Truth commission
A truth commission, also known as a truth and reconciliation commission or truth and justice commission, is an official body tasked with discovering and revealing past wrongdoing by a government (or, depending on the circumstances, non-state actors also), in the hope of resolving conflict left over from the past. Truth commissions are, under various names, occasionally set up by states emerging from periods of internal unrest, civil war, or dictatorship marked by human rights abuses. In both their truth-seeking and reconciling functions, truth commissions have political implications: they "constantly make choices when they define such basic objectives as truth, reconciliation, justice, memory, reparation, and recognition, and decide how these objectives should be met and whose needs should be served".[1]
This article is about commissions formed to discover and reveal past wrongdoings. For bodies named Truth and Reconciliation Commission, see Truth and Reconciliation Commission (disambiguation). For other uses, see Truth Commission (disambiguation).
According to one widely cited definition: "A truth commission (1) is focused on the past, rather than in ongoing events; (2) investigates a pattern of events that took place over a period of time; (3) engages directly and broadly with the affected population, gathering information on their experiences; (4) is a temporary body, with the aim of concluding with a final report; and (5) is officially authorized or empowered by the state under review".[2]
The term used in the Australian context of reconciliation with its Indigenous peoples is truth telling.
History[edit]
The first truth commissions did not use the name, but aimed to unearth the truth about human rights violations under military regimes, predominantly in Latin America. Bolivia established a National Commission of Inquiry Into Disappearances in 1982 based on bringing together disparate sectors of society after the end of military rule, but the commission never reported. An earlier and perhaps the first such commission occurred in Uganda in 1974, and was known as the Truth Commission: Commission of Inquiry into the Disappearances of People in Uganda since 25 January 1971.
The first such commission to be effective was Argentina's National Commission on the Disappearance of Persons, created by President of Argentina Raúl Alfonsín on 15 December 1983. It issued the Nunca Más (Never Again) report, which documented human rights violations under the military dictatorship known as the National Reorganization Process. The report was delivered to Alfonsín on 20 September 1984 and opened the door to the Trial of the Juntas, the first major trial held for war crimes since the Nuremberg trials in Germany following World War II and the first to be conducted by a civilian court.
Ugandan president Yoweri Museveni established the Commission of Inquiry into Violations of Human Rights (CIVHR) in 1986 to investigate human rights abuses under his predecessors Idi Amin and Milton Obote. The commission suffered from under-resourcing and did not deliver its report until 1994.[12] In Chile, shortly after the country's return to democracy, a Truth and Reconciliation Commission was established in April 1990.[13] It was the first to use the name and most truth commissions since then have used a variation on the title. Other early commissions were established in diverse locations including Nepal (1990), El Salvador (1992), Guatemala (1994), and Ireland (1994).