After the Truth Commission: Gender and Citizenship in Timor-Leste

This article explores the relationship between truth commissions and gendered citizenship through a case study of Timor-Leste. It examines how, 10 years after the Commission for Reception, Truth and Reconciliation (CAVR) has completed its work, women’s citizenship remains constrained by, and negotiated within, deeply gendered narratives of nation-building that are informed by historical experiences of the resistance struggle. The power of these narratives—which foreground heroism rather than victimisation—underscores the need to situate truth commissions as part of an ongoing politics of memory. Despite the power of political elites to shape this politics, the continued marginalisation of sections of society within official narratives is also providing an impetus for alternative truth-telling efforts that seek to broaden public perspectives on the past. By promoting new narratives of women’s experiences of the conflict, these projects might be understood as attempts to negotiate and transform gendered conceptions of citizenship in the present and for the future.     

Greg Grandin and Thomas Miller Klubock, eds. 'Truth Commissions: State Terror, History, and Memory,' a special issue of Radical History Review 97

What does Radical History Review have to say about truth commissions?The journal gives them mixed reviews in this special issue,Truth Commissions: State Terror, History, and Memory. Accordingto the authors of the three full-length articles which makeup the volume, truth commissions’ treatment of past violencemay sometimes hew too closely to depoliticized narratives ofindividual victims and perpetrators – foregoing deeperaccounts of structural violence. Or, their     

Truth Skepticism: An Inquiry into the Value of Truth in Times of Transition

Truth commissions have become so fashionable in times of transitionthat one can readily recognize what might be called a ‘truthcascade.’ The commissions, and the reports they produce,are reputed to promote many of the goals at the heart of thetransitional justice project: helping victims to heal, promotingaccountability, drawing a bright line between the past and thepresent, promoting reconciliation and so forth. And yet, a closerlook at the truth-seeking enterprise suggests that it may notbe able to deliver on these promises. This article exploresboth the intrinsic and instrumental reasons why truth commissionsmay not be effective in promoting the goals attributed to them.The article does not argue that transitional governments shouldnot pursue the truth, but it does urge governments to use cautionand careful planning when they do so.     

The curious case of Ali Cenani Bey: the story of a génocidaire during and after the 1915 Armenian genocide

While there exists an extensive body of literature addressing the Armenian genocide, certain gaps persist. The processes and events of the genocide have been unearthed and examined, but genocide is not a phenomenon set in motion by a force of nature. On the contrary, the systematic destruction of Ottoman Armenians was designed and executed by a cadre of individuals, most of whom are little known today. Kurt’s aim here is to recover the story of one such actor from a particular town, Aintab, modern-day Gaziantep—situated on the boundaries of Cilicia (today the southern part of Anatolia) and Syria, near both the Mediterranean Sea and the Gulf of Alexandretta—thereby revealing the perpetrators and their active involvement in the destruction of Armenians at the local/provincial level. Kurt’s article seeks to shed light on such a perpetrator by analysing the objective features of his background and career. Highlighting the human dimension of the genocide allows for an examination of the actors—their motives and their acts—that ultimately bore responsibility for the catastrophic loss of life. Kurt focuses on the life story of Ali Cenani (1872–1934): his background and involvement in the 1915 Armenian deportation and genocide as well as his career in post-genocide Turkey.     

Pragmatic solidarity and asylum expert witnessing

The demand for expert witness testimony has increased in recent years as the numbers of applicants for refugee status/asylum continue to rise and legal restrictions tighten. While the contribution of expert testimony improves outcomes for refugee and asylum claimants and has generated new critical scholarship, participation as an expert witness is not without political, legal, and ethical concerns. Framed in terms of “pragmatic solidarity,” or the application of specialized knowledge to social justice goals, this article situates expert testimony in refugee and asylum procedures within wider considerations of power to explore how it is both beneficial and problematic, and how it may shape, and be shaped by, a researcher’s own situated questions, methods, and orientation.     

Speaking the truth

Suspicion regarding the notion of truth is a characteristic feature of much contemporary thought. Often this suspicion is based in a view that takes truth to be a notion associated with a discredited view of knowledge or with an oppressive and exclusionary politics. That the very possibility of knowledge, and so of our access to the truth, can be put in question and that truth itself always operates within a political dimension are not, of course, claims that can be denied. Nor can it be denied that knowledge, truth and power are closely tied together. But these considerations should prompt us to a reappraisal of the notion of truth that sees it as more, not less, significant. This paper is an attempt to begin such a reappraisal and to attend, not merely to the truth. Speaking the truth is not something the successful achievement of which can, in every case, be guaranteed in advance; yet neither is it something that we can abandon or ignore.     

