Practices of memory in transitional justice : the construction of a collective memory in Tunisia

Abstract

This report sheds light on the critical relationship between transitional justice and memory. I examine how memorization processes within the context of transitional justice are presented as a healing mechanism for victims. I assess how these processes are often politicized, I examined how this politicization may occur in two instances: firstly, when memorization is practiced by the state for the purposes of building a national collective narrative through practices such as commemoration and creation of truth commissions or memory laws; new regimes use these practices to regain its authority in the public sphere and to give a sense of legitimization to their official narratives. Secondly, politicization may occur through the acts of civil society, their memorization turns into revolutionary conduct to oppose the official narrative of the new regime, hence their processes turn into a continuation to refuse and oppose forms of power, or either to demand an acknowledgment in the official institutions. I observe how politicizing these processes; whether by highlighting certain versions or ignoring others, affect the process of constructing a national and collective memory, and how it affect victims and their rights to truth and memory, which risks the idea of being re-victimized again in the process.