Editorials

South Africa: does a truth commission promote social reconciliation?

In South Africa the Truth and Reconciliation Commission is winding to a close next year after a marathon of testimony taking from victims and perpetrators. It has pushed rather harder than similarly named commissions in El Salvador or Argentina, where the political and military order implicated in the events under investigation was still essentially in power. Its purpose has been to facilitate society's recognition of the extent of state violence during apartheid by recording the accounts of ordinary victims and thus promote reconciliation.

What can we reliably say about the role of public apology, acknowledgment, and forgiveness in the aftermath of war or political violence? Does truth purify? In optimal circumstances do victims forgive and forget, or do they die off and a new generation grows up for whom what happened is more remote and eventually mere history? How are we to measure the social impact of a truth commission . . . [Full text of this article]

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This article has been cited by other articles:

• Summerfield, D. (2002). Effects of war: moral knowledge, revenge, reconciliation, and medicalised concepts of "recovery". BMJ 325: 1105-1107 [Full text]  
• Nicholson, J., Gerrard, N., Harris, E., Appleyard, W J., Southall, D., Shepherd, C. (1998). Humanitarian issues. BMJ 316: 76-76 [Full text]