne: A Discourse Analysis of the Framing Strategies of Competing Actors in a 'New' Participatory Forum, 48 Brit. J. Soc. 493, 496 (1997).
50. Fairclough, supra note 21, at 91-2;
51. Patrick G. Coy, Lynne M. Woehrle, & Gregory M. Maney, Discursive Legacies: The U.S. Peace Movement and "Support the Troops," 55 Soc. Prob. 161, 164 (2008);
52. Trevor Purvis & Alan Hunt, Discourse, Ideology, Discourse, Ideology, Discourse, Ideology., 44 Brit. J. Soc. 473, 485 (1993).
53. van Dijk, supra note 21, at 259 (emphasis in original).
54. Fairclough, supra note 21, at 87.
55. Id.
56. van Dijk, supra note 21, at 256.
57. Fairclough, supra note 21;
58. Norman Fairclough, Critical Discourse Analysis and the Marketization of Public Discourse: The Universities, 4 Discourse & Soc'y 133 (1993),
59. For the dual role played by discourse both as a "social shaper" and as "shaped by" social elements.
60. Fairclough, supra note 21, at 91-2.
61. Id. at 91.
62. Gibson, supra note 9, at 104 (emphasis added);
63. Humphrey, supra note 2, at 176 for the important role of "witnessing public" in truth process.
64. Gibson, supra note 9, at 90.
65. Coy et al., supra note 24, at 169;
66. van Dijk, supra note 21, at 265.
67. Coy et al., supra note 24, at 164,
68. For a study of how movements are able to use discursive legacies to their advantage when they can reframe the message in a way that is not an affront to the discursive legacy but that simultaneously undermines the intended message of the power elite.
69. Thomas P. Anderson, Matanza: the 1932 "Slaughter" that traumatized a nation, Shaping us-salvadoran policy to this Day 120-68 (2d ed. 1992);
70. Erik Ching, Patronage and Politics Under General Maximiliano Martinez, 1931-1939: The Local Roots of Military Authoritarianism in El Salvador, in Landscapes of struggle: politics, society, and community in el salvador 50 (Aldo Lauria-Santiago & Leigh Binford eds., 2004);
71. William Stanley, The protection racket state: elite politics, Military extortion, and civil war in el salvador 41 (1996).
72. Tommie Sue Montgomery, Revolution in el salvador: from civil strife to civil peace 37-8, 43-4, 62-4, (1995);
73. James Dunkerley, The long war: dictatorship and revolution in el salvador 33-102 (1982);
74. Mazzei, supra note 1.
75. Estimates vary up to 75,000 killed. The Truth Commission confrmed 6,566 killed and/ or disappeared. However, given the Commission's limited timetable and interview and investigatory capabilities, one must understand this number as a gross underestimate.
76. Lauren Weiner, El Salvador Confronts the Truth Commission Report, 24 Freedom rev. 36 (1993).
77. From Madness to Hope: The 12-Year War in El Salvador, Report of the Commission on the Truth for El Salvador, U.N. SCOR, § IV.A, U.N. Doc. S/25500 (1993), 43, available at http://daccess-dds-ny.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/N93/209/27/IMG/N9320927.pdf?OpenElement.
78. Thomas Buergenthal, The United Nations Truth Commission for El Salvador, 27 vanD. J. of tranSnat'l l. 497, 529 (1994);
79. Popkin & Roht-Arriaza, supra note 5, at 99.
80. Mazzei, supra note 1.
81. Montgomery, supra note 36, at 143-4;
82. Dunkerley, supra note 36, at 156-9, 164-5;
83. Mazzei, supra note 1.
84. Buergenthal, supra note 38, at 500.
85. Montgomery, supra note 36, at 242.
86. The Truth Commissioners were united in favoring the release of the names. According to Buergenthal's account, the Commission had been mandated to ensure that "the complete truth be made known.
87. For the Commissioners, this mandate had always entailed revealing the names of the perpetrators. Thus, when Cristiani asked otherwise, the Commissioners, backed by the UN, argued that not revealing the names would require that they ignore in large part what they had been tasked to do.
88. Buergenthal, supra note 38, at 519-22.
89. Buergenthal, supra note 38, at 529;
90. Margaret Popkin, Peace without justice: obstacles to building the rule of law in el salvador 89 (2000).
91. William M. Leogrande, Our own backyard: the united states in central america, 1977-1992, at 577 (1998).
92. From Madness to Hope, supra note 38, at 46, 62, 120, 127.
93. Fairclough, supra note 21, at 84-5, 87.
94. Interview with ARENA member, in San Salvador, El Sal. (Mar. 2003).
95. Id.
96. Id.
97. Interview with Legislative Aide, in San Salvador, El Sal. (Mar. 2003).
98. Id.
99. Id.
100. Id.
101. Id.
102. Id.
103. Interview with Antonio Martínez-Uribe, Author, in San Salvador, El Sal. (Mar. 2003).
104. Interview with Anonymous Professor, in San Salvador, El Sal. (Mar. 2003).
105. Interview with Salvador Sanchez Cerén, current Vice-President of El Sal., in San Salvador, El Sal. (Mar. 2003).
106. Id.
107. Sarah Garland, El Salvador: ARENA Wins Elections, Nacla: report on the americas, May-June 2004, at 1.
108. Id.
109. Id.
110. Raul Lara Menéndez, El Salvador-El Frente no es la Solución, el Frente es el Problema, (14 Mar. 2009) available at http://offnews.info/verArticulo.php?contenidoID=13278.
