%0 Journal Article
%T Antinomies of  truth and reconciliation¡°: Post-Yugoslav cases
%A Karamani£¿ Slobodan
%J Filozofija i Dru£¿tvo
%D 2012
%I Institute for Philosophy and Social Theory, Belgrade
%R 10.2298/fid1203003k
%X The paper offers a critical evaluation of the theoretical propositions and practical uses of the concept of ¡°truth and reconciliation¡± (T&R), with special regard to the post-Yu-goslav case studies. Firstly, the paper indicates an antinomy situated between the liberal principle of individual autonomy and attempts to establish an ¡°organised memory.¡± Drawing from the concept of ¡°Serbian collective responsibility,¡± it is demonstrated how this conceptual framework undermines both the political and private autonomy of citizen, by translating the question of responsibility into the collective moral and cultural domain. Secondly, the ¡°organised memory,¡± which calls for identification with ¡°national crimes¡±, creates a short-circuit, resulting in re-nationalising rather than de-nationalising the figure of citizen. As a result, the forms of organized national memory induce structural limitations, producing the fragmentation of truth into separate ¡°national truths.¡± Thirdly, the concept is both abstract (prescriptive and trans-historical) and empirical (descriptive and enclosed within the framework of given subjectivities and categories). A paradoxical result is that T&Rtakes the consequences as its ends, whilst taking for granted the political identities constructed in the course of the conflict. In addition, the no-tion of truth in use here is reductive, aiming mostly at registering and measuring the ¡°forensic truth¡± of the conflict. Finally, the absolute structural limitation of T&Rrepresents the nation state itself. Since the alternative name of T&Ris ¡°official truth seeking¡± (Pricilla Hayner), this concept finds itself entrapped within the limits of the existing state¡¯s institutional framework, depending on the ¡°good will¡± of political elites. At the same time, the given ¡°truths¡± are depoliticised and medicalised. The paper concludes that rather than opening new avenues for the emergence of genuinely new political subjectivities, the T&Rparadigm effectively blocks the process of disidentification and the creation of a new political subject liberated from a narrowly defined community bound to the common (national) substance and history.
%K truth and reconciliation
%K political subjectivity
%K liberal democracy
%K organized memory
%K identification
%K groupist ontologies
%K empirico-transendental doublet
%K official truth seeking
%K medicalisation
%K depoliticisation
%U http://www.doiserbia.nb.rs/img/doi/0353-5738/2012/0353-57381203003K.pdf