Judy Barsalou and Victoria Baxter

The Urge to Remember

The Role of Memorials in Social 

Reconstruction and Transitional Justice

Summary and Recommendations

This report focuses on the often-ignored challenges faced by those seeking, through memorialization, to help repair societies that are emerging from violent conflict. The summary 

matrix at the end of this report provides recommendations to international actors interested 

in assisting in that process.

• Memorialization is a process that satisfies the desire to honor those who suffered or died 

during conflict and as a means to examine the past and address contemporary issues. 

It can either promote social recovery after violent conflict ends or crystallize a sense of 

victimization, injustice, discrimination, and the desire for revenge.

• Memorialization occurs throughout the conflict life cycle: before conflict begins, during 

conflict, and after conflict ends. Memorialization initiatives take different forms depending on who initiates them, the stage of the conflict at which they are initiated, and the 

kind of society that emerges after the violence ends. Thus, memorialization is a highly 

politicized process that reflects the will of those in power. 

• Outside providers of assistance, such as international mission staff, peacekeepers, international nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), and humanitarian organizations, often 

are inadvertently drawn into local disputes about the creation or maintenance of memorial and cultural sites. These outsiders may be expected to protect places (such as mass 

gravesites or important document collections) that form the basis for future memorials 

and museum sites or that may be valuable in legal trials. 

• It is not easy for outsiders to determine their proper roles in such situations, especially 

when dealing with ad hoc, spontaneous efforts to build memorials that can fuel the 

desire for revenge and promote further violence. Adding to the complexity is the fact that 

the definition of “outsider” depends on context. Survivors in local communities may view 

fellow nationals from other communities or identity groups as outsiders.

STABILIZATION AND RECONSTRUCTION SERIES NO. 5 

JANUARY 2007

ABOUT THE REPORT

This report is based on the deliberations of a United States 

Institute of Peace Working Group that focused on the role 

of memorialization in promoting, jeopardizing, or impairing 

social reconstruction and reconciliation in societies emerging 

from violent conflict. The Memorialization Working Group 

was part of the Institute’s Filling the Gaps series, which 

addresses reconstruction and stabilization challenges facing 

societies that have recently experienced violent conflict. 

Judy Barsalou (Institute vice president, Grant and Fellowship 

Program) and Victoria Baxter (director, The People Speak, 

United Nations Foundation) led the Memorialization Working 

Group, with assistance from Beth Cole (senior program officer 

in the Institute’s Center for Post-Conflict Peace and Stability 

Operations). Judy Barsalou and Victoria Baxter prepared this 

report. Baxter was the senior program associate, American 

Association for the Advancement of Science, while writing 

this report.

The views expressed in this report do not necessarily reflect 

those of the United States Institute of Peace, which does not 

advocate specific policy positions.

CONTENTS

Summary and Recommendations 1

Introduction 3

Defining Memorialization 4

Defining Reconciliation and Social Reconstruction 5

xMemorialization and Types of Conflict 6

Timing and Sequencing 8

Connecting Memorialization to Other Transitional x

Justice Initiatives 9

“Insiders” versus “Outsiders” 11

The Importance of Process 13

Measuring Impact 15

Difficulties of Determining Impact 16

Helping Outsiders Approach Memorialization 17

Stabilization and

U N I T E D S T A T E S I N S T I T U T E O F P E A C E

Reconstruction series

 1200 17th Street NW • Washington, DC 20036 • 202.457.1700 • fax 202.429.6063 • www.usip.org
2

• Outsiders can play important roles in getting former enemies to work together on 

memorial initiatives that promote social reconstruction. Increasingly, outside experts 

on memorialization are called upon to consult on national memorial projects in societies emerging from conflict. But outsiders overstep their role if they seek to start or 

dominate memorial processes, for those processes must be initiated and controlled 

by local actors if they are to become truly meaningful to recovering societies. 

• International actors, especially, need to be clear about the limits of their role. 

Memorialization is a process that locals must initiate, although outsiders may make 

important contributions through technical assistance, financial help, or facilitation 

in bringing contending parties together. 

• Few international actors—international mission staff and peacekeepers, humanitarian aid workers, foreign NGOs, international organizations, and others—involved in 

postwar reconstruction are prepared to deal with memorialization. Their personnel 

need to learn about the importance of memorialization, for good or for ill, in societies 

emerging from conflict. International actors must recognize sites and other resources 

(such as document collections) of cultural, historical, or symbolic significance and 

clarify how they can protect these resources in an effort to promote social reconstruction. They also need to train their staff to be culturally aware of local practices and 

beliefs relating to conflict resolution, death, and burial.

• The process of determining what shape a memorial project should take and how 

memorial space should be used is essential—more important, ultimately, than the 

physical edifice itself. Moreover, the process remains essential even after a memorial 

is built. Memorial projects that encourage survivors to explore contested memories 

of the past, promote learning and critical thinking, and facilitate ongoing cultural 

exchange are more likely to advance social reconstruction. They are also more likely 

to retain meaning for rising generations than static memorials of long-past conflicts 

and heroes that fail to interpret their meaning in ways that have contemporary 

relevance.

• Memorialization is often not recognized as an important tool of transitional justice 

initiatives. National and international actors involved in transitional justice—especially in tribunals and truth commissions—have largely missed the opportunity to 

incorporate memorialization into their initiatives. The repeated failure to deal with 

memorials (whether ad hoc or sanctioned) and their potentially negative impact can 

imperil transitional justice efforts and peacebuilding.

