6 UNDERSTANDING RECONCILIATION AND TRANSITIONAL JUSTICE Dzafura churu chimwe dzava nzivani. (Shona proverb meaning: ‘An experience shared unites people ever after.’) Understanding reconciliation (Brainstorming, mini lecture and group exercises) Reconciliation is both a process and the goal of repairing damaged relationships. It is often thought to originate in religious discourse and around the notions of forgiveness and mercy, but reconciliation now transcends religious discourse into the other components and disciplines in society. A post-conflict state is one that is in ‘transition’ and that is shifting from periods of gross human rights violations, mass violence or protracted armed conflict towards a peaceful, democratic future characterised by respect for human rights and the rule of law. Such a state must actively engage in a process of reconciliation – at the very least in the political and social domain – to promote national healing and avert the resurgence of violence and gross human rights violations in the future. Political reconciliation focuses on the characteristically impersonal relations among members of a political society. The actors involved in this form of reconciliation would include political parties and their leadership, and state institutions such as the security sector and the judiciary, among others. A state in transition that seeks to promote reconciliation must move away from a concern with the resolution of issues towards a frame of reference that provides a focus on the restoration and rebuilding of relationships.1 Reconciliation is closely linked to the notion of transitional justice. Transitional justice seeks to address legacies of large-scale past abuses and includes mechanisms such as acknowledgement and truth-telling, criminal trials, reparations and guarantees of nonrecurrence, memorialisation, and institutional reform. The anticipated outcome of such mechanisms is the creation of a platform where national healing, cohesion and reconciliation can begin. A key note to states in transition is that reconciliation is not an isolated event but is rather a process which involves an integrated approach on the part of many actors – political leaders, civil society, faith-based institutions, communities and individuals – and extends over a significant period of time. Reconciliation and transitional justice are interdependent. Reconciliation is perceived as one of the pillars of transitional justice, which include truth-seeking, justice, reparations, and guarantees of non-recurrence. Reconciliation is also the product of transitional-justice interventions in a given society. Ultimately, at the core of the reconciliation process is the institutionalisation of transitional justice.2 In this sense, no matter the school of thought, implicit in transitional justice is the concept of reconciliation and the recognition that the practice of reconciliation is a process and not a one-off event in a country in transition. 1 This understanding of the concept of reconciliation can be found in the following works: Roth, J. (2004). Unless experience: Its significance for reconciliation after Auschwitz. In D. Patterson & J. K. Roth (Eds.), After words: post holocaust struggles with forgiveness, reconciliation, justice. Seattle: University of Washington Press, p. 86; Philpott, D. (2006). Introduction. In D. Philpott (Ed.), The politics of past evil: Religion, reconciliation and the dilemmas of transitional justice. Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, p. 14; and Govier, T. & Verwoerd, W. (2002). Trust and the problem of national reconciliation. Philosophy of the Social Sciences, 32(2), 178–205. This is the second sense of reconciliation that Paul M. Hughes identifies in his 2001 article: Moral atrocity and political reconciliation: A preliminary analysis. International Journal of Applied Philosophy, 15(1), 123–135. 2 Murithi, T. (2009). The value of reconciliation. In The ethics of peacebuilding. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, p. 136. Module 6: Community healing through reconciliation and transitional justice 95