Reconciling Complexities of Time in Criminal Justice and Transitional Justice

Abstract

This article analyses complexities of time in transitional justice (tj) and categorises the temporal dichotomies of tj processes as timeboundness/timelessness and linearity/circularity, challenging the dominant linear conception of time in the field. Criminal justice, as the most dominant tj pillar, is seen as timebound, battling with the passage of time to avoid justice being denied or delayed. By its procedural nature, criminal justice is less capable of addressing any circularity or repetition of violence but rather treats acts of violence as ruptures in linear time. Field research in Bosnia and Herzegovina shows that the less conventional tj processes of education and memorialisation are often given the normative content of timelessness and utilised for their capacity to capture some of the repetition of harm. In addition to establishing these distinct temporal regimes and noting any conflicts between them, the article seeks to reconcile them by repositioning criminal justice within tj as a factual and legitimating foundation for education and memorialisation.