• Successful memorialization draws upon specialists from many fields—transitional 

justice experts, historians, museum designers, public artists, trauma specialists, and 

human rights activists, among others—who traditionally have not worked together 

or are not viewed as having concerns in common.

• Tribunals and truth commissions share with memorial projects the fact that their 

work depends in part on collecting documents and other materials used to establish 

historical truths. Collecting, managing, and deriving value from these materials is 

especially challenging when the amount of documentary materials is overwhelming. 

Those involved in truth commissions and tribunals need to consider how their documentary collections can be made accessible to those involved in memorial projects. 

Truth commissions can make better use of their proceedings and final reports to prepare countries for tasks that logically follow—incorporating the truth commissions’ 

findings into educational programs and memorial projects designed to prevent future 

generations from forgetting the past and repeating its mistakes. 

• In planning and budgeting for tribunals and truth commissions, national and international authorities need to consciously lay the groundwork for national memorialization projects designed to advance the goals of earlier transitional justice initiatives.

ABOUT THE INSTITUTE

The United States Institute of Peace is an independent, nonpartisan institution established and funded 

by Congress. Its goals are to help prevent and resolve 

violent conflicts, promote post-conflict peacebuilding, 

and increase conflict-management tools, capacity, and 

intellectual capital worldwide. The Institute does this by 

empowering others with knowledge, skills, and 

resources, as well as by its direct involvement in 

conflict zones around the globe.

BOARD OF DIRECTORS

J. Robinson West (Chair), Chairman, PFC Energy, Washington, D.C. • María Otero (Vice Chair), President, ACCION 

International, Boston, Mass. • Betty F. Bumpers, Founder 

and former President, Peace Links, Washington, D.C. • 

Holly J. Burkhalter, Vice President of Government Affairs, 

International Justice Mission, Washington, D.C. • Chester 

A. Crocker, James R. Schlesinger Professor of Strategic 

Studies, School of Foreign Service, Georgetown University • Laurie S. Fulton, Partner, Williams and Connolly, 

Washington, D.C. • Charles Horner, Senior Fellow, Hudson 

Institute, Washington, D.C. • Seymour Martin Lipset,

Hazel Professor of Public Policy, George Mason University • 

Mora L. McLean, President, Africa-America Institute, New 

York, N.Y. • Barbara W. Snelling, former State Senator 

and former Lieutenant Governor, Shelburne, Vt. 

MEMBERS EX OFFICIO

Barry F. Lowenkron, Assistant Secretary of State for 

Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor • Peter W. 

Rodman, Assistant Secretary of Defense for International 

Security Affairs • Richard H. Solomon, President, United 

States Institute of Peace (nonvoting) • Frances C. 

Wilson, Lieutenant General, U.S. Marine Corps; President, 

National Defense University 
3

• Determining what contributions memorial initiatives make toward reconciliation or 

social reconstruction is difficult in part because of the complexity and contested

meanings of those terms. Memorial initiatives describe evolving, long-term social, 

economic, cultural, and political processes that are difficult to measure. Assessing the 

impact of memorials and museums is possible, but doing so requires careful planning, 

investment of resources, and willingness to track changes over time. Understanding 

what effect a memorial project has on promoting social reconstruction also requires 

being clear up front about the goals the project is trying to achieve. 

• Effective evaluation also requires assessments before, during, and after project implementation, as well as the understanding that future generations may form entirely 

different, unanticipated opinions of a memorial. Researchers seeking to link changes 

in attitude and behavior to a specific initiative may find it difficult to do so in relation to broader social and political change, but consider it worth trying nonetheless. 

More broadly, the impact of all transitional justice processes—memorialization among 

them—remains under-researched. 

Introduction

The urge to honor the dead and remember violent struggles is as prevalent as the impulse 

to try to repress terrible memories and move on. Societies around the world undertake 

memorial activities to preserve historical memory relating to traumatic events. But what 

is the impact of such initiatives? Do they advance reconciliation and social reconstruction among former enemies, or do they have the opposite effect of preserving or even 

strengthening divisions that led to violent conflict? 

In an effort to understand how to promote social reconstruction, reconciliation, and 

transitional justice in societies emerging from violent conflict, the Memorialization Working Group addressed five sets of questions:

• Memorialization: What is memorialization and why is it important? What forms do 

memorials take around the world, and what roles do timing and the nature of the 

conflict play in shaping the form and impact of memorial activities? Who initiates 

memorial projects, at what stages in the conflict, and why? What memories do they 

seek to preserve, and how? In whose name do they act? How much memory is useful, 

particularly in cases of mass murder and genocide? How can one limit the manipulation of public memory by political actors for their own narrow interests? 

• Timing and Sequencing: What is the relationship between memorialization and other 

transitional justice interventions, such as legal tribunals and truth commissions? How 

can memorials best advance the goals of other transitional justice initiatives? What 

is the optimal timing and sequencing of memorials in relation to other transitional 

justice initiatives?

• Insiders versus Outsiders: What roles do “outsiders”—including UN-mandated missions, international organizations, foreign peacekeeping troops, and international 

NGOs—play in memorialization, and how do they become involved in memorial initiatives? What steps should outsiders take to ensure that their role is a positive one?

