Hostname: page-component-8448b6f56d-m8qmq Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-19T11:41:41.243Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Constructing a Common Language: The Function of Nuremberg in the Problematization of Postapartheid Justice

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 December 2018

Stéphane Leman-Langlois
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This paper analyzes the function acquired by the historical Nuremberg trial in the constitution of a specific discourse about transitional South Africa and about what should be done about the brutality of the past. This function is best described as mythical: emptied of content, Nuremberg was a blank slate on which all parties to the debate could write their conflicting representations of the situation and their respective proposed solutions. The organization of fundamentally incompatible representations of reality around unifying myths such as Nuremberg was key to the production of visible consensus on the proper evaluation of the sociopolitical situation and the basic characteristics of the right course of action, and thus the appearance of effective state administration in a reconciled nation.

Type
Research Article
Information
Law & Social Inquiry , Volume 27 , Issue 1 , Winter 2002 , pp. 79 - 100
Copyright
Copyright © American Bar Foundation, 2002 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

African National Congress [ANC]. 1992. Skweyiya Commission Report: Report of the Commission of Enquiry into Complaints by Former African National Congress Prisoners and Detainees. On the web: http://www.anc.org.za/ancdocs/misc/skweyiya.html.Google Scholar
African National Congress [ANC]. 1993. Report of the Commission of Enquiry into Certain Allegations of Cruelty and Human Rights Abuse against ANC Prisoners and Detainees by ANC Members. Motsuenyane Commission, ANC internal documents.Google Scholar
Carbonell, Charles-Olivier, and Rives, Jean, eds. 1990. Mythes et politique. Toulouse, France: Presses de 1'Institut d'Études Politiques.Google Scholar
Cohen, Stanley. 1994. Social Control and the Politics of Reconciliation. In The Futures of Criminology, ed. Nelken, David, 63–88. London: Sage.Google Scholar
Cohen, Stanley. 1995. State Crimes of Previous Regimes: Knowledge, Accountability and the Policing of the Past. Law and Social Inquiry 20 (1): 7–50.Google Scholar
Crozier, Michel, and Friedberg, Erhard. 1992. L'acteur et le système. Paris: Seuil.Google Scholar
Dreyfus, Hubert, and Rabinow, Paul. 1983. Michel Foucault: Beyond Structuralism and Hermeneutics. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Edelman, Murray. 1971. Politics as Symbolic Action: Mass Arousal and Quiescence. Chicago: Markham.Google Scholar
Ensalaco, Mark. 1994. Truth Commissions for Chile and El Salvador: A Report and Assessment. Human Rights Quarterly 16: 656–75.Google Scholar
Feitlowitz, Marguerite. 1998. A Lexicon of Terror: Argentina and the Legacies of Torture. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Flood, Christopher. 1996. Political Myth: A Theoretical Introduction. New York: Garland.Google Scholar
Foucault, Michel. 1982. The Discourse on Language. In The Archaeology of Knowledge. New York: Pantheon.Google Scholar
Foucault, Michel. 1984. Polemics, Politics and Problematizations: An Interview. In The Foucault Reader, ed. Rabinow, Paul, 381–90. New York: Pantheon.Google Scholar
Foucault, Michel. 1991. Governmentality. In The Foucault Effect: Studies in Governmentality, ed. Burchell, Graham, Gordon, Colin, and Miller, Peter, 87–104. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Giliomee, Hermann. 1997. TRC Report, Academics and History. Cape Times, 23 Oct., 8.Google Scholar
Gobodo-Madikizela, Pumla. 1996. Reenactment of Old Identities and Implications for Reconciliation. Paper presented at the Fortieth Annual Convention of the Institute of Personnel Management, 21 October. TRC internal documents.Google Scholar
Goldhagen, Daniel Jonah. 1996. Hitler's Willing Executioners: Ordinary Germans and the Holocaust. New York: Alfred A. Knopf.Google Scholar
Hayner, Priscilla. 1994. Fifteen Truth Commissions: A Comparative Study. Human Rights Quarterly 16: 597–655.Google Scholar
Huyse, Luc. 1995. Justice after Transition: On the Choices Successor Elites Make in Dealing with the Past. Law and Social Inquiry 20 (1): 51–70.Google Scholar
Jung, Courteney, and Shapiro, Ian. 1995. South Africa's Negotiated Transition: Democracy, Opposition and the New Constitutional Order. Politics and Society 23 (3): 269–308.Google Scholar
Leman-Langlois, Stéphane. 2000. Mobilizing Victimization: The Construction of a Victim-centred Approach in the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission. Criminologie 33 (1): 145–65.Google Scholar
Lós, Maria. 1995. Lustration and Truth Claims: Unfinished Revolutions in Central Europe. Law and Social Inquiry 20 (1): 117–62.Google Scholar
National Party. 1997. Second Submission to the Truth And Reconciliation Commission. Original distributed on 23 March 1997.Google Scholar
Nel, Philip. 1995. Transition through Erosion: Comparing South Africa's Democratisation. Aussenpolitik 46: 82–93.Google Scholar
South Africa. 1994. Hansard Debates of the National Assembly; Interpellations, Questions and Replies of the National Assembly.Google Scholar
South Africa. 1995a. Hansard Debates of the National Assembly; Interpellations, Questions and Replies of the National Assembly.Google Scholar
South Africa. 1995b. Hansard Debates of the Senate; Interpellations, Questions and Replies of the Senate (Hansard).Google Scholar
South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission [TRC]. 1998. The Report of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. Cape Town: Juta Books. Also available on unofficial website: http://www.struth.org.za.Google Scholar
Thompson, Leonard. 1985. The Political Mythology of Apartheid. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press.Google Scholar