Suzanne Kryder talks with Ruben Carranza, a lawyer with the International Center for Transitional Justice

SK: Transitional justice has evolved quite a bit over the years. It began really with an emphasis on legal actions, but it has broadened. How would you define transitional justice today?

RC: This is not my definition, but I’ll start with it because it’s a definition that most people will look up literally on Google and then that leads them to the website of the organization that I work for, the ICTJ, the International Center for Transitional Justice.

When you look up the ICTJ website, the definition of transitional justice tends to be vague and broad at the same time by saying that it is a set of tools that includes both judicial and non-judicial processes to deal with legacies of massive human rights violations in a country. It goes on to say that it includes truth commissions, prosecutions, reparations programs and various institutional reforms.

SK: I thought that this would have happened earlier in terms of the International Criminal Court. It’s headquartered in the Hague and it was not established until 1998 by the Rome Statute. Just briefly, what is the Rome Statute and what is the International Criminal Court, also known as the ICC?

RC: In 1998, several countries agreed to establish what is now called the International Criminal Court. It’s the first court of its kind meaning it’s a criminal court that has jurisdiction across several countries that are part of the treaty that established the court.

It is a court in the sense that it can go to trial and punish individuals who commit war crimes, crimes against humanity, genocide and now also the crime of aggression within those countries or among those people who are subject to its (what lawyers call) jurisdiction.

It’s also important to say what the International Criminal Court is not. It’s not a court that can cover every single war crime, every single crime against humanity committed on the planet for one reason. Many powerful countries are not part of the ICC. The United States is not part of the ICC. China is not part of the ICC. Russia and India are not part of the ICC. There are limits to the ICC, but at the same time it’s a first step. It has its flaws, but I think it is better to have an ICC than not to have an ICC.

SK: One strategy of transitional justice is the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. Some people say that a Truth and Reconciliation Commission could build peace if eventually it was used in different places like Israel and Palestine or Lebanon or Iraq. What do you believe about using a Truth and Reconciliation Commission in those kinds of places? Should it be used there?

RC: Well, there are two things to say in response to that question. One is that we talk about Truth Commissions and not necessarily Truth and Reconciliation Commissions. There is a reason for that. Reconciliation is not only a very nebulous concept, it’s also a very personal concept. We might talk about societies having a reconciliation process, but really, at the end of the day, it’s individuals deciding if they can reconcile with other individuals. It’s groups of people deciding whether they can forgive or whether they want to pursue accountability before they can forgive.

These are steps that might lead to some form of reconciliation, but organizing it is another matter altogether. In my case at least, I avoid linking reconciliation with truth, linking reconciliation with justice. I think truth stands as its own purpose. Justice might happen after truth, but not necessarily always reconciliation.

The second answer would be that there are places where setting up a truth commission can be helpful but then in many places where truth commissions have been set up, it has not been enough.

While it might be possible to set up a truth commission between Israel and Palestine, that is very unlikely to be enough given the issues involved in the occupation of Israel of Palestine but also many of the consequences of that occupation that seeking truth alone cannot answer.

At the same time, without truth-seeking and the work of a truth commission, it is very hard to simply go ahead and proceed to prosecution or even to just say we’ll give reparations to victims without even acknowledging through a truth commission what happened in the past.

A truth commission has its value. It can lead to justice, but it will not be enough.

SK: Ruben, indigenous oppression; transitional justice has been used to address indigenous oppression in some places like Australia, Canada, New Zealand. Some people in the U.S. have suggested using transitional justice to address racial issues as well as indigenous issues. Do you believe that transitional justice should be used in the U.S. to address both indigenous and other racial issues?

RC: Definitely and in fact, there have been examples of transitional justice processes in the United States. They may not be as prominent as the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission, but they have been done.

One example is a truth commission that was locally established in the city of Greensboro North Carolina to examine a specific episode in history, a conflict between the Ku Klux Klan, white supremacists and left-wing activists that led to killings during a protest. A local truth commission was established in Greensboro. Some of my colleagues in ICTJ in fact helped in the establishment of that local truth commission. It’s been done in the United States.

