Symbolic forms of transitional justice in their potential for symbolic recognition in Bosnia-Herzegovina

Symbolic forms of Transitional Justice (TJ), meant here as localized and non-judicial measures aiming at acknowledgment of suffering and accounting for survivors’ accounts of the violent past, constitute a key element of social restoration in Bosnia-Herzegovina (BiH). Scholarship has highlighted their significance in symbolically acknowledging individuals’ suffering, in representing a societal recognition of past harm doing, as well as in providing a possibility for survivors to account for their personal experiences of the conflict. Yet, such forms of justice are more likely to contribute to social restoration, if they account for the heterogeneity of needs and experiences of those affected by the conflict. This is particularly significant in the case of BiH, because it constitutes a complex social reality within which contrasted and competing understandings of the past are often contested and negotiated between different collectives through symbolic TJ measures. Through the analysis of survey data collected across BiH (n=855), we analyse how the relative support for dimensions of symbolic justice of acknowledgment and truth-telling is related to specific patterns of experiences of conflict, of beliefs about the war and justice, as well as of demographic factors. Our findings suggest that whether respondents may be more likely to support both forms of symbolic recognition or only one or the other may be highly dependent on the specific nature of their reported past victimization and their present justice and conflict-related concerns. They reveal the key role of personal experiences of the past in shaping symbolic justice needs and their embedding within specific social identities and memories. Highlighting the value of non-judicial TJ measures as significant sources of symbolic recognition, they also point to the necessity of not only ensuring the inclusiveness and mutuality of these initiatives, but also of accounting for various levels of recognition in the implementation of post-conflict justice.status: publishe