More than just an opportunity to uncover fact after conflict, truth commissions can also offer restorative power to nations across the globe. Truth Commissions and State Building presents the first comparative study of the role of its kind, illuminating these possibilities.

Examining truth commissions as mechanisms for civic inclusion, identity formation, institutional reform, and nation (re)building in post-conflict and post-authoritarian societies, the book shifts attention towards institutional innovation in African countries, where approximately a third of all commissions have been established. Contributors explore the mandates, methods, outcomes, and legacies of truth commissions, analyzing their place in transitional and restorative justice. Rather than conceptualizing state building as incidental to their work, they present it as an intrinsic, central component. This flagship volume – authored by a stellar cast of policymakers, practitioners, and scholars – brings multidisciplinary and cross-sectoral perspectives to bear on the complex role of truth commissions in addressing transitional justice, historical injustices, and present-day human rights violations.

As more countries, in both the Global South and the North, adopt this model to address historical and contemporary abuses, the dialogue between different sectors of society modelled here will help inform this process – wherever it might occur.

Bonny Ibhawoh is professor of history and Senator William McMaster Chair in Global Human Rights at McMaster University.

Bonny Ibhawoh's profile page

Jasper Abembia Ayelazuno is associate professor of political science and vice-dean of the Faculty of Communication and Cultural Studies at the University for Development Studies, Ghana.

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Sylvia Bawa is associate professor of sociology at York University.

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• Commended, African Studies Review Association 2024 Best Africa-Focused Anthology or Edited Collection Prize (Honorable Mention)

"More than 50 state-sponsored or civil society–led truth commissions were established by 2023. They seek restorative justice in the face of prior widespread human rights abuses. This collection's 16 chapters move from theoretical engagements to methods and process to documents and archives, concluding with outcomes and legacies. Recommended." Choice

“Original and noteworthy. Nelson Mandela and the Archbishop Tutu may be the face of truth commissions globally, but Truth Commissions and State Building travels from Sierra Leone, Burkina Faso, and The Gambia to Canada [to] tackle concerns about justice, civic participation, gendered violence, and the voluminous archives created by such commissions while making the case for iterative evaluations of these efforts to build states and nations in the wake of trauma.” African Studies Review 2024 Best Africa-Focused Anthology or Edited Collection Prize Jury

“While there are a few books on transitional justice, broadly construed, and others focusing on Africa, this volume’s framing is entirely unique and its discussion of outcomes and legacies, essential.” Aderomola Adeola, co-editor of The Palgrave Handbook of Democracy, Governance and Justice in Africa

“The year 2024 is significant for elections around the world, including on the African continent. Given this, the insights of Truth Commissions and State Building, particularly the chapters that probe civic inclusion, identity formation, and institutional reform, could not have come at a better time.” H-Diplo

“This is the first time I have seen an effort to develop sustained and systematic investigation of how truth commissions operate as state building tools. The book will be of great interest to those studying transitional justice, as well as African politics, memory politics, and legal pluralism.” Bronwyn Leebaw, author of Judging State-Sponsored Violence, Imagining Political Change