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Reconciliation is a process through which a society moves from a divided past to a shared future. A successful reconciliation is both a Goal: something to achieve and a Process: means to achieve that goal. A great deal of controversy arises from confusing these two ideas. The goal on the one hand, it is a future aspiration; perhaps something important to aim towards that should include finding ways to live alongside former enemies; not necessarily to forget the past in any way, but to peacefully coexist with them and develop a degree of co-existence and cooperation necessary to share the same social system.
The process on the other hand, it is very much a present tense, a means of dealing with how things are, which includes the search for the truth, justice, forgiveness, healing and reparation. Thus, seeking for accuracy about the past is a vital step in the reconciliation process; allowing victims to tell their stories, but truth itself is not enough for the victims to heal wounds of the past. Truth-seeking is just only one ingredient in the process of reconciliation which must be accompanied with and supported by unbiased justice. Thus, justice is a requirement for healing wounds of past by holding offenders accountable and reestablish victims' dignity, but justice alone cannot bring reconciliation. Truth and justice are not separate to reconciliation: they are key ingredients of it.
But how is it possible for someone to move forward when one does not know where she or he comes from? Peaceful co-existence, empathy, democracy and power sharing demand that justice is done or that in one way or the other, the crimes of the past are acknowledged and punished. Thus, reconciliation is not a matter of ignoring a cruel past but a matter of confronting it with unity, truth and justice. A genuine reconciliation consolidates peace, advocates for human rights and strengthens democratic institutions which pave the way for truth-telling, justice, and healing. Read our guide on reconciliation. |
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Published on 13.11.2018 at 03:16 
