Imagining Transitional Justice : The Construction of Meaning in the Arts and Law

This book explores how legal and artistic narratives construct shared meanings of truth, justice, healing, and reconciliation after atrocity. Through four case studies that connect the ICTY and ICTR cases with novels, film and theatre, the book reveals how transitional justice is imagined and conceptualised in reflective narratives.

Imagining Transitional Justice contends that reflective narratives encompass conceptualisations of the processes of (re)building lives and societies after war and genocide. It shows how narratives produced slowly in and through the arts and law construct meaning and operationalise the notions of truth, justice, healing and reconciliation in the wake of the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda and Yugoslav Wars. In doing so, this book contributes to the ongoing task of theorising transitional justice and establishing shared meanings of the core concepts of the field. The book analyses stories and encounters that imagine different futures through methods of 'law and literature'. Four case studies bring together creative narratives, such as a novel or film, and legal cases from the ICTY and ICTR. The book locates legal and creative narratives as part of knowledge production, reflecting on their critical potential in transitional justice.