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‘Living Well is the Best Revenge’—If one can: An Invitation to the Creation of Justice off the Beaten Path: A review of James McAdams (ed) Transitional Justice and the Rule of Law in New Democracies

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Abstract

This review essay has two main goals: one, to elaborate on connections within the contribution under review, and secondly to critically evaluate that contribution to the field of transitional justice. Transitional Justice and the Rule of Law in New Democracies lacks an introduction or a conclusion. This essay seeks to fill in that gap by providing a road map that tells us where the chapters in the book under review will take us as well as providing concluding remarks that draw the various chapters together. Further, this essay evaluates how each of the country studies lives up to the ideals set forth in the first chapter. The essay situates the book under review within the larger fields of justice and transitional studies. This approach is designed to help assess the work's contribution to the larger fields as well as to provide a greater understanding of the work's contribution to the specific sub-field that it addresses. In addition to analysing the country studies in terms of the theoretical chapter that begins the collection, the theoretical standards are analysed both in terms of the country studies and in terms of the broader concerns of transitional justice. Finally, the essay challenges these theoretical standards by drawing attention to justice ‘off the beaten path’, ie to the special context and challenges that face states/societies in transition. Here it is argued that not only are the set standards potentially inappropriate to this context but further, that justice requires more than these standards would imply.

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might require more than justice as it is usually carried out It may require taking a higher moral ground. This is at odds with the views of justice expressed in the work under review, wherein amnesties, pardons and truth and reconciliation are seen as falling short of ‘complete justice
  • This
While these are arguably necessary conditions for an emerging democracy to be worthy of its name, they are clearly not sufficient
  • Ibid
Is the Truth and Reconciliation Process Compatible with International Law? An Unanswered Question’ (1997) 13 SAJHR 258, commenting on AZAPO v president of the Republic of South Africa
  • J Dugard
there is little to no treatment of South Africa in the Kritz collection (save a few documents in Vol III and a brief forward by Nelson Mandela). Further, a treatment of South Africa by Lynn Berat in the Roht-Arriaza work, while excellent, is clearly dated (given that it ends with events in
  • Asa Further Note
Anthony Flew A Dictionary of Philosophy 2 ed (1984) 188 and James Sterba Justice: Alternative Political Perspectives
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