Journal Article

Who’s Sorry Now? Government Apologies, Truth Commissions, and Indigenous Self-Determination in Australia, Canada, Guatemala, and Peru

Corntassel, Jeff, Holder, Cindy

2008

Overview

Official apologies and truth commissions are increasingly utilized as mechanisms to address human rights abuses. Both are intended to transform inter-group relations by marking an end point to a history of wrongdoing and providing the means for political and social relations to move beyond that history. However, state-dominated reconciliation mechanisms are inherently problematic for indigenous communities. In this paper, we examine the use of apologies, and truth and reconciliation commissions in four countries with significant indigenous populations: Canada, Australia, Peru, and Guatemala. In each case, the reconciliation mechanism differentiated the goal of reconciliation from an indigenous self-determination agenda. The resulting state-centered strategies ultimately failed to hold states fully accountable for past wrongs and, because of this, failed to transform inter-group relations.

• Publisher: Springer Netherlands,Springer Nature B.V
• Subject: Aboriginal Australians / Apologies / Australia / Canada / Commissions / Development Aid / Education / Equality and Human Rights / Group dynamics / Guatemala / Human Rights / Human rights violations / Indigenous peoples / Indigenous Populations / Intergroup relations / Interpersonal relations / Investigating commissions / National reconciliation / Native peoples / Peru / Philosophy / Political Philosophy / Public officials / Reconciliation / Self Determination / Social Justice / Social Philosophy / Social relations / State responsibility / Strategies / Terrorism and Political Violence / Transitional justice / Tribunals & commissions / Truth / Truth and Reconciliation Commissions