AHRC-NSF MOU: Alternative Accountabilities for Past Human Rights Abuses

世界各国都制定了创新战略，以追究肇事者对过去侵犯人权行为的责任。事实上，“过渡司法”机制已成为二十世纪末和二十一世纪初减少侵犯人权和加强民主的主要政策创新。过渡时期司法的实践催生了一个政策制定者、学者和民间社会非常感兴趣的研究领域。然而，到目前为止，这一领域的系统和跨国研究侧重于三个主要机制--刑事审判、真相委员会和赦免--及其对人权和民主的影响。然而，许多其他机制也被广泛使用。因此，对过渡司法机制的全面影响感兴趣的学者、政策制定者和倡导者缺乏对这些机制及其影响的完整阵列的研究和分析。拟议的AHRC-NSF合作资助机会由Leigh Payne(牛津大学)和Kathryn Sikkink(明尼苏达大学)共同提供，旨在通过产生关于全面过渡司法机制影响的经验性检验的理论来填补这一空白。为此，他们打算在现有的过渡时期司法数据库中增加目前尚不清楚的“替代责任”(即民事审判、清洗和审查、赔偿和习惯司法)。由于经常采用替代责任制来处理内战的大规模暴行和由此造成的社会分裂，除了在以前的工作中分析的民主和人权成果外，私营部门主管还将审查其对和平的影响。该项目将提供第一个数据库，以促进对最新的学术和政策问题的研究：在努力加强人权保护、民主与和平的努力中，替代责任制是否取代或补充其他过渡司法机制？合作者先前的研究使他们有资格开展这一项目。在过去五年中，私人投资司单独建立了关于过渡时期司法的两个最完整的数据库。随后，在AHRC-NSF的支持下，他们开始建立一个关于三个主要过渡时期司法机制的新的大N数据库，以确定审判、真相委员会和赦免的哪些方面有助于或阻碍人权和民主的改善。私人投资机构在他们目前的学术工作中以及在政策形式的陈述中公布了这项研究的初步结果。他们还创建了一个完全可访问和可搜索的数据库(2012年9月可在网上使用)。这一拟议项目旨在扩展这一早期研究，并解决新出现的关于刑事司法的适当性、可取性和有效性的批评。虽然独立调查团发现，审判是改善民主和人权的核心，但他们没有发现，各国必须遵循单一的过渡司法道路。这导致他们探索替代责任在世界各地在促进或限制人权、民主与和平成果方面所发挥的特殊作用。一系列理论论证提出了这些替代责任何时、为什么以及如何可能单独或与审判和赦免相结合地改善结果。到目前为止，还没有系统的数据或研究来回答这些问题。PIS先前的分析导致他们假设，尽管现在领域专家中流传着充满希望的主张，但替代问责与起诉相结合，可能会对人权、民主与和平的具体结果产生更积极的影响。因此，该项目将使私人投资机构能够进一步测试他们自己和其他人对过渡司法的方法，从而促进学术辩论，并产生关于过渡司法机制和结果的更好信息，以促进冲突后和威权后局势的政策和宣传。私人投资机构已向国家科学基金会申请307,129美元，向AHRC申请349,844美元，用于开展为期两年(2012年9月1日至2014年8月31日)的替代问责研究和分析。该项目的学术价值包括开发一种新的理论，即这些机制何时、如何以及为什么为人权、民主与和平做出贡献，研究人员将为学术出版提供这些理论。该项目的更广泛影响包括：为研究生和博士后研究员提供学术和专业发展；通过在线访问关于从1970年至今120个国家所有过渡时期司法机制的完整数据库，共享数据，以进一步开展学术、政策和宣传研究；以及编写和提出政策建议。

Countries around the world have crafted innovative strategies to hold perpetrators accountable for past human rights violations. In fact, "transitional justice" mechanisms have become the major policy innovation of the late twentieth and early twenty-first century to reduce human rights violations and strengthen democracy. The practice of transitional justice has spawned a field of study of great interest to policy makers, scholars, and civil society. To date, however, systematic and cross-national studies in this field have focused on three main mechanisms—criminal trials, truth commissions, and amnesties—and their impact on human rights and democracy. Many other mechanisms, however, are widely used. Scholars, policy makers, and advocates interested in the full impact of transitional justice mechanisms, therefore, lack the research and analysis of the complete array of those mechanisms and their effects.The proposed AHRC-NSF Collaborative Funding Opportunity between Leigh Payne (University of Oxford) and Kathryn Sikkink (University of Minnesota) aims to fill that void by generating an empirically-tested theory concerning the impact of a full range of transitional justice mechanisms. To this end, they intend to add to their existing transitional justice database currently uncharted "alternative accountabilities" (i.e., civil trials, lustration and vetting, reparations, and customary justice). Because alternative accountabilities are often adopted to deal with the massive atrocities of civil war and the resulting social divisions, the PIs will also examine their impact on peace, in addition to democracy and human rights outcomes analysed in their previous work. The project will provide the first database that will facilitate research on the latest scholarly and policy question: do alternative accountabilities substitute or complement other transitional justice mechanisms in the effort to strengthen human rights protections, democracy, and peace?The collaborators' prior research qualifies them to undertake this project. In the last half-decade, the PIs individually built the two most complete databases on transitional justice. Subsequently, and with support from AHRC-NSF, they began constructing a new, large-N database of the three main transitional justice mechanisms to determine what aspects of trials, truth commissions, and amnesties contribute to, or impede, improvements in human rights and democracy. The PIs are releasing preliminary findings from this research in their current scholarly work, as well as in presentations in policy form. They have also created a fully accessible and searchable database (available online in September 2012).This proposed project aims to extend this earlier research, and to address emerging criticisms concerning the appropriateness, desirability, and effectiveness of criminal justice. While the PIs have found that trials are central to improvements in democracy and human rights, they have not found that countries necessarily follow a single transitional justice pathway. This leads them to probe the particular roles alternative accountabilities play around the world in advancing or constraining human rights, democracy, and peace outcomes. A set of theoretical arguments propose when, why, and how these alternative accountabilities are likely to improve outcomes either in isolation or in combination with trials and amnesties. As yet, no systematic data or research exists to answer these questions. The PIs' prior analysis leads them to hypothesize that, despite hopeful claims now circulating among area specialists, alternative accountabilities are likely to have a more positive impact on the specific outcomes of human rights, democracy, and peace when combined with prosecutions. The project will thus allow the PIs to further test their own and others' approaches to transitional justice, thereby contributing to scholarly debate and also to producing better information on transitional justice mechanisms and outcomes to contribute to policy and advocacy in post-conflict and post-authoritarian situations.The PIs have requested $307,129 from the NSF and £349,844 from the AHRC to conduct two years (September 1, 2012 to August 31, 2014) of research on, and analysis of, alternative accountabilities. The project's intellectual merit involves developing a new theory of when, how, and why these mechanisms contribute to human rights, democracy, and peace that the researchers will produce for scholarly publication. The project's broader impact includes: academic and professional development for graduate students and post-doctoral fellows; data sharing to further scholarly, policy, and advocacy research through the online access of a complete database on all transitional justice mechanisms in 120 countries from 1970 to the present; and the preparation and presentation of policy recommendations.