111. Enrique Miranda & Francisco Mejía, Tras Votos, Noticias de las Elecciones (2006), available at http://www.elsalvador.com/especiales/2006/elecciones/noticias/nota96.asp (translated from Spanish).
112. Elaine Freedman, Who's Defending Monsignor Romero?, ReviSta envio, Jan. 2008, available at http://www.envio.org.ni/articulo/3717.
113. Marc Lacey, 4 Salvadorans Killed in Way That Evokes '80s Confict, N.Y. times, 21 Feb. 2007, at A10, available at http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/21/world/americas/21salvador.html?.
114. Ironically, the proposal also included giving the same honor to Napoeón Duarte, whose exile and torture was believed to be orchestrated by none other than D'Aubuisson. Freedman, supra note 66. International efforts and outrage quelled this effort.
115. Menéndez, supra note 64;
116. Jason Beaubien, Leftist on Track for Historic Triumph in El Salvador, Nat'l pub. radio: all things considered, 23 Feb. 2009, available at http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=100920378;
117. Elisabeth Malkin, Elections in El Salvador Invoke Rivalries of Civil War Years, N.Y. Times, 12 Mar. 2009, at A6, available at http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/12/world/americas/12salvador.html.
118. Beaubien, supra note 68.
119. Blake Schmidt, El Salvador's Path May Shift Radically, Miami Herald, 13 Mar. 2009, available at http://www.latinamericanstudies.org/elsalvador/path.htm.
120. Alexandra Olson, Salvadoran Ex-Rebels Win Presidency for First Time, China Post, 16 Mar. 2009, available at http://www.chinapost.com.tw/international/ameri-cas/2009/03/16/200354/Salvadoran-ex-rebels.htm.
121. Oscar Avila, Venezuela vs. U.S. in Salvadoran Vote, Chi. Trib., 15 Mar. 2009, at C13, available at http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2009-03-15/news/0903140338_1_mau-ricio-funes-el-salvador-fmln.
122. Alexandra Olson, Salvadoran Leftist President Promises Moderation, Ass. Press, 17 Mar. 2009, available at http://www.thefreelibrary.com/Salvadoran+leftist+president+promises+moderation-a01611819105.
123. Teun A. Van Dijk, Social Cognition and Discourse, in Handbook Of Language And Social Psychology 163, 176-7 (Howard Gils & W. Peter Robinson eds., 1990);
124. Fair-Clough, supra note 21.
125. Fairclough, supra note 21, at 87.
126. Van Dijk, supra note 21, at 255.
127. Fairclough, supra note 21, at 87.
128. Interview with Anonymous Teenage City Worker, in San Salvador, El Sal. (Mar. 2003).
129. Id.
130. Interview with Anonymous professor, supra note 58.
131. Interview with Former Military Higher-up, in San Salvador, El. Sal. (Mar. 2003).
132. Id.
133. Id.
134. Buergenthal, supra note 38, at 504.
135. Id. at 503-04;
136. Popkin & Roht-Arriaza, supra note 5, at 87-88.
137. Weiner, supra note 37.
138. In a 2004 report on transitional justice, the UN Secretary-General advocated for increased emphasis on "nationally led strategies of assessment and consultation carried out with the active and meaningful participation of national stakeholders." The Rule of Law and Transitional Justice in Confict and Post-Confict Societies, U.N. SCOR, at 6, U.N. Doc S/2004/616 (2004).
139. The report further called for international logistic and advisory support during transition periods "while leaving process leadership and decision-making to the national stakeholders.
140. Id. at 7.
141. One should make a distinction here regarding the evaluation of having "outsider" commissioners. Multiple observers have criticized the El Salvadoran TC for the use of international overseers, largely due to questions regarding legitimacy or "interference." However, this article is making a point that relates to process rather than to outcome or identity.
142. Buergenthal, supra note 38, at 504-05.
143. Id.
144. For further discussion of this process.
145. Popkin & Roht-Arriaza, supra note 5, at 85.
146. Id. at 86.
147. Rightly point out that an important distinction between Argentina and Chile, on the one hand, and El Salvador, on the other, is that there was a signifcant shift in power in both Argentina and Chile. In El Salvador, those in power during the civil war remained in power through the transition and into the post-war era, perhaps making a public stance against human-rights violators less likely.
148. Id.
149. Cohen, supra note 2, at 17.
150. Humphrey, supra note 2, at 178;
151. Popkin & Roht-Arriaza, supra note 5, at 109.
152. Interestingly, 55.5 percent of El Salvadorans polled opposed the amnesty provision, and 77 percent supported "punishment of those who violated rights.
153. Popkin & Roht-Arriaza, supra note 5, at 109-10.
154. Meanwhile, 45 percent were "satisfed with the Truth Commission's report, while 27% were dissatisfed.
155. Id. at 95 n.32.
156. Montgomery, supra note 36, at 243.
157. Id. at 228.
158. Gibson, supra note 9, at 90.
159. Buergenthal, supra note 38, at 500.
160. Popkin & Roht-Arriaza, supra note 5, at 100-01.
161. Id. at 99.
162. Cohen, supra note 2, at 38.
163. Writes that ""[f]reeze-dried' stigmas can thus be unfrozen, a[n] invaluable way of making reparation to living victims as well as their surviving families and friends.
164. Id.
165. Joe Rubin, El salvador: payback, pbs: frontline/world, 12 Oct. 2004, available at http://www.pbs.org/frontlineworld/elections/elsalvador.
166. Id.
167. Buergenthal, supra note 38, at 540.