National reconciliation via confession can come at the longer-term cost of justice

Evidence

National reconciliation in the context of the TRC thus concerned itself with reuniting a country sharply set apart by the divisive violence and human rights violations perpetrated by the pursuits of separate development, resacralizing the body politic by bringing its divided communities into accord and harmony. Some would say at the longer-term cost of justice. The TRC was, in short, a national purification rite, South Africa’s redemption song. — David Theo Goldberg, The Threat of Race, 1580

Categorization

• ADDENDUM: Echoes the sacrifice article’s thesis that ritualized atonement stabilizes rather than overturns stratified orders.
• XREF: connects to: Post-apartheid reconciliation was built as a political theology of confession and forgiveness — David Theo Goldberg, The Threat of Race: Reflections on…, 1573; Truth commissions fail as national reconciliation unless wider coalitions bear across-time witness — David Theo Goldberg, The Threat of Race: Reflections on…, 1857; Nation-making often requires forgetting the very injustices restorative justice remembers. — David Theo Goldberg, The Threat of Race: Reflections on…, 1580 (+2 more)

Broader Connections

• Post-apartheid reconciliation was built as a political theology of confession and forgiveness #expands (0.87) — David Theo Goldberg, The Threat of Race, 1573
• Truth commissions fail as national reconciliation unless wider coalitions bear across-time witness #qualifies (0.85) — David Theo Goldberg, The Threat of Race, 1857
• Nation-making often requires forgetting the very injustices restorative justice remembers. #corroborates (0.82) — David Theo Goldberg, The Threat of Race, 1580
• Statute-of-limitations arguments against abuse claims also shield confessed offenders from prosecution #qualifies (0.80) — Albert Bandura, Moral Disengagement, 500