The impact of human rights prosecutions : insights from European, Latin American, and African post-conflict societies / edited by Ulrike Capdepon and Rosario Figari Layus.

Format:

Book

Contributor:

Figari Layus, Rosario, editor.

Capdepón, Ulrike, editor.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Human rights--Cases.

Human rights.

Crimes against humanity.

Criminal justice, Administration of.

War crimes trials.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (243 pages)

Place of Publication:

Leuven : Leuven University Press, [2020]

Summary:

Human rights prosecutions are the most prominent mechanisms that victims demand to obtain accountability. Dealing with a legacy of gross human rights violations presents opportunities to enhance the right to justice and promote a more equal application of criminal law, a fundamental condition for a more substantive democracy in societies. This book seeks to analyse the impact, advances, and difficulties of prosecuting perpetrators of mass atrocities at national and international levels. What role does criminal justice play in redressing victims' wrongs, guaranteeing the non-repetition of mass atrocities, and attempting to overcome the damage caused by systematic human rights violations? This volume addresses critical issues in the field of human rights prosecution by drawing on the experiences of a variety of post-conflict and authoritarian countries covering three world regions. Contributing authors cover prosecutions in post-Nazi Germany, post-Communist Romania, and transnational legal complaints by victims of the Franco dictatorship, as well as domestic and third-country prosecutions for human rights violations in the pioneering South American countries of Argentina, Chile, Peru, and Uruguay, prosecutions in Darfur and Kenya, and the work of the International Criminal Court. The Impact of Human Rights Prosecutions offers insights into the difficulties human rights trials face in different contexts and regions, and also illustrates the development of these legal procedures over time. The volume will be of interest to human rights scholars as well as legal practitioners, participants, justice system actors, and policy makers.

Contents:

Prologue / Aleida Assmann

Introduction : do human rights trials make a difference after conflict, dictatorship and state-sponsored violence? / Rosario Figari Layús and Ulrike Capdepón

Human rights trials without human rights law : prosecuting Nazi crimes in postwar Germany after Nuremberg / Annette Weinke

Courts as a site to tell the "truth" : the case of former prison commander Alexandru Vişinescu / Kristine Avram

Seeking justice for the crimes of the Franco dictatorship : the politics of victimhood in the "Argentine legal complaint" / Ulrike Capdepón

The struggle of victims for human rights trials in post-dictatorship Chile / Boris Hau

The state against the state : the impact of governmental contradictions on human rights trials and victims in Argentina / Rosario Figari Layús

Operation Condor trials abroad : the innovation and domestic constraints of transnational prosecution / Debbie Sharnak

Tensions between criminal trials and the sense of justice in post-conflict Peru / Iris Jave

The International Criminal Court's "Africa problem" and suppression of the "justice cascade" / Geoffrey Lugano

Conditions and cultural consequences of international criminal justice intervention : the case of Darfur / Joachim J. Savelsberg

The effects of seeking justice on behalf of the victim : a critical analysis of criminal trials in the Kenyan post-election violence transitional justice process / Valeria Vegh Weis

Concluding reflections : towards the end of impunity? the scope and impact of human rights trials / Rosario Figari Layús and Ulrike Capdepón.

Notes:

Description based on print version record.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

94-6270-249-7

OCLC:

1224153805