• Process: How can outsiders prompt communities of former antagonists to work 

together on memorial projects? Why is process so important?

• Impact of Memorials on Social Reconstruction: What contribution—positive or 

negative—does memorialization make to social reconstruction or reconciliation, and 

what is the meaning of these terms? How does the impact of memorials change over 

time, as subsequent generations are born and the events and people being memorialized recede from immediate memory? What means are available to assess the impact 

The urge to honor the dead and 

remember violent struggles is as 

prevalent as the impulse to try 

to repress terrible memories and 

move on.
4

of memorials on people’s understanding of a conflict and their inclination to live in 

peace or conflict?

Defining Memorialization

Memorialization initiatives take a wide variety of forms—from formal museums and 

monuments that evolve over years and cost millions of dollars to ephemeral collections of 

condolence notes, flowers, and pictures of victims at sites where they died or vanished. 

In Kosovo, for example, Albanian students on annual school-led tours of Kosovo honor 

a famous Albanian nationalist by visiting his destroyed house, where he and fifty-seven 

others died in a fight with Serbian police in January 1998. Initiators of memorials range 

from individual survivors and the communities in which they live to civil society organizations, national governments, and even private sector enterprises. 

At the same time, in every society emerging from a traumatic past there are efforts to 

suppress memory in an effort to “move on” or “put the past behind us.” According to Liz 

Sevcenko, director of the International Coalition of Historic Site Museums of Conscience, 

remembering is a basic human instinct, and memory cannot be imprisoned—it will usually 

come out in one form or another. The challenge is to find ways to harness memory to learn 

lessons from the past in an effort to avoid repeating it.

According to Ereshnee Naidu of the Centre for the Study of Violence and Reconciliation in Braamfontein, South Africa, memorialization takes a variety of forms, serving as 

an umbrella concept encompassing a range of processes to remember and commemorate. 

Memorialization as a process satisfies the desire to honor those who suffered or died during conflict and becomes a means of examining the past. In this process, the past can be 

reinterpreted to address a wide range of political or social needs—recasting “subversives” 

as martyrs or innocent victims, for instance, or consolidating a new national identity, such 

as the transformation of South Africa from apartheid state to “Rainbow Nation.” Memorialization thus represents a powerful arena of contested memory and offers the possibility 

of aiding the formation of new national, community, and ethnic identities. 

Hassan Mneimneh of the Iraq Memory Foundation notes that memorialization often 

results in a blurred line between reflecting and remembering, on the one hand, and 

deliberately promoting a political position, on the other. This blurring occurs particularly 

in ongoing conflicts. In south Lebanon, for example, the Khiyam prison (opened in the 

Israeli-occupied zone in 1985) has been converted into a site of remembrance to honor 

victims but also to denounce the enemy. Even more starkly, the hastily built Elian Gonzalez monument in Havana was erected as a sort of rallying call to political action, reinforcing Cuban demands for the United States to return Gonzalez. Regardless of the intention 

of memorials, Mneimneh argues that “remembering is by necessity refashioning the past, 

through the selective highlight of elements of subjective relevance” and that it can “even 

be perceived as being a confiscation of history.” 

Vamik Volkan, professor emeritus of the University of Virginia, points out that many 

memorials honor ruling parties or victors in a conflict at the expense of “losers” or marginalized communities. The dark side of memorialization, he notes, involves efforts to use 

memories of the past to fan the flames of ethnic hatred, consolidate a group’s identity as 

victims, demarcate the differences among identity groups, and reify grievances. Wittingly 

or unwittingly, interested parties around the world use memorial sites to seek absolution, 

lodge accusations against their enemies, establish competing claims of victimhood, or 

promote ideological agendas. In short, regardless of what form it takes, memorialization 

is a highly political process that is shaped by those in power. In the words of Harvey 

Weinstein at the University of California, Berkeley, memorials represent a complex nexus 

between politics, trauma, collective memory, and public art.

Functions of Memorialization 

• Truth-telling or documenting specific 

human rights violations

• Creating a specific place for the 

immediate family and/or the larger 

society to mourn victims 

• Offering symbolic reparations to honor 

the victims of violence and reinstate 

their reputations 

• Symbolizing a community’s or nation’s 

commitment to values such as democracy and human rights 

• Promoting reconciliation by recasting the national identity or repairing 

damaged relations among groups 

• Encouraging civic engagement and 

education programs to engage the 

wider community in a dialogue about 

the past and promote discussions of a 

peaceful future based on coexistence

• Advancing educational purposes, 

including the retelling of history for 

future generations 

• Facilitating historic preservation of a 

specific era in a country’s or community’s history
5

Defining Reconciliation and Social Reconstruction

Any examination of memorialization requires clarification of the meaning of two 

terms—“reconciliation” and “social reconstruction.” Dictionary definitions of the former 

emphasize a persuasive element, requiring a party to “win over” another with whom there 

has been a conflict. But a simple definition does little to convey the complexity of the 

term. For some, reconciliation carries a specific meaning based on religious injunctions 

to forgive and forget, while others define it in terms of changes in attitudes, beliefs, and 

identities, or in changed relationships. Those who think they understand what reconciliation looks like on the personal level may have trouble defining it on the societal level. 

