Memorialization generally refers to the process of preserving memories of people or events. It can be a form of address or

petition A petition is a request to do something, most commonly addressed to a government official or public entity. Petitions to a deity are a form of prayer called supplication. In the colloquial sense, a petition is a document addressed to some offici ...

, or a ceremony of remembrance or commemoration.

Memorialization as a human right

Memorialization is a universal need for both those being memorialized and those who are grieving. Although historically it was limited to the elite and only practiced in the highest societal classes, it is now almost considered a fundamental

human right Human rights are moral principles or normsJames Nickel, with assistance from Thomas Pogge, M.B.E. Smith, and Leif Wenar, 13 December 2013, Stanford Encyclopedia of PhilosophyHuman Rights Retrieved 14 August 2014 for certain standards of hu ...

for all people.

Memorialization and transitional justice

In the context of transitional justice, memorialization is used to honor the victims of human rights abuses. Memorials can help governments reconcile tensions with victims by demonstrating respect and acknowledging the past. They can also help to establish a record of history, and to prevent the recurrence of abuse. Memorials can also be serious social and political forces in democracy-building efforts. Memorials are also a form of

reparations Reparation(s) may refer to: Christianity * Restitution (theology), the Christian doctrine calling for reparation * Acts of reparation, prayers for repairing the damages of sin History *War reparations **World War I reparations, made from G ...

, or compensation efforts that seek to address past

human rights violations Human rights are moral principles or normsJames Nickel, with assistance from Thomas Pogge, M.B.E. Smith, and Leif Wenar, 13 December 2013, Stanford Encyclopedia of PhilosophyHuman Rights Retrieved 14 August 2014 for certain standards of hum ...

. They aim to provide compensation for losses endured by victims of abuse, and remedy prior wrongdoing. They also publicly recognize that victims are entitled to redress and respect. The United Nations Basic Principles on the Right to a Remedy and Reparation recognizes “commemorations and tributes to the victims” as a form of reparation. There are numerous types of memorials used as transitional justice initiatives. These include architectural

memorial A memorial is an object or place which serves as a focus for the memory or the commemoration of something, usually an influential, deceased person or a historical, tragic event. Popular forms of memorials include landmark objects or works of a ...

s, museums, and other commemorative events. For instance, in northern

Uganda }), is a landlocked country in East Africa East Africa, Eastern Africa, or East of Africa, is the eastern subregion of the African continent. In the United Nations Statistics Division scheme of geographic regions, 10-11-(16*) territor ...

, monuments, annual prayer ceremonies, and a mass grave were created in response to the war conducted by and against the

Lord’s Resistance Army The Lord's Resistance Army (LRA), also known as the Lord's Resistance Movement, is a rebel group and heterodox Christian group which operates in northern Uganda, South Sudan, the Central African Republic, and the Democratic Republic of the C ...

there. Another example is the

Museum of Memory and Human Rights The Museum of Memory and Human Rights (in Spanish: ''Museo de la Memoria y los Derechos Humanos'') is a museum in Santiago, Chile, which commemorates the victims of human rights violations during the military dictatorship led by Augusto Pinochet ...

Chile Chile, officially the Republic of Chile, is a country in the western part of South America. It is the southernmost country in the world, and the closest to Antarctica, occupying a long and narrow strip of land between the Andes to the east a ...

, which was created to document abuses by the former

military dictatorship A military dictatorship is a dictatorship in which the military exerts complete or substantial control over political authority, and the dictator is often a high-ranked military officer. The reverse situation is to have civilian control of the m ...

there.

Challenges of memorialization

Memorialization can arouse controversy and present certain risks. In unstable political situations, memorials may increase desire for revenge and catalyze further violence. They are highly politicized processes that represent the will of those in power. They are thus difficult to shape, and international relief workers, peacekeepers, and

NGOs A non-governmental organization (NGO) or non-governmental organisation (see spelling differences) is an organization that generally is formed independent from government. They are typically nonprofit entities, and many of them are active in h ...

risk being drawn into disputes about the creation or maintenance of memorial sites. Yet they also have the potential to redress historical grievances and enable societies to progress.

Guy Beiner Guy Beiner (born in 1968 in Jerusalem) is an Israeli historian of the late-modern period. He was formerly a full professor at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev in Beer Sheva, Israel. In September 2021, he was named the Sullivan Chair in Irish ...

has introduced a concept of ''decommemorating'' in reference to hostility towards acts of commemoration that can result in violent assaults and in iconoclastic defacement or destruction of monuments. Beiner's studies suggest that rather than stamping out memorialization, decommemorating can paradoxically, function as a form of ambiguous remembrance, sustaining interest in controversial memorials. Destruction of monuments can also trigger renewed acts of memorialization (which Beiner labelled "re-commemorating").Guy Beiner
Forgetful Remembrance: Social Forgetting and Vernacular Historiography of a Rebellion in Ulster (Oxford University Press, 2018)
pp. 356-443.

References

External links

International Center for Transitional Justice, Truth and Memory page
{{Authority control Human rights Memorials by commemoration Memory Reparations Transitional justice

Memorialization as a human right

Memorialization and transitional justice

Challenges of memorialization

See also

Further reading

References

External links