How religious actors influence the politics of transitional justice: Truth recovery and reconciliation in South Africa and Guatemala

Over the past few decades, some 40 transitions from authoritarianism to democracy and a number of civil war settlements have left a diverse set of societies across the globe to confront past political injustices. Yet, how are societies emerging from sustained violations of human rights to understand their collective experience and move forward? This thesis argues that current theories of political transitions---from revolutionary theory to the logic of power to the role of ideology---fail to fully account for a global shift from amnesia and amnesty to confrontation and reconciliation because they do not take seriously the role of religious actors in the politics of transitional justice. It provides a general framework of Western, Christian religious actors' conception of and participation in transitional justice and applies this framework to the cases of South Africa and Guatemala. Particular attention is paid to the diverse actors, influences and conditions which aid or inhibit their activities. By focusing on the pressure from religious actors on governments to adopt transitional justice institutions based on the principles of truth recovery and reconciliation and the extent to which the outcomes in South Africa and Guatemala can be explained as a result of this pressure, this thesis argues that religious actors are not simply another faction among the already long list of participants involved in transitional justice. Rather, religious actors exert an influence as they help to shape the formation and implementation of institutions designed to confront a country's violent past.