Closing the Books: Transitional Justice in Historical Perspective

After a change of political system, notably a transition from an autocratic to a democratic, or at least constitutional, regime, a process of transitional justice emerges in which wrongdoers from the previous regime are judged responsible and victims are compensated. John Elster looks at examples and proposes a framework for explaining variations. In addition to the numerous transitions after 1945 in Western Europe and after 1989 in Eastern Europe, transitional justice has taken place in classical Greece, the English and French restorations, and, more recently, in Latin America and South Africa. John Elster looks at these examples in this history of transitional justice.

Was the first comprehensive analysis of main episodes of transitional justice in history, from the fifth century BC to the present
Emphasis on explaining variations in the outcomes of these processes, rather than on offering normative assessments
Among the first studies to cite emotion (and specific emotions) to explain political behavior in a systematic way