CONFERENCE: Borders and Boundaries in Transitional Justice

Oxford Transitional Justice Research is holding its biennial summer conference on Friday 27 June, 2014 at the Law Faculty, University of Oxford.  OTJR welcomes papers falling within the theme ‘Borders and Boundaries in Transitional Justice.’

 

The past few years have seen a growing interest in cross-border issues in the study and practice of transitional justice.  For instance, the Operation Condor trial that began last year in a domestic court in Buenos Aires, Argentina, addresses transnational atrocities perpetrated in six countries in South America, and in the process raises questions about the design and validity of domestic amnesties in respect of extraterritorial wrongdoing.  In Europe, states have pursued domestic trials for international crimes committed abroad, such as genocide, or have opted to extradite suspects back to the country where the crimes occurred, highlighting a shift to the domestic application of international criminal law.  In the US, the Supreme Court’s decision in Kiobel has affected one important avenue of accountability for extraterritorial wrongdoing.

 

At the same time, traditional boundaries in the theory and practice of transitional justice are being redrawn, creating new dynamics of inclusion and exclusion.  In Liberia, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission sought to engage the state’s diaspora community, prompting questions about who is included in transitional justice processes.  Regional bodies, including the African Union and European Union, have started to play a more prominent role in determining states’ responses to past wrongs, challenging the boundaries of decision-making in transitional justice.  These developments also raise broader conceptual questions about the relationship between national, regional, and international ideas and practices of justice and accountability. 

The conference will explore how these and other borders and boundaries inform and affect transitional justice.  Within this theme, potential topics might include, but are not limited to:

• How extraterritorial atrocities are addressed in, or excluded from, transitional justice;
• The role of refugee, diaspora, and/or foreign communities in transitional justice;
• Nationalism and pan-nationalism after gross human rights abuses;
• The interaction between domestic transitional justice processes and foreign, regional, or international courts, for example in the application of the principles of complementarity and ne bis in idem; and
• The interplay between domestic and international conceptions of justice and accountability.

 To propose a paper, please send an abstract of no more than 500 words to the OTJR Convenor, Miles Jackson –   miles.jackson@law.ox.ac.uk This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. – by 21 April, 2014.  Abstracts should include your name, contact details, any institutional affiliation, and the title of the presentation.  Applications from scholars of all disciplines and doctoral and early-career researchers are welcomed.

 

Conference page is here.