Between Retribution and Restoration – explaining the Politics of Transitional Justice

Transitional Justice has become an increasing field of research and academic discussion during the decades after World War II. What originally was a subject mainly for historians and lawyers, has now become a field for sociologists and political scientists, too. That is why we see a need to include Transitional Justice into the activities of ECPR and intend to integrate researchers who concentrate on issues of legal transition and institutions and mechanisms of “dealing with the past”. We expect the workshop to be of great interest to at least some of the ECPR standing groups, like the ones dealing with International Relations, Central and East European Politics, Comparative Political Institutions, Latin American Politics, Security Politics, Southern European Politics and with the European Union. We invite empirical oriented papers which embrace comparative, cross-national approaches, which allow identifying and analyzing patterns of Transitional Justice in more than only one country and can contribute to a better theoretical understanding of Transitional Justice mechanisms. Even when only one country is dealt with, the analysis should attempt to make wider claims about the mechanisms of Transitional Justice. The overarching perspective for all papers should be an attempt to explain the choices made in particular countries between restorative and retributive justice and different combinations of both. Why do some transitional societies apply harsh and punitive measures against former dictators, perpetrators and their followers, whereas others grant de facto or de jure amnesties? How can we explain the difference in the scope of punitive measures and cross – national differences of the number of people excluded from society? How do transitional societies construe notions of guilt and criminal responsibility and apply exclusive measures during and after transition? What are the driving forces behind the institutional design for transitional justice? We warmly welcome and encourage papers dealing with the politics and policies of the EU in that field: How can we explain the preferences within the EU with respect to retributive and restorative justice in a transitional context? Why does the EU strongly support retributive measures in some cases (like the former Yugoslavia, the ICC), whereas it supports restorative institutions in others (South Africa, Northern Ireland)? Why did the EU require compliance with the ICTY in the former Yugoslavia as a precondition for accession, but refrain from any demands for vetting with respect to Central and Eastern post-communist Europe? Contributions to the workshop could also try to address some of the already existing theoretical claims made by authors like Huntington, Stan, Welsh, Kitschelt et al, Nedelsky, Nalepa , Teitel and Elster.