South Africa's amnesty was a unique experiment. A path that lay 'between a Nuremberg option and total amnesia, ' the amnesty process was designed in the heat of a remarkable and complex transition to constitutional democracy

"A compelling read." Richard J. Goldstone, former Chief Prosecutor of the UN tribunals for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda "A very important contribution." Princeton N. Lyman, Council on Foreign Relations "A powerful reminder that dealing with the legacy of wartime atrocities is not simply a matter of bringing perpetrators to justice. It also means overcoming the divisions within the society and healing the victims." Marina Ottaway, Senior Associate, Democracy and Rule of Law Project, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace In Amnesty after Atrocity? veteran journalist Helena Cobban examines the effectiveness of different ways of dealing with the aftermath of genocide and violence committed during intergroup conflicts. She traveled to Rwanda, Mozambique, and South Africa to assess the various ways those nations tried to come to grips with their violent past: from war crimes trials to truth commissions to outright amnesties for perpetrators. She discovered that in terms of both moving forward and satisfying the needs of survivors, war crimes trials are not the most effective path. This book provides historical context and includes interviews with a cross-section of people: community leaders, victims, policymakers, teachers, rights activists, and even some former abusers. These first-person accounts create a rich, readable text, and Cobban's overall conclusions will surprise many readers in the West.

"Of the truth commissions to date, the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) has most effectively captured public attention throughout the world and provided the model for succeeding bodies. Although other truth commissions had preceded its establishment, the TRC had a far more expansive mandate: to go beyond truth-finding to promote national unity and reconciliation, to facilitate the granting of amnesty to those who made full factual disclosure, to restore the human and civil dignity of victims by providing them an opportunity to tell their own stories, and to make recommendations to the president on measures to prevent future human rights violations.

For the last thirty years, documented human rights violations have been met with an unprecedented rise in demands for accountability. This trend challenges the use of amnesties which typically foreclose opportunities for criminal prosecutions that some argue are crucial to transitional justice. Recent developments have seen amnesties circumvented, overturned, and resisted by lawyers, states, and judiciaries committed to ending impunity for human rights violations. Yet, despite this global movement, the use of amnesties since the 1970s has not declined. Amnesties, Accountability, and Human Rights examines why and how amnesties persist in the face of mounting pressure to prosecute the perpetrators of human rights violations. Drawing on more than 700 amnesties instituted between 1970 and 2005, Renée Jeffery maps out significant trends in the use of amnesty and offers a historical account of how both the use and the perception of amnesty has changed. As mechanisms to facilitate transitions to democracy, to reconcile divided societies, or to end violent conflicts, amnesties have been adapted to suit the competing demands of contemporary postconflict politics and international accountability norms. Through the history of one evolving political instrument, Amnesties, Accountability, and Human Rights sheds light on the changing thought, practice, and goals of human rights discourse generally.

This edited volume brings together well-established and emerging scholars of transitional justice to discuss the persistence of amnesty in the age of human rights accountability. The volume attempts to reframe debates, moving beyond the limited approaches of 'truth versus justice' or 'stability versus accountability' in which many of these issues have been cast in the existing scholarship. The theoretical and empirical contributions in this book offer new ways of understanding and tackling the enduring persistence of amnesty in the age of accountability. In addition to cross-national studies, the volume encompasses eleven country cases of amnesty for past human rights violations: Argentina, Brazil, Cambodia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Indonesia, Rwanda, South Africa, Spain, Uganda and Uruguay. The volume goes beyond merely describing these case studies, but also considers what we learn from them in terms of overcoming impunity and promoting accountability to contribute to improvements in human rights and democracy.

Amnesty, Serious Crimes and International Law examines the permissibility of amnesties for serious crimes in the contemporary international order. In the last few decades, there has been a growing tendency to consider that amnesties are prohibited in respect of certain grave crimes. However, the question remains controversial as there is no explicit treaty ban and general amnesties continue to be frequently issued in post-conflict and transitional contexts. The first part of the book explores the use of amnesties from antiquity to the present day. It reviews amnesty traditions in ancient societies and provides a global picture of modern amnesties. In parallel, it traces the development of the accountability paradigm underpinning the current prohibitive stance on amnesties. The second part assesses the position of modern international law on amnesties. It comprehensively analyses the main arguments supporting the existence of a general amnesty ban, including the duty to prosecute international crimes, the right to redress of victims of human rights violations, international standards and trends in state practice, and the mandate of international criminal courts. The book argues that, while international legal or policy requirements restrict the freedom of states to extend amnesty in respect of serious crimes, or the effectiveness of amnesty measures in preventing the prosecution of such crimes, these restrictions do not add up to an absolute and universal prohibition.

Providing a refreshing take on transitional justice, this second edition Research Handbook brings together an expanse of scholarly expertise to reconsider how societies deal with gross human rights violations, structural injustices and mass violence. Contextualised by historical developments, it covers a diverse range of concepts, actors and mechanisms of transitional justice, while shedding light on new and emerging areas in the field.