A related question is whether reconciliation is a state of being that can be observed 

and measured at various points, or whether it is a longer term goal that can be used to 

organize individuals and societies. Researchers often note that reconciliation is both a 

goal and a process. Does one directly promote a “reconciliation agenda” aimed at changing attitudes of former enemies, or are there subcomponents (effective legal systems, 

reconstructed school systems, etc.) that should be put in place first in order to promote 

reconciliation as a goal? What comes first—the institutions or the attitudes? Where 

should policymakers and others begin?

Despite ongoing debate about the meaning of reconciliation, it has become one of 

the key components of transitional justice, which assumes that (1) truth-telling (a full 

accounting of the past) is necessary for reconciliation; and (2) justice (holding perpetrators accountable through legal processes or restorative measures, such as compensation) 

promotes reconciliation. These assumptions are just beginning to be empirically tested, 

and the findings are mixed. Eric Stover and Harvey Weinstein in their edited volume My 

Neighbor, My Enemy: Justice and Community in the Aftermath of Mass Atrocity (Cambridge: 

Cambridge University Press, 2004) challenge the causal relationship between criminal 

trials and reconciliation. They state that justice is often more broadly defined by those 

immediately affected by atrocities and civil violence, and argue that criminal trials do 

not always have a therapeutic value for survivors of violence. By contrast, in his book 

Overcoming Apartheid: Can Truth Reconcile a Divided Nation? (New York: Russell Sage Foundation, 2004), James L. Gibson concluded that South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation 

Commission did help promote reconciliation. More research drawing from a broad range 

of disciplines and social theories is needed to explain more fully the relationships among 

truth, justice, and reconciliation in a variety of contexts. 

Some who are uncomfortable with the term “reconciliation” prefer the terms “social 

reconstruction” and “reclamation,” which are usually associated with an array of interventions to promote economic, political, and social progress, as well as identity transformation, with less emphasis on legal accountability and truth-telling. 

Without trying to contend with all the conflicting definitions of reconciliation, the 

Working Group’s definition included the following assumptions about the meaning of the 

term and what must be done to achieve it: 

• Reconciliation is a multilevel process that involves national-level responsibility but 

also requires coordination and holistic approaches to promote social reconstruction 

at many levels of society. Various processes—legal, social, political, and economic—

need to be at work if reconciliation is to be achieved.

• Reconciliation should be aimed conservatively, with the goal of finding ways to 

peacefully manage rather than to eliminate conflict. 

• Reconciliation is a long-term process that requires the management of expectations. 

There is a limit to what any one policy or intervention can achieve.

• Reconciliation has pragmatic dimensions and must be considered alongside programs 

to promote democracy, rule of law, and justice. Failure to pay attention to reconciliation can undermine interventions designed to achieve other goals. 

Major Forms of Memorial Initiatives 

Constructed sites:

• Museums and commemorative 

libraries

• Monuments

• Walls of names of victims

• Virtual memorials on the World 

Wide Web

Found sites:

• Graves

• Locations of mass killings or 

genocide

• Former torture centers/concentration camps

Activities:

• Anniversaries of coups, battles, or 

other actions related to the conflict

• Temporary exhibits

• Renaming or rededicating streets, 

buildings, or infrastructure

• Walking tours or parades

• Demonstrations and vigils

• Public apologies

Source: Louis Bickford, International Center 

for Transitional Justice
6

• Key to reconciliation is the creation of new national identities and, in some cases, 

new myths guiding the nation. Memorialization is a pivotal component of reconciliation because of its power to shape identities, myths, and memories. 

Memorialization and Types of Conflict

Most research on memorialization is limited to descriptions of different types of memorial 

efforts, revealing little about their impact on society or their contributions to transitional 

justice. One question is whether there is a correlation between types of conflict (or types 

of conflict resolution policies and programs) and forms or functions of memorials. 

Memorials to Genocide and Mass Killings

In cases of mass killings and genocide, memorialization often revolves around human 

remains. Displaying or preserving human remains becomes a central way to educate 

people about the sheer scope of death that occurred in a country. In Rwanda, for example, 

some victims’ bodies from the 1994 genocide have been preserved in the schools and 

churches where they were found. These sites are open to visitors and seek to convey 

the scale of the genocide through the presentation of an almost overwhelming number 

of bodies. In some of the “killing fields” memorials in Cambodia, tour guides will assist 

visitors in digging up remains, such as bone fragments and teeth.

When the violence occurred fairly recently, these memorials often do not offer visitors an analysis of the conflict or any sort of educational background. In places where 

more time has elapsed, memorials are more likely to provide explanations of the roots 

of the violence and present larger lessons. For example, many of the Holocaust museums 

or exhibits centered primarily on the loss of Jewish lives during the World War II period 

draw upon a larger historical context and offer a coherent “story” for visitors. According to 

Edward T. Linenthal of the University of Indiana, the designers of the exhibits at the U.S. 

Holocaust Museum and Memorial made a point of choosing a relatively narrow, coherent 

story that visitors could easily follow and understand, rather than attempting to include 

all aspects of the Holocaust.

While many such memorials are reminders of a violent past, some honor positive 

actions. In Sarajevo, Tito’s granddaughter Svetlana Broz created the Garden of the Righteous memorial to commemorate those who helped victims across ethnic lines during the 

Bosnia war—stories that were documented in her book, Good People in Times of Evil. The 

Yad Vashem memorial in Jerusalem honors those who protected victims of the Holocaust. 