What has not been done in the United States is the same kind of national, large-scale more comprehensive approach to truth-seeking that other countries have had. As you mentioned, Canada has had a truth commission that dealt with indigenous people who were forcibly assimilated into Western schools to make them more Western. Australia has now opened a truth commission for one state that would also examine the same kind of legacy of oppression committed against indigenous people.
You have examples from mostly global North countries dealing with human rights violations committed against indigenous people. But you also do have examples of a truth commission in the United States as well as even reparations programs in the United States that are examples of transitional justice being applied.

An example of a reparations program in the United States that constitutes transitional justice, you have reparations that were given to Japanese Americans who were interned during WWII, put into concentration camps because they were seen as threats because of their Japanese ancestry. Reparations were given to them and that’s an example of transitional justice in the United States.

SK: Are we truly building peace with transitional justice? Some people would say it’s too victim-centric or it’s really just making dominators out of the dominated.

RC: The difficulty in measuring the impact of transitional justice is that part of the impact is often only found when the next round of violence, the next attempts at authoritarianism or the next episodes of social upheaval happen. We find out what the impact was of transitional justice when in those next rounds of violence, of war or attempts at dictatorship or social upheaval whether persons in fact go to war, whether persons end up under a dictatorship, whether persons in fact end up killing each other over social disagreements. If they don’t or if the scale of violence isn’t of such a magnitude that it becomes genocide or it becomes a fratricidal war or that it becomes a year’s-long dictatorship.

In many ways, one can argue that transitional justice has had an impact. Transitional justice has succeeded not to prevent war, not to prevent attempts at dictatorship, not to prevent social upheaval but to prevent a scale of killing, a scale of repression, a scale of violent disagreement that approaches what happened in the past.

Peace isn’t the complete absence of conflict. I think peace is in large part being able to fulfill basic needs whether they’re economic or social or whether they’re about expressing one’s political views or civil rights without punishment, without conflict, without violent disagreements. In many ways, peace isn’t going to be all the kinds of love and harmony that might be how others see it. I think peace is being able to coexist at the very least or be reconciled at most.

Suzanne Kryder talks with Sandy White Hawk, Commissioner for the Maine
Wabanaki-State Child Welfare Truth and Reconciliation Commission

SK: Sandy, what is your nation?

SWH: My name is Sandy White Hawk. I am Sicangu Lakota from the Rosebud Reservation in South Dakota.

SK: You’ve been involved in several different truth and reconciliation processes. How do you define a truth and reconciliation process?

SWH: When we began having gatherings of our relatives who had been impacted by child welfare, we stared this in 2006 I believe was the first one. My intent was that those who had been impacted by foster care and adoption have the opportunity to share with those who make decisions about foster care and adoption. That would be social workers, guardian ad litems, judges, lawyers, mental health workers, anyone who touched a case.

I wanted them to hear what the outcomes of these decisions were because at this time, it’s not just me who knew, most of Indian country knew that our children who were being placed outside our families and communities were not faring well for the most part.

I wanted workers to hear that these decisions that they were making in the best interest of the child were not indeed in the best interest of the child. My hope was that, based on our lived experience, they would focus on family preservation.

SK: It’s so difficult for people to share painful stories in public. It seems like many truth and reconciliation commissions are set up that way where a person talks to a group in public. Are there other options where a person doesn’t have to speak in public?

SWH: The fear of speaking in public, I don’t know where that comes from because as Indian people, our ancestors were well-spoken and not ashamed prior to colonization. Being afraid to say what happened to you is a result of colonization. Being afraid to speak your truth and not understanding and knowing that being assured that speaking your truth is your power and that that releases shame, that is all a result of colonization.

I have witnessed hundreds of individuals share their lived experiences publicly and they find release. Finally, their experience is validated. These things, these atrocities that happened in boarding school and in abusive adoptive homes and abusive foster homes happened in isolation and were probably given the message, if not directly, indirectly that you say nothing.

