Narrative expressivism: A criminological approach to the expressive function of international criminal justice

Abstract

In response to recent demands to make use of international criminal justice institutions' archives for social scientific research, this article develops a theoretical approach to international criminal justice called narrative expressivism. Narrative expressivism considers criminal justice as a potent source of information about past crimes-yet also, as a site that impacts on present and future societal understandings of mass violence, promoting a particular structuring of thought. As such, narrative expressivism addresses what kind of knowledge international criminal justice, its institutions and archives, provide the empirical basis for. Theorizing expressivism through a narrative lens, narrative expressivism shifts the emphasis of legal expressivist approaches from facts to stories, from punishment to process, from purpose to function, and from the normative to the descriptive.

Violent re-presentations: Reflections on the ethics of re-presentation in violence research

“…More than a third of those convicted at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) were convicted for crimes that included sexual violence (ICTY, n.a.). Thus, particularly for conflict-related sexual violence, ICJ mechanisms have become an important source of information about these forms of violence (Houge, 2019; Skjelsbæk, 2015).…”

“…The research on conflict-related sexual violence that the reflections herein derive from focuses on the legal, social, and political narratives about complex problems that ICJ produces and contributes to. In particular, its focus is on juridified re-presentations of violence and suffering and the individuals that surface these narratives as victims and offenders (Houge, 2016(Houge, , 2019. While the introductory quote from a US Courts-martial points to the inherent limitations of language's capacity to articulate war crimes and experiences, the actors of criminal justice-including the epistemic community of advocates, journalists, and scholars that surrounds them-do their part in shaping both legal and societal imageries of the violence, its agents, causes, victims, and consequences.…”

Imageries of Self: Guilty Plea Statements in Sexual Violence Cases at the ICTY

“…It refers to research that addresses ICJ as a site for storytelling and knowledge construction, catering to the different constraints and motivations of stories in this field. Narrative expressivism “considers [ICJ] as a site that impacts on present and future societal understandings of mass violence, promoting a particular structuring of thought” (Houge, 2019, p. 288). I have previously exemplified narrative expressivism by reference to the speech acts of two defiant defendants who used the ICTY proceedings against them as a platform for public protest as they attempted to taint the history of their role and responsibilities that the Tribunal produced (Houge, 2019).…”

“…Narrative expressivism “considers [ICJ] as a site that impacts on present and future societal understandings of mass violence, promoting a particular structuring of thought” (Houge, 2019, p. 288). I have previously exemplified narrative expressivism by reference to the speech acts of two defiant defendants who used the ICTY proceedings against them as a platform for public protest as they attempted to taint the history of their role and responsibilities that the Tribunal produced (Houge, 2019). Yet, defendants’ narratives need not take the form of protest for them to be relevant subjects of narrative expressivist analyses.…”

“…In this article, however, I argue that defendants’ stories matter because of the instrumental purposes they serve rather than in terms of the truth level they entail. Whether their stories help or challenge the prospects of justice and reconciliation, international criminal tribunals provide a platform for defendants to address multiple constituencies (Houge, 2019).…”