In Yerevan, the Garden of the Righteous remembers non-Armenians who helped Armenians 

before, during, and after the 1915 genocide. Such memorials help postwar societies celebrate courageous people and positive values that existed even during the worst times.

Memorials to Disappearances

Memorials in countries in which many people have been “disappeared” often take a different form. Unlike genocide sites that display human remains, sites commemorating 

disappearances generally reflect the absence of bodies. Repressive regimes and other 

perpetrators use disappearances precisely for the deniability of the act. The immediate 

result is that surviving family members are left without physical locations to mourn their 

dead.

Accordingly, memorials to the disappeared often include walls of names of the victims 

and sometimes other information focused on recasting their identities—from “subversives” to victims of the state. Such sites also provide a physical space where family members can mourn their losses. Survivors have created a number of Internet-based “virtual” 

memorials to the disappeared in Latin America in which pictures are displayed, along with 

biographical information and places for family members to record their emotions. Two 

Unlike genocide sites that 

display human remains, sites 

commemorating disappearances 

generally reflect the absence 

of bodies.
7

examples are Sin Olvido (Without Forgetting) at www.sinolvido.org and Proyecto Desaparacido (Project Disappeared) at www.desaparecidos.org/main.html. 

Societies recovering from large-scale disappearances also tend to create memorials at 

clandestine torture centers, where visitors are encouraged to explore the history of statesponsored torture and extrajudicial killings. Depending on the level of legitimacy the 

former regime still enjoys and public attitudes about the subsequent political transition, 

there can be an uneasy relationship between the state and these former torture centers. 

In 2001, a coalition of survivors and NGOs attempted to create a monument to the disappeared in Kashmir. A day after the group laid the foundation stone for the monument, 

the Indian government razed the site. In Chile, a similar coalition took the initiative to 

convert the former torture site of Villa Grimaldi into a memorial. After the demise of the 

military dictatorship led by General Augusto Pinochet, the first few democratic governments did little to promote Villa Grimaldi officially or incorporate the site into national 

education initiatives. This situation might have to do with the fact that for many years 

after the transition, Pinochet continued to enjoy substantial support throughout Chile. By 

contrast, the Argentine government has been very involved in the formation of a human 

rights-themed museum at a former torture center in the Naval Mechanics School. A coalition of human rights and survivor organizations called Memoria Abierta (Open Memory) 

has been closely involved with the government and a number of other groups in designing 

this site to make it accessible to the public, and the government has been relatively open 

to their participation. The process of creating the museum has been a widely debated 

issue in Argentina.

Memorials to Ethnic Conflict

Ethnically divided societies usually produce memorials that honor a narrowly defined ethnic group and its “martyrs.” Sometimes, however, memorials are used to promote a new, 

multicultural national identity after the conflict has ended and a democratic transition 

is under way. Examples of the former include a memorial in Kigali, Rwanda, to the Tutsi 

victims of the 1994 genocide, which fails to mention some 200,000 Hutu victims of subsequent Tutsi repression, and wall murals in Northern Ireland commemorating “martyrs.” By 

contrast, Robben Island Museum in South Africa tells the story of the “Rainbow Nation” 

through the collective struggle of anti-apartheid prisoners on the island, yet the dominant narrative is that of the party that came to power through the struggle: the African 

National Congress. The difference between the two approaches often has to do with how 

the conflict ended (whether or not an inclusive democratic transition is under way, replacing an authoritarian political order that privileged one ethnic group over another); how 

much time has elapsed since the violence ended; and whether the memorial was initiated 

at the local or national level. 

In newly democratic societies, national memorials often honor the “great men” who 

prevailed during the conflict at the expense of marginalized groups, such as women and 

ordinary citizens also involved in the struggle. For example, in Zimbabwe Hero’s Acre, a 

monument was built to honor the people who fought for independence. The monument 

features statues of men in combat fatigues. The women depicted in the statues, however, 

are wearing dresses rather than the combat fatigues they actually wore, thereby downplaying their important role. The focus on “great men” sometimes creates anomalous 

juxtapositions. In Moscow, the Park of (Totalitarian) Arts features an uneasy coexistence 

between statues of former Soviet leaders, sculptures celebrating Russian artists and writers, and a monument commemorating victims of the Gulag. South Africa continues to 

struggle to integrate memorials honoring Afrikaner culture and history with the “Rainbow 

Nation” themed memorials that celebrate black African culture, democracy, and racial 

tolerance.

Naidu points out that national memorial projects in democratizing societies often 

reflect the aspirations rather than the reality of transforming countries. These memorials 

Ethnically divided societies usually 

produce memorials that honor a 

narrowly defined ethnic group 

and its “martyrs.”
8

may not address the immediate needs of victims/survivors and their families but work 

instead to consolidate new notions of nationhood. For example, South Africa’s Freedom 

Park project is being built directly opposite the Voortrekker Monument in Pretoria. Freedom Park seeks to negotiate the triumphant nature of the Voortrekker Monument by 

depicting a variety of stories, ranging from the Anglo-Boer War to the anti-apartheid 

struggle in South Africa. In doing so, Freedom Park acknowledges the survivors, broadly 

defined, of the conflict but focuses mainly on drawing together the different racial, ethnic, and cultural narratives of a richly diverse country in an attempt to portray a nation 

moving forward into a transformed future. Survivors may have negative opinions about a 

nationally and future-focused memorial because it does not relate directly to their particular needs—honoring those killed in conflict, restoring the good names of those involved 

in struggles against oppression, or commemorating particular types of violence. However, 

memorials representing aspirations of a transforming society often appeal to the broader 

community, particularly bystanders and/or perpetrators of the conflict, by allowing them 

to “participate” in the meaning of the memorial. 

