In the framework of its Justice Heals project, Hafıza Merkezi will organize an international symposium titled “Restorative Justice Approaches to Conflicts and Human Rights Violations: Opportunities and Limits”, which will be held in Istanbul on November 15th-16th, 2024.

This symposium will explore restorative justice approaches to gross human rights violations and conflicts, and question the potential of restorative justice to transform the political and social dynamics underlying these violations. We thus aim to open a space to discuss the restorative justice principles and practices, with a special focus on gross human rights violations and the ongoing Kurdish question. Bringing together academics, psychologists, educators, activists and artists from Turkey and other countries, the symposium will seek to bring new perspectives on different experiences and methods in the area of support to victims, social dialogue, memorialization and peace-building.

Why Restorative Justice?

Restorative justice first became associated with transitional contexts with the establishment of the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission in 1997. Since then, restorative justice approaches have been adopted by a number of transitional justice institutions, in Rwanda, Northern Ireland or Timor-Leste for instance, but restorative justice continues to be mostly implemented and discussed in the framework of the criminal justice system.

While they are often combined, transitional justice and restorative justice approaches focus on different processes and purposes. Transitional justice refers to a set of mechanisms and principles used to confront gross human rights violations during transitions from authoritarian regimes to democracy or in post-conflict periods. It is an approach that predominantly uses truth-discovering mechanisms (criminal courts, truth commissions). The aim is to establish peace and justice by confronting a certain past period and to provide structural changes to prevent similar violations in the future.

Restorative justice, on the other hand, is an approach that focuses on repairing the damage caused by crimes or human rights violations by trying to understand their social and political roots, and ensuring dialogue and reconciliation between victims, perpetrators and communities, without being limited to a certain period. This approach aims to create a meaningful and lasting solution and peace process between all parties affected by the crime, rather than just punishing the crime. It aims at healing and rebuilding social relations by focusing on the needs of the victims rather than punishment.

Today, restorative justice is increasingly considered as an alternative or complementary model to existing criminal justice systems to achieve repair and reconciliation in societies witnessing conflicts and gross human rights violations. However, Yet, strong divergences exist on the suitability of applying restorative justice approaches to human rights violations, the relationship between retributive and restorative justice, and the actual contribution of restorative justice to peace and reconciliation.

Restorative Justice in Turkey

In the context of Turkey, the concept of restorative justice remains little known and debated with respect to the multiple forms of rights violations, massacres and injustices witnessed by the country for more than a century. The struggle against impunity has been at the core of the fight for justice led by activists, lawyers, survivors and victims’ relatives, who have relentlessly denounced the lack of accountability of perpetrators, protected by state institutions and political interests. At the same time, the paradigm of transitional justice raised much interest among scholars and activists in the 2000s and during the 2013-2015 peace process between the Turkish government and the PKK.

With the end of the peace process in the last months of 2015, the re-escalation of violence in Kurdish provinces and the increase in pressure on rights defenders across the country, discussions on transitional justice lost momentum on Turkey’s civil society agenda. Yet, despite the narrowed civic space and the absence of a transitional horizon, civil society organizations, grassroots initiatives, psychologists, lawyers, educators, activists and artists continue to voice their demands for truth and justice, to research and memorialize past human rights violations, and to bring support to victims and communities affected by rights violations and violence.

Beyond the case of Turkey, the ongoing gross human rights violations and conflicts in the region make it particularly timely to critically address the potential and limits of restorative justice in societies facing structural violence and wars. With the contribution of academics, psychologists, educators, activists and artists from Turkey and other countries, the symposium will create a space for sharing knowledge, experience and ideas about restorative justice.

This symposium is organized with the support of the European Union through the Justice Heals project. Its contents are the sole responsibility of Hafıza Merkezi and do not necessarily reflect the views of the European Union.