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Education and Truth Commissions: Patterns, Possibilities and Implications for Historical Justice

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Historical Justice and History Education

Abstract

Based on an analysis of 20 truth commission (TC) reports, this chapter explores how these bodies engage with educational actors and institutions, and how they envision the formal educational sector as a mechanism of transitional justice. The authors document increased engagements by TCs with education over time. However, TCs usually do not work closely with education actors to shape the versions of the past that they present in their final reports, nor think in advance about how those reports and their historical narratives might be used in educational spaces. The authors raise questions about how (and if) the historical knowledge TCs produce is educationalised, and explore whether this supports wider goals of transitional justice.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the British Association for International and Comparative Education (BAICE). Portions of this text first appeared in Paulson, Julia, and Michelle J. Bellino. 2017. Truth Commissions, education, and positive peace: An analysis of truth commission final reports (1980–2015). Comparative Education 53 (3): 351–378. doi: 10.1080/03050068.2017.1334428, and have been reprinted with permission. No more than 200 words are reprinted directly from the Comparative Education article.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Bristol, Bristol, UK

    Julia Paulson

  2. University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, USA

    Michelle J. Bellino

Authors
  1. Julia Paulson
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  2. Michelle J. Bellino
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Correspondence to Julia Paulson .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, University of Technology Sydney, Sydney, NSW, Australia

    Matilda Keynes

  2. Department of Education, Umeå University, Umeå, Sweden

    Henrik Åström Elmersjö  & Björn Norlin  & 

  3. Department of Historical, Philosophical & Religious Studies, Umeå University, Umeå, Sweden

    Daniel Lindmark

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Paulson, J., Bellino, M.J. (2021). Education and Truth Commissions: Patterns, Possibilities and Implications for Historical Justice. In: Keynes, M., Åström Elmersjö, H., Lindmark, D., Norlin, B. (eds) Historical Justice and History Education. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-70412-4_4

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-70412-4_4

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  • Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-030-70411-7

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-030-70412-4

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