Remembrance, History, and Justice. Coming to Terms with Traumatic Pasts in Democratic Societies

Abstract

Jerusalem, Haj Amin el-Husseini. He had been a collaborator with the Radio Division in the German Foreign Office during the Nazi regime, but in the postwar period, he became a member of the leadership in Palestine without being forced to change his views; he continued to combine anti-Zionism with visceral hatred of the Jews. Herf remarks that in the aftermath of gross human rights violations, there is tension between rapid democratization and judicial reckoning. In his view, the evolution of memory politics in Germany shows that where elements of the old regime persist and where foreign occupation has not taken place, as is the case in most post-dictatorial settings, the ability of the successor democracy to explore the traumatic past has been much weaker. However, by bringing into the discussion Husseini's case, he insists on the vital importance of the complete delegitimation of anti-Semitism and of the support for anti-democratic politics for allowing the possibility of coming to terms with the past. Similar to Chirot, Herf concludes that Germany was an exception because foreign powers and past democratic traditions eventually tipped the balance in favor of memory, despite the existence of widespread cynicism, opportunism, hypocrisy, and amnesia in the postwar period.The last chapter in this section adds an additional facet to Herf's general observations. Romanian political scientist, Alexandru Gussi, underlines the connection between deliberate politics of forgetting and biased politics of memory in post-communist Europe and the collective feelings of frustration among individuals living in this region's societies. He shows how the instrumentalization of the past subverted the moral weight that collective remembrance could potentially carry after 1989. Ultimately, Gussi's conclusions remain within the interpretative framework of the other contributors in the section: politics of memory are an integral part of democratization, but the latter process neither guarantees nor presupposes a genuine confrontation of the past. But the consequences of institutionalized amnesia or selective remembrance are dire on the long term, as they conceal societal tendencies that can severely subvert the very building of democracy.This insight is the stepping stone for Part Two of the volume, which discusses the relationship between the historicization of the past and the dynamics within different publics directly affected or involved in the process of dealing with past. Vladimir Tismaneanu's opening contribution is an essay that fulfills a double function. On the 12 REMEMBRANCE, HISTORY, AND JUSTICE Petrović underlines that as the Milošević trial moves from the legal field to join the ongoing memory wars over his role in the Yugoslav wars, its achievements ought not to be measured solely from the point of its procedural outcome. Despite the protracted and almost unmanageable nature of the proceedings, the trial produced a massive body of evidence, inspiring further proceedings on both the international and national level.The nex...