Individuals that are sharing their lived experiences don’t share intimate details, but they share the brutality that happened to them, how it made them feel and how it impacted them today.

One of the things that has not been addressed in our communities as a result of boarding school and adoption is this disenfranchised grief which is a grief that has not been publicly acknowledged or validated. When that happens, it begins to heal that grief. It’s the start of taking back your power. This happened to me. The relatives here embrace that individual, support that individual and the healing begins.

SK: Sandy, you were on a commission for the main Wabanaki State Child Welfare Truth and Reconciliation Commission. Two things, what was unique about that and how did it build peace?

SWH: It was unique because it was the first mandated child welfare truth commission between tribes and the state that the tribes are in. That was unique.

The circles I had been doing were all basically grassroots circles even though there were professionals involved in the hearing.
Here, there was more structure to focus on in the long run, goals that the tribes wanted. It was a beautiful time of truth gathering and getting to know the main tribes.

The organization that structured the commission called REACH is still working today to enhance the relationships that were built during the Truth Commission.

SK: Sandy, what is the Indian Child Welfare Act and how does it promote peace?

SWH: The Indian Child Welfare Act was passed in 1978 as a response to the systematic removal of Indian children from Indian families. It set a criterion of how a child should be removed from their home. So many decisions were being made such as “unfit mother,” “no electricity,” “no running water,” “poverty.” Mothers who were pregnant were coerced to sign their babies over even before they gave birth. It was just a horrible time of being targeted.

In 1978, under the leadership of Senator Abourezk and a New York-based attorney named Bertram Hirsch, they co-authored of the Indian Child Welfare Act and got it passed. However we are still seeing high rates of removal of Indian children. In fact, Minnesota has the distinction of having the highest rate of removal in the nation.

SK: What if some of our listeners want to do something to help the process of a truth and reconciliation commission in the U.S. for First Nation people, is there anything they can do?

SWH: You would call your state representatives, your tribal leaders, people you have relationships with within the county and state that you’re in. There are always allies. There won’t be as many as we want them to be, but they are there. Begin to think how you want to go through the process. You can go to the main TRC.org website and look it up there. You could contact them in Maine. We are doing some groundwork here in Minnesota. You can contact me as well if you want to. You can reach out. You can go to the Canadian TRC and go on there and look and see what they did and the result of what they did.

Suzanne Kryder talks with Nkechi Taifa, a social justice attorney and member of the
National African American Reparations Commission

SK: I think many people are confused about reparations as I was. I used to think reparations was only about money, but it’s not, it’s a lot more than money. What else would reparations for African Americans in the U.S. include?

NT: Well, a lot of people think it’s just about a check. It is not. That’s not to say a check would not be a legitimate form of a reparation settlement, but it’s far, far, far more. Today it’s crystal clear that reparations settlements can be fashioned in as many ways as necessary to equitably address the countless manifestations of injuries sustained from childhood slavery and beyond.
Some forms of redress could include land, it could include economic development or scholarships. It could embrace community development. There could be repatriation resources. It can be textbooks. It might be the erection of monuments and museums. It even could be pardons for prisoners from the war on drugs or from the COINTELPRO era. The harm was multifaceted, and the remedy must be multifaceted as well.

SK: There are some people of color in the African American community who make a lot of money, they’re wealthy and they say, “Don’t have financial reparations because it would be belittling.” What’s your reaction?

NT: Well, my response to that is, just like in the legal system, if Oprah got hit by a car, she is entitled to damages. Whether she decides if she wants to accept those damages or donate it or use it for any other purposes, that’s her prerogative. The fact that it is owed should not rest upon the economic status of the injured party. It is owed. That doesn’t mean that the person has to accept it. They can do with it whatever they feel motivated.

SK: Nkechi-Taifa, you’re a member of NAARC, the National African American Reparations Commission. What is that?