A Trojan Horse? Unionism, Trust and Truth-telling in Northern Ireland

The aim of this article is to examine the relationship betweentrust, testimony and truth recovery processes as part of post-conflicttransition. The paper uses the case study of unionist attitudestoward a community-based truth-telling project in Northern Irelandto demonstrate the impact an absence of trust can have uponwhat the French philosopher Paul Ricoeur has described as the‘space of controversy’ that emerges between the‘certification’ and the ‘accreditation’of testimony. The paper suggests such distrust is a legacy,not only of conflict, but also of the particular circumstancesof transition and the specific mechanisms of truth recoveryadopted. Ultimately the paper argues for a holistic, community-centredapproach towards truth-telling and raises issues relevant toother violently divided societies undergoing transition andgrappling with ways in which to deal with the legacy of politicalconflict.     

The HIH Royal Commission and the Tangled Web of Truth

There are high expectations that the HIH Royal Commission will uncover the truth about the collapse of the HIH insurance group and bring to justice the individuals and organistions culpable for the losses incurred. This article argues that this hope for veracity flies in the face of other royal commissions into financial issues in Australia which were but verisimilitude.     

The truth about youth? Media portrayals of young people and politics in Britain

Some forms of political participation in Britain appear to be in crisis. Official rates of turnout are alarmingly poor and the sub‐population least likely to participate in general—and vote in particular—is the youngest section of society. Moreover, the way that the media and and politicians have responded to the apparent crisis of youth participation has become a self‐fulfilling prophecy. A full review of young people's place in the political environment is needed. This requires the application of different criteria for evaluating youth interests, and the avoidance of some of the most routinely used phrases to describe young people's attitudes to politics. Copyright © 2004 Henry Stewart Publications     

Heaven's Talent Scout: Prime Ministerial Power,Ecclesiastical Patronage and the Governance of Britain

In the last decade the role of the Prime Minister in the process for making senior Church appointments has changed significantly. The man who replaces Dr Rowan Williams—and it will be a man—will be appointed through a procedure in which the Prime Minister is expected to enjoy no choice but to simply confirm the Church of England's preferred candidate. The aim of this article is to draw upon fresh empirical research in order to explore why and how the politics and governance of ecclesiastical patronage has been recalibrated in this way. More importantly this article seeks to embed the study of ecclesiastical patronage within a much broader appreciation of how other forms of ministerial patronage have also become tightly constrained. This, in itself, forges a connection between the role of politicians in senior Church appointments, on the one hand, and a much richer and broader seam of research and writing that poses distinct questions about the nature of modern governance, the benefits of depoliticisation, the accountability of appointment commissions, the capacity of politicians and the future of democracy.     

Environmental Justice and Information Technologies: Overcoming the Information-Access Paradox in Urban Communities

Scientific studies and resident testimony suggest that urban residents in low-income and minority communities have been subject to an unequal burden of environmental pollution and inequitable environmental enforcement practices. A key component of the equitable development and implementation of environmental policies is the participation of citizens and community-based organizations in the policy process. Such participation rests upon equitable access to agency-generated environmental information and effective use of that information by citizens. This article focuses on the adoption of Internet technologies by environmental agencies as a mechanism for disseminating information and the implications for low-income and minority residents in urban communities. A framework is developed to guide a programmatic response to overcome these implications. The results from several community-based projects are described and analyzed for their capacity-building effectiveness. Analysis of the projects indicates improvement in community capacity for information access and use, which bolstered community participation in the environmental decision-making process.     

The intergenerational transmission of welfare participation: Facts and possible causes

This article explores two methodological issues in measuring intergenerational correlations in welfare participation. First, a method is proposed that controls for differences in eligibility as well as participation. Second, the use of event history analysis allows all available information on mothers' and daughters' welfare histories to be used. The National Longitudinal Survey of Youth is used to measure the intergenerational correlation among whites, blacks, and Hispanics. Three broad conclusions emerge. First, parental participation in Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) is correlated with daughters' AFDC participation for whites and Hispanics—daughters living in households that received assistance have higher probabilities of having a child and receiving assistance in the year of first birth than similar daughters whose parents didn't participate (or participated for shorter periods). Second, parents' participation does not seem to be capturing solely the effects of low income which leads to a correlation in mothers' and daughters' eligibility. Finally, the loss of income if the parent does not participate raises the probability that the daughter will receive assistance. The effect of this income loss offsets nearly half of the participation effect for whites.     

The Airports Commission,the Dilemmas of Political Leadership and the Third Runway at Heathrow Airport

This article assesses the character, role and outcomes of the Airports Commission. Analysing its workings from September 2012, it evaluates the final recommendations and then charts their subsequent public reception. The article claims that the Airports Commission's endeavours to depoliticise aviation by using ‘reasonable’ methods and impartial judgements—often embodied in Howard Davies himself—have been met with local resistance and political opposition, focussed on the proposal to expand either Heathrow or Gatwick. It exposes how the recourse to expert commissions offers only temporary respite for government responsibility and accountability in the making of hard decisions. It concludes that the inability to secure a binding and acceptable agreement does not just reside at the door of the Airports Commission, but rests also on the failures of political leadership and the ‘missed opportunity’ to articulate a sustainable vision for aviation after the 2010 moratorium on airport expansion in the south‐east of England.     

