Transitional Justice and Ireland's Legacy of Historical Abuse

Abstract

This essay evaluates the application of transitional justice to the context of historical abuse in peaceful, consolidated democracies, in particular the Republic of Ireland. Examining Ireland’s efforts at repairing its past from such a perspective reveals an unwillingness by state authorities and Christian churches and religious orders to embrace the necessity of fundamental social, legal, and political transformation when addressing widespread and systemic historical abuse. In Irish efforts to address historical abuse across a range of contexts, power remains out of the hands of victim-survivors and of those traditionally marginalized in society. Instead, in agreement with Georges Balandier, I argue that “the supreme ruse of power is to allow itself to be contested ritually in order to consolidate itself more effectively.” Recent state responses to historical abuse contribute to such a consolidation of power. Although public inquiries, legal accountability, and redress schemes claim to serve the interests of victim-survivors of historical abuse, these mechanisms fail meaningfully to empower or support their voices, participation, and ownership in shaping how