NT: Well, NAARC is the National African American Reparations Commission. It’s a body that was established in 2015, bringing together experts and professionals in various areas such as law, medicine, psychology, academics and the like to, as a united voice, look at some of these issues and really try to confront them. I’ve been an honorable member of NAARC since its founding in 2015. It is patterned off of the CNRO, the Caribbean Nations Reparations Organization that they see as a ten-step program.

SK: Tell us a few of the ten steps.

NT: Some of the ten steps of the NAARC preliminary reparations program includes first and foremost an apology, an apology from the United States Government and the establishment of what we call an MAAFA which is an African Holocaust Institute. We also talk about the right to land for social and economic development. We talk about resources for health and wellness and healing. Healing is so very critical. We talk about education for community development, the preservation of black sacred sites and monuments, affordable housing, repairing the damages of the criminal and justice systems. Those are just some of the points that are part of NAARCs ten-point reparations program.

SK: HR40, also known as House Resolution 40, what is it and how would it build peace?

NT: HR40 is the bill that was first established by Congressman John Conyers back in 1989 to establish a commission to study and develop reparation proposals for African Americans. It is modeled after the successful Japanese American Reparations bill that passed in 1988 and it has been languishing in Congress for over 30 years. We hope that that will come to fruition very soon. That would go a long way towards reconciliation and peace.

SK: What is Transgenerational Epigenetic Trauma?

NT: I just heard this term Transgenerational Epigenetic Trauma from one of our NAARC commissioners who has since passed, Pat Newton who is a psychiatrist. She talked about this concept wherein the trauma travels within our genes. She said that the concept was based on actual studies that were done of holocaust survivors’, their descendants, their grandchildren and great grandchildren. They were experiencing some types of issues that was scientifically shown that the memory from their ancestors was embedded in their genes.

Then we looked at that situation as it relates to black people in this country and the centuries-long memory and pain, and trauma. That concept applies to black people in this country as well. We’re hoping that a reparation settlement would seek to involve some type of remedy towards alleviating these types of conditions.

SK: I learned about Katrina Browne who is a person who is white, and she created this moved called Traces of the Trade. Talk about that.

NT: Yes, my white colleague Katrina Browne. She uncovered evidence that her ancestors were the largest slave trading family in U.S. history. She found that they brought over 10,000 Africans to the Americas in chains. She documented her roots in a phenomenal film called Traces of the Trade: A Story from the Deep North, not from the deep South, from the deep North.
I think that some of the things that she brough out really impacted me. She said that everybody benefitted from slavery whether it was boat makers, iron worker who manufactured the shackles, the coopers who made the barrels that holds rum, the distillers who took the molasses and sugar and made it.

She basically said literally the whole town was dependent upon the slave trade. She states emphatically that wealth and privilege in the United States has been amassed as a direct or indirect consequence of the institution of slavery. This is my white college, Katrina Browne.

I would like to say one more thing if that’s okay. I just want to say something about my memoir, Black Power, Black Lawyer. It’s not just a memoir, it’s part textbook, it’s part study guide and it’s part expose. I say part textbook because I tell about a lot of these things in my book from a personal point of view, from someone who actually went through a lot of these issues when I was 16 years old opening up the Black Panther paper and seeing points that talked about reparation.

My book stitches together suspense and calamity and humor and wit into a tapestry that includes history and politics, law, culture and sometimes even romance. But basically, in essence, in my book I offer my truth and I offer it unapologetically and unfiltered with honesty and authenticity.

My quest, my life’s quest for justice as a Black Power advocate and as a black movement lawyer and as a reparation’s activist, I want all of it to awaken, to inform, to provoke, to move and at best to fire up folks to be part of this whole struggle.

SK: I’m thinking about the Frederick Douglass quote: “If there is no struggle, there is no progress....”

NT: “If there is no struggle, there is no progress. Those who profess to favor freedom and yet deprecate agitation are men who want crops without plowing the ground. They want rain without thunder and lightning. They want the ocean without the its mighty roar.” I get very passionate about that speech because Frederick Douglass talked about power conceding nothing without a demand. That’s what we must do. That’s what we’re trying to do with respect to our claim for reparations, speaking out the power.