The Justice Facade

For survivors of the brutal Khmer Rouge Regime, western instruments of justice are small plasters on deep wounds. In Hinton's account of the subsequent international tribunal, only traditional ceremony, ritual, and unmediated dialogue can provide true healing.

What is Justice? Is it always just 'to come'? Can real experience be translated into law? Examining Cambodia's troubled reconciliation, Alexander Hinton suggests an approach to justice founded on global ideals of the rule of law, democratization, and a progressive trajectory towards liberty and freedom, and which seeks to align the country with so called universal modes of thought, is condemned to failure. Instead, Hinton advocates focusing on the individual lived experience, and the discourses, interstices, and the combustive encounters connected with it, as a radical alternative.

A phenomenology inspired approach towards healing national trauma, Hinton's ground-breaking text will make anybody with an interest in transitional justice, development, humanitarian intervention, human rights, or peacebuilding, question the value of an established truth.

there is much to ponder in this book ... Any students of transitional justice who see the Cambodian experience as a chapter in a larger, evolving volume will find much to advance their thinking.

Auteur
Alexander Hinton is Founder and Director of the Center for the Study of Genocide and Human Rights, Professor of Anthropology, and UNESCO Chair on Genocide Prevention at Rutgers University. The American Anthropological Association selected Hinton as the recipient of the Robert B. Textor and Family Prize for Excellence in Anticipatory Anthropology. Hinton was listed as one of 'Fifty Key Thinkers on the Holocaust and Genocide' and is a past President of the International Association of Genocide Scholars. Hinton has received fellowships from a range of institutions and was a Member of the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton. Most recently Hinton was a convener of the international "Rethinking Peace Studies" initiative and served as an expert witness at the Khmer Rouge Tribunal.

Résumé
What is Justice? Is it always just 'to come'? Can real experience be translated into law? Examining Cambodia's troubled reconciliation, Alexander Hinton suggests an approach to justice founded on global ideals of the rule of law, democratization, and a progressive trajectory towards liberty and freedom, and which seeks to align the country with so called universal modes of thought, is condemned to failure. Instead, Hinton advocates focusing on the individual lived experience, and the discourses, interstices, and the combustive encounters connected with it, as a radical alternative. A phenomenology inspired approach towards healing national trauma, Hinton's ground-breaking text will make anybody with an interest in transitional justice, development, humanitarian intervention, human rights, or peacebuilding, question the value of an established truth.

Contenu

• I - Vortices

• Preamble: Discourse, Time, and Space

• 1: Progression (Cambodia's Three Transitions)

• 2: Time (The Khmer Institute of Democracy)

• 3: Space (Centre for Social Development and the Public Sphere)

• II - Turbulence

• Preamble: Re/enactment

• 4: Aesthetics (Theary Seng, Vann Nath, and Victim Participation)

• 5: Performance (Reach Sambath, Public Affairs, and "Justice Trouble")

• 6: Discipline (Uncle Meng and the Trials of the Foreign)

• III - Eddies

• Preamble: Breaking the Silence

• 7: Subjectivity (DC-Cam and the ECCC Outreach Tour)

• 8: Normativity (Civil Party Testimony)

• 9: Disposition (Youk Chhang, Documenter and Survivor)

• Conclusion: Justice in Translation