Blogging and political information: truth or truthiness?

Does the blogosphere generate truth, or what Stephen Colbert calls ‘truthiness,’ facts or concepts one only wishes or believes were true? Bloggers and the mainstream media face the same difficulties if they wish to rely on the blogosphere as a generator of truth. First, both bloggers and media converge on a small number of key blogs as sources of information. But the proprietors of these elite blogs are likely to resist information that doesn’t conform to their existing attitudes and beliefs, precisely because they are already highly aware of politics. Second, blogs and blog readers are likely to separate themselves into smaller networks according to their particular tastes. However, under some circumstances the blogosphere may still approximate a parallel processing statistical estimator of the truth with ‘nice’ properties. The key to this outcome is that judgments are independent, and that problems of polarization are mitigated.     

Priming citizens to think about public participation initiatives: Does it impact their view of government?

Prior research has shown that public participation initiatives may have positive effects on how participating citizens view government. However, little is known about whether and how priming citizens to think about such initiatives influences the view of government among the larger public. Using a survey experiment, we find that the effect of priming citizens to think of a public participation initiative that includes a small group of citizens on their view of government is conditional on how proximate the service, which the initiative resolves around, is to citizens. Notably, across outcome measures we a find a negative priming effect among those for which the service is not proximate. These results are highly important, as they suggest that among the larger public, public participation initiatives—that involve few citizens—may have mixed results on the view of government, thus questioning the legitimacy of decisions reached by such initiatives.     

Does Truth Lead to Reconciliation? Testing the Causal Assumptions of the South African Truth and Reconciliation Process

Throughout the world, truth commissions have been created under the assumption that getting people to understand the past will somehow contribute to reconciliation between those who were enemies under the ancien regime . In South Africa, the truth and reconciliation process is explicitly based on the hypothesis that knowledge of the past will lead to acceptance, tolerance, and reconciliation in the future. My purpose here is to test that hypothesis, based on data collected in a 2001 survey of over 3,700 South Africans. My most important finding is that those who accept the "truth" about the country's apartheid past are more likely to hold reconciled racial attitudes. Racial reconciliation also depends to a considerable degree on interracial contact, evidence that adds weight to the "contact hypothesis" investigated by western social scientists. Ultimately, these findings are hopeful for South Africa's democratic transition, since racial attitudes seem not to be intransigent.     

未来纪委建设的方向——基于党内监督机构的演变规律

党内监督机构受腐败形势和反腐败模式影响,权威性和独立性不断提高,运作不断规范。未来将推行新的双重领导体制以提高纪委的独立性,纪委的权威性将得到适度控制,腐败的复杂化将迫使纪委不得不提速自身的能力建设,纪委将更加注重吸纳网络民意,并与社会生态的改变形成良性互动。     

What's left after right-wing extremism? The effects on political orientation

Does radical right political violence favour or hinder public support for right-wing stances? Numerous existing studies have demonstrated that Islamic terrorism provokes a conservative shift, increases nationalism and induces negative sentiments towards immigration. However, little is known about the consequences of far-right terrorism, despite its incidence in Western societies. We leverage four waves of the British Election Study (BES) and use a quasi-experimental design to analyse individual political orientations shortly before and after terrorist attacks. We find that respondents distance themselves from the ideology associated with the perpetrator and shift away from ideological positions at the right end of the political spectrum. Furthermore, respondents are less likely to report nationalistic attitudes and immigration skepticism, core tenets of extremist right-wing political ideologies. Our findings suggest that the characteristics of the perpetrators and their driving goals are crucial factors shaping the impact of terrorism on public sentiments.     

Truth and Reconciliation in South Africa: Did the TRC Deliver? ed. Audrey R. Chapman and Hugo van der Merwe; Narrating Political Reconciliation: South Africa's Truth and Reconciliation Commission, Claire Moon

The South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC)is by far the most noted and praised truth commission in theworld. It has served as a role model to many of the subsequenttruth commissions set up worldwide, as well as inspired a vastbulk of scholarly literature. For those interested in the truthand reconciliation process in South Africa, or in truth commissionsin general, two read-worthy books have appeared on the marketthat offer a much-needed sobering account of the TRC. The edited volume by Audrey Chapman and Hugo van der Merwe isto my knowledge the most comprehensive and penetrating analysisof the truth and reconciliation process in South Africa. Theauthors argue that it is time to assess critically the TRC process,as well