Regardless of what type of conflict a society experiences—a civil war, a war between 

states, genocide, or other conflict—the urge to publicly document who died, by what 

means, and why appears to be nearly universal. Societies want to be able to say definitely 

how many died and under what circumstances. For example, this impulse is behind a new 

initiative in Kosovo to create a comprehensive database with details about individual 

Albanians and Serbs who died or disappeared between February 1998 and December 2000 

during the war and immediately thereafter. This so-called “Kosovo Book of the Victims” 

is being created by the Humanitarian Law Center. The fact that the book will include 

information about victims on both sides of the conflict means this documentation effort 

will help lay the groundwork for a more complete historical narrative of the war. Even in 

countries like Lebanon, where no national memorials or museums to the fifteen-year civil 

war have been built and where former warlords from the conflict occupy the highest positions in government, civil society efforts to document the war are increasingly evident in 

photo exhibits, films, and other cultural media.

Timing and Sequencing

The forms that memorials take reflect the time when they were initiated and the people 

who built them. Grieving relatives sometimes create impromptu memorials where their 

loved ones died. In Kosovo, for example, hundreds of memorials were erected by families 

of victims. Survivors often build memorials when new mass gravesites are discovered 

or human remains are removed for reburial elsewhere. Larger, formal memorials undertaken by states generally do not appear until at least five to ten years have passed. Liz 

Sevcenko argues that memorialization takes place, and should be supported, throughout 

the different stages of the conflict—from the time when trauma first occurs as a result of 

violence and as it reverberates throughout subsequent generations. Each stage or type of 

memorialization addresses different but powerful needs. Clearly, however, events or people 

who seem heroic or noble and worth memorializing during or immediately after conflict 

often appear differently with time and hindsight. 

Why does it take so long for national memorials to be built? Survivors often feel that 

other needs should take priority—caring for victims; rebuilding political, judicial, and 

economic institutions; reestablishing the rule of law; and engaging in truth-telling and 

legal accountability processes. Moreover, decisions about what should be depicted, where 

and how, and how much the memorial should cost usually are marked by lengthy, contentious, and exhausting debates—witness ongoing controversies over the World Trade 

Center memorial in New York City. In settings such as Bosnia, where international forces 

intervened, the parties to conflict may feel that little has been resolved and balanced 

The forms that memorials take 

reflect the time when they 

were initiated and the people 

who built them.
9

depictions of the country’s suffering through memorials are difficult to conceive and 

negotiate. Perhaps this explains why a Bosnian NGO recently unveiled a statue of Bruce 

Lee in the city of Mostar, the site of fierce fighting during the war. According to Veselin 

Garalo of the group Urban Movement, which promoted the creation of the statue, “This 

does not mean that Bruce Lee will unite us, because people are different and cannot be 

united and we will always be Muslims, Serbs and Croats. But one thing we all have in 

common is Bruce Lee” (Pravda, November 27, 2005).

Even where contending parties are able to work with each other, it may take many 

years to raise sufficient funds for a memorial or museum. Doing so any earlier, in competition with other pressing reconstruction needs, is likely to be viewed as inappropriate by 

the poorest survivors, even though memorials generally cost much less than investments 

in infrastructure and other reconstruction projects. Sometimes, however, survivors or 

local entrepreneurs initiate memorials as a means of generating revenue. The Krasnoyarsk 

region in south Siberia, for example, recently advertised a newly restored memorial to 

Josef Stalin in an effort to promote tourism. According to Yevgeny Pashenko, the deputy 

governor of the region, “the idea was launched by travel agents” (Times of Oman, April 19, 

2006). Robben Island prison, where Nelson Mandela spent many of his twenty-six years 

in prison, has become a major tourist destination in South Africa. Survivors sometimes 

welcome this kind of memorialization, but generally only if they derive personal benefit 

from the revenue generated. Especially when lavish monuments—such as the Kliptown 

memorial in South Africa—are built in very poor areas where victims of the conflict still 

struggle to survive, memorial revenue generation from tourism that does not benefit the 

local community becomes a source of resentment. In some communities, the memorial 

itself becomes the focal point of frustration. Furious Kurds in northern Iraq recently 

destroyed the Halabja Monument, which memorialized some 5,000 Kurds killed in a 

chemical warfare attack, because they felt that the Patriotic Union, which governs the 

eastern section of Iraq’s Kurdish region, had “transformed the monument into an emblem 

of its own tyranny and greed.” One resident said, “Kurdish officials used Halabja to gather 

money. Millions of dollars [have] been spent, but nothing has reached us” (The New York 

Times, March 17, 2006).

