Remembrance, Democracy, and Violence: The Effectiveness of Transitional Justice
Friday, September 4, 12:00 pm to 1:30 pm
2026 APSA Annual Meeting & Exhibition — Boston, MA | Register here
In-person | Full Paper Panel
Participants:
- (Chair) Benjamin Curtiss Krick, Duke University
- (Discussant) Ethan vanderWilden, University of Wisconsin – Madison
Session Description:
In societies emerging from authoritarian rule and violent conflict, democratic consolidation is often threatened by unresolved legacies of repression, violence, and contested collective memory. What tools are available to protect fragile democracies and rebuild democratic norms in these contexts? This panel examines the role of symbolic transitional justice—including recognition, commemoration, memorials, museums, and educational reforms—in shaping political attitudes, democratic norms, and resistance to authoritarian backsliding. Collective memory is a critical but understudied site of democratic vulnerability and resilience. When narratives of the past remain unsettled, societies may become susceptible to authoritarian nostalgia, exclusionary nationalism, or the normalization of political violence. Conversely, symbolic transitional justice may help societies reckon with past abuses, instill democratic values, and guard against democratic erosion.
This panel brings together four papers that address these questions. The first two papers adopt a comparative perspective. Kljajić and Balcells examine how the sequencing of transitional justice mechanisms shapes democratic consolidation across cases. Rose analyzes the political and institutional factors that motivate states to invest in commemorative memorials and museums. The remaining two papers provide country-specific evidence. Krick studies a curriculum reform in Iraqi Kurdistan that integrates field trips to a transitional justice museum documenting atrocities committed under Saddam Hussein’s regime, assessing its effects on authoritarian nostalgia. Finally, Son conducts a field experiment in Japan to evaluate how visiting the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum influences conflict attitudes and norms surrounding nuclear nonuse. Together, the papers in this panel analyze the causes and consequences of symbolic transitional justice as a strategy for protecting democracy under threat and rebuilding democratic norms in post-authoritarian and post-conflict societies.
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