Suchergebnisse

The 1979 amnesty marked the beginning of the end of military dictatorship in Brazil. It has since been both a help and a hindrance to the transition to democracy and the implementation of mechanisms of transitional justice. Two sections of the first Article of the proposed amnesty were especially controversial. One section explicitly excluded individuals convicted of specified national security crimes and the other implicitly included state agents complicit in torture. This article looks at the efforts by legislators to alter the amnesty bill on either or both of these points. Although unsuccessful, the strategies behind and the reactions to their efforts add to our historical understanding of accountability work and the persistent problem of impunity in Brazil.

This article examines the history of the Torture Never Again monument, which was proposed by Grupo Tortura Nunca Mais (Torture Never Again Group) and designed by Oscar Niemeyer for the city of Rio de Janeiro in the months following the transition from military to civilian government in Brazil in 1985. The prospect of the installation of the monument, although intended to denounce the human rights violations committed by the military government, evoked unexpected challenges and criticisms. Nonetheless, it was approved for installation and a foundation was put in place. Yet, the monument has yet to be erected. As a case study, this article shows the ways in which memorial projects must answer to multiple and often conflicting demands. It argues that the formidable opposition was not directed toward a project to memorialize the victims of torture, but rather toward the specific project proposed. Discussed primarily in terms of propriety and taste, the critiques effectively directed debates about the monument away from a denunciation of the military regime and toward other concerns.

Bringing together some of the world's leading scholars, practitioners, and human-rights activists, this groundbreaking volume provides the first systematic analysis of the 2012-2014 Brazilian National Truth Commission. While attentive to the inquiry's local and national dimensions, it offers an illuminating transnational perspective that considers the Commission's Latin American regional context and relates it to global efforts for human rights accountability, contributing to a more general and critical reassessment of truth commissions from a variety of viewpoints