Connecting Memorialization to Other Transitional Justice Initiatives

The passage of time enables survivors to achieve perspective on a conflict and what they 

want to remember about it. If other transitional justice processes—especially tribunals 

and truth commissions—have finished their work, the public is likely to better understand aspects of the conflict that were previously hidden or repressed. For these reasons, 

memorialization at the national level ideally follows truth-telling and legal accountability 

processes and is intimately linked to educational efforts to engage the public and schoolchildren in a dialogue about the past. These education initiatives—ranging from efforts to 

change how the history of the conflict is taught in schools to public education programs 

based at memorials and museums—are essential to extending the impact of truth commissions and tribunals. For example, the education programs at the District Six Museum 

in South Africa help younger generations understand what their parents and grandparents 

lived through and have enabled that museum to retain meaning for new generations.

So what is the record on truth commissions with respect to memorialization? A 

number have included recommendations for memorialization—among them the truth 

commissions in Chile, Guatemala, South Africa, Ghana, and Sierra Leone—by specifically 

endorsing the use of symbolic reparations to promote reconciliation and, in the words of 

the South African commission, “restore human and civil dignity.” But even in these cases, 

memorialization was largely an afterthought. Louis Bickford of the International Center 

for Transitional Justice described the expression of this need in the Chilean commission 

For these reasons, memorialization 

at the national level ideally follows 

truth-telling and legal accountability processes and is intimately 

linked to educational efforts to 

engage the public and schoolchildren in a dialogue about the 

past.
10

report as a “throwaway line.” To date, truth commissions have not articulated in much 

detail what memorialization means, how it should be connected to other transitional 

justice processes, who should take charge, and other specific points of consideration. By 

not taking into greater account the role of memorialization and the educational processes 

that should accompany it, truth commissions are losing an important opportunity to 

extend their impact. 

Countries are also missing opportunities when they do not use peace agreements to 

address the need for symbolic reparation. Generally, peace agreements include procedural 

components that outline processes to stabilize the country as well as structural components describing the new political order. While faced with the urgent need to end violence 

and establish stable peace in the short term, drafters of peace agreements could still 

include clauses designed to encourage memorialization and symbolic reparations at the 

national level years down the road.

Even when memorialization is not a conscious outgrowth of other transitional justice 

processes, all transitional justice interventions share a dependence on documentation. 

According to Louis Bickford, there are two overlapping paradigms for confronting the 

past—the “transitional justice paradigm” and the “memory paradigm.” Both require the 

collection and preservation of a range of materials and resources—forensic evidence, files, 

photos, oral histories, posters, and other ephemeral materials. 

• The transitional justice paradigm relates to the legal responsibilities of the state and 

the international community to promote the rule of law. It requires that postwar 

states meet four responsibilities: truth-telling about what happened in the past, 

prosecutions of perpetrators, reparations for victims, and guarantees of non-repetition 

through institutional reform. Documentation is essential for each of these postwar 

processes. Successful truth-telling requires collecting the stories of victims and perpetrators; prosecutions need documentary evidence of crimes; reparations need correct 

identification of the recipient class; and institutional reforms include vetting and 

other processes that rely on administrative files from the police, military forces, and 

other government bureaucracies. 

• The memory paradigm seeks to promote a culture of democratization in part by creating a “never again” mentality. Depending heavily on cultural and other methods 

of educating and reminding people about the past, this paradigm also relies substantially on documentary evidence. Oral histories and other evidence used in trials 

and tribunals may be put to different but equally important use in museums and 

memorials.

Given the dependence of transitional justice interventions on documentation, it is 

essential to develop better policies for collecting, storing, and sharing documents that 

can be used for more than one purpose. Unfortunately, either because of limited resources 

or limited vision, many organizations collecting documentary evidence provide access to it 

on a limited basis at best. Concerns about victims’ privacy may be one reason. The International Tracing Service, which was established in London in 1943 and moved to Germany 

in 1945 to help relatives of Nazi victims determine what had happened to them, has only 

now agreed to make its 30 million documents available to the public, citing privacy as 

the reason for keeping its archives closed for sixty-one years. 

Trudy Huskamp Peterson, who recently surveyed the six existing international criminal 

tribunals as to their plans for the retention or disposal of their records, argues that they 

need to be more proactive in thinking about the disposition of their files. The Artemis 

Project at Yale University is conducting a feasibility study of creating a centralized facility 

to store truth commission archives. Because NGOs increasingly are involved in collecting 

valuable documentation, they also need to be drawn into collective decision making about 

how to make their resources accessible and useful to survivors, perpetrators, and various 

transitional justice initiatives. The Documentation Affinity Group, an unofficial groupTo date, truth commissions 

have not articulated in much 

detail what memorialization 

means, how it should be connected to other transitional 

justice processes, who should 

take charge, and other specific 

points of consideration.
11

ing of documentation centers in Serbia, Burma, Cambodia, Guatemala, and Iraq, meets 

regularly to explore and share best practices in promoting documentation for a variety of 

transitional justice purposes.

A major problem facing those who collect documents is getting full value from them. 

According to Hassan Mneimneh of the Iraq Memory Foundation, the value of materials can 

be dissipated when the amount of documentation is overwhelming, and collectors find it 

difficult to establish a balance between too much and too little. In Iraq, the sheer amount 

of materials—estimated by Mneimneh at 400 million pages—gathered by various local 

and international actors with varying levels of financial resources and technical expertise 

has created a substantial burden to sort, preserve, and analyze. What may be essential 

to one transitional process—for example, establishing where a document was found and 

what else was found with it for a legal tribunal—may be of less interest to another process. Documents needed for legal prosecutions must meet very high evidentiary standards, 

while the requirements of memorials and museums may be less stringent. Despite these 

differences, the materials collected, analyzed, and stored by truth commissions and tribunals provide essential evidence upon which memorialization depends.

