OTJR@10: "Rethinking Transitional Justice: What Does It Mean Today?"

To mark its 10th Anniversary, OTJR is organising a one-day workshop to engage PhD candidates, early-career researchers and practitioners working on transitional justice in guided discussions about their current work. The workshop will provide an opportunity for networking and exchanging ideas with other postgraduates and practitioners with similar research interests. OTJR encourages applications from a variety of disciplines, including - but not limited to - law, criminology, socio-legal studies, development, political theory, history, anthropology.
 
OTJR is delighted to welcome Pablo de Greiff, the UN Special Rapporteur on the promotion of truth, justice, reparation and guarantees of non-recurrence, as keynote speaker of the event. Alongside him, other participants will include renowned scholars and former members of OTJR such as Phil Clark, Nicola Palmer, Miles Jackson, and many more.

About the workshop

The workshop aims to create a discussion on the meaning of transitional justice today and the new challenges and perspectives of transitional justice practice and research. Each participant will be given an opportunity to reflect on and discuss how his or her own research relates to these broader questions, in the format of a guided discussion with the assistance of senior academics acting as facilitators.  Various roundtable discussions will be structured around the following thematic areas:

1. Giving meaning to ‘justice’ in transitional justice

Potential topics can include:

International vs regional vs local justice mechanisms;
The role of international law in shaping the concept of justice;
Judicial, extra-judicial, and quasi-judicial mechanisms;
Truth-seeking mechanisms: a unique concept?
Which actors determine what ‘justice’ means?
Victims’ participation in the design and implementation of transitional justice measures. 

2. ‘Transition’ ... from where to where?

Potential topics can include:

Is peace a priority over other considerations?
Relationship between transitional justice and development;
Transitional Justice and Economic, Social and Cultural Rights;
Guarantees of non-recurrence as part of a comprehensive transitional justice strategy;
Legitimacy of transitional justice measures. 

3. Methodology and ethics in transitional justice research

Potential topics can include:

Dialogue between legal, theoretical, empirical qualitative and quantitative research;
Ethical dilemmas: engaging with human suffering;
Engagement between TJ researchers and practitioners.

Application process

If you would like to apply, please send an application with your CV and a 300-word abstract of your research. In your application, please specify the thematic area which you are interested in, indicating which particular topics of those listed (or other falling under the broader overarching themes) are relevant to your research. All applications must be sent to OTJR’s Convenor Daniel Franchini at daniel.franchini@law.ox.ac.uk by Sunday 23 April 2017.

This event will take place at the University of Oxford with no charge. However, there are no travel bursaries available for participants.

If you have any questions, please contact the organisers:

Daniel Franchini: daniel.franchini@law.ox.ac.uk
Elena Butti: elena.butti@law.ox.ac.uk
Diana Dajer: diana.dajer@law.ox.ac.uk

About OTJR

Oxford Transitional Justice Research (OTJR) is an inter-disciplinary network of academics and students working on issues of transition in societies recovering from conflict and/or repressive rule.  Founded in 2007, it is now the largest and most diverse academic community conducting research in this field.  OTJR is dedicated to producing high-quality scholarship that connects intimately to practical and policy questions in transitional justice, including research within the following themes: domestic and international prosecutions, institutional reform and the rule of law, truth commissions, reparations, amnesty processes and new topics in transitional and post-conflict justice.
 
While we focus on transitional justice, broadly defined, we do so from a variety of angles and perspectives. Our members, students and academics alike, have a great variety of expertise including from the disciplines of law, criminology, socio-legal studies, development, political theory, history, anthropology, area studies and many more. We pride ourselves of our interdisciplinarity, which allows our research and work to be up-to-date with the most current developments in the field and we are a truly, unique group within Oxford University’s academic and professional community.
 
You can find more information about OTJR at www.law.ox.ac.uk/otjr

Sponsors

OTJR@10 is generously supported by:

The Law Faculty Research Support Fund, University of Oxford
The ESRC Interdisciplinary Networks Fund
The Planethood Foundation
The Centre for Criminology, University of Oxford