“Insiders” versus “Outsiders”

It is essential that survivors of conflict, rather than the outsiders who come to help them, 

initiate memorial projects. Outsiders, especially international actors, may feel that they 

are more objective or balanced in their understanding of the conflict, particularly in its 

immediate aftermath, but their efforts to create memorials are likely to be greeted by 

either indifference or hostility. If memorials are to help reunite a society, they must be 

the outgrowth of a consultative process dominated by survivors. 

The definition of an outsider depends on the context. For example, members of the 

community in Kliptown, just outside the Soweto township in which a memorial was being 

built, considered a South African NGO based in Bramfontein (about 40 kilometers away) 

that was consulting on the project to be an outsider. Ultimately, the question comes 

down to who makes the important decisions. When the Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum, 

located in a former prison and torture center in Cambodia, decided to turn its yard into 

an ornamental garden with walkways and flowers, local residents were upset. One of 

them said, “My opinion is we should leave the old things the same. It’s our heritage.” 

Chuch Phoeurn, secretary of state of the Cambodian Ministry of Culture in Phnom Penh, 

disagreed and said that the new garden should be permitted as long as it did not disturb 

prison buildings that formed the museum site or adjacent gravesites (The Cambodia Daily,

September 27, 2005). 

However they are defined, outsiders must work to win the respect and trust of locals 

in order to play an effective role in memorialization. In Kosovo, the head of the UN mission, Sorren Jessen Petersen, deepened his relationships with local residents by attending 

funerals, reburials, and remembrance festivals, among other important events. Insider 

reactions to outsiders vary from one setting to another. In some societies, receptivity 

to foreign NGOs may be greater than to foreign governments. But even outsiders who 

do their best to be “objective” and “neutral” are likely to be considered anything but by 

insiders. While outsiders both from abroad and from outside the immediate community 

often have much to offer in terms of human and financial resources, they must be prepared to engage in empathetic listening, be careful about imposing their own values, and 

be ready to deal with moral complexities.

International actors involved in memorialization also need to acquire cultural knowledge about local belief systems and practices related to death, burial, and memorialization. This means setting aside time and funding to train their staff members, to become 

familiar with the key stakeholders in any struggle over memorialization, and to understand 

The materials collected, 

analyzed, and stored by 

truth commissions and 

tribunals provide essential 

evidence upon which 

memorialization depends.

International actors involved 

in memorialization need to 

acquire cultural knowledge 

about local belief systems and 

practices related to death, 

burial, and memorialization. 
12

the historical context of which the memorial effort is a part. Identifying, mapping, and 

protecting important sites, document collections, and other materials essential to memorialization are very useful functions that can be played by outside actors who are intent, 

at a minimum, on doing no harm or on promoting social reconstruction. International 

actors can also help bring together the disparate local and international professionals 

whose combined work helps create successful memorials. Transitional justice experts, 

historians, museum designers, public artists, trauma specialists, and human rights activists, among others, traditionally do not work together and/or view themselves as having 

significantly overlapping professional concerns, but their interests and skills intersect in 

key ways in memorial projects.

How do outsiders get drawn into memorialization processes? For one thing, outside 

military forces involved in the conflict are expected to protect important sites, including 

mass gravesites. In Germany, Allied troops intervened to preserve the Nazi death camps—

sites that many Germans were eager to destroy and forget. Peacekeeping troops in Kosovo 

stand guard over an uncompleted Orthodox cathedral in downtown Prishtina—a highly 

unpopular symbol of former Serbian domination. These sites are crucial to a country’s historical memory and often become the basis for historical site museums and monuments. 

Yet because the “losers” in a conflict want to hide evidence of their crimes or the “winners” want to remove the reminders of a hated past, temporary foreign control of such 

sites is sometimes essential to their short-term survival. 

Outsiders also play a crucial role in collecting and preserving documents and other 

artifacts—materials vital to memorial efforts. For example, eleven countries (Belgium, 

France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Israel, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Poland, the United 

Kingdom, and the United States) managed the aforementioned International Tracing 

Service. The U.S. government possesses the largest collection of documents and other 

artifacts that reveal the workings of the Saddam Hussein regime, although dozens of Iraqi 

groups also possess considerable collections. Preservation of such holdings is crucial to 

memorialization efforts and their educational programs. Foreign control can be useful for 

preserving and analyzing the documents in the short run, but usually eventually leads to 

struggles over their ownership.

Outsiders are also often involved in legal accountability and truth-telling processes 

that are part of transitional justice and essential to memorialization. International organizations, such as the United Nations, may run tribunals—as the United Nations currently is 

doing in Tanzania and The Hague following conflicts in Rwanda and the former Yugoslavia. 

They may also advise on the establishment and operation of truth commissions. As the 

field of memorialization has become professionalized, local authorities sometimes ask 

experienced outsiders to advise on memorial projects. Experts from Latin America have 

consulted with counterparts in Spain and India about how to memorialize their conflicts, 

and South African experts have advised Americans seeking to commemorate the September 11 terrorist attacks. Affinity groups, such as the International Coalition of Historic Site 

Museums of Conscience, which has thirteen member institutions in eight countries, have 

organized to share knowledge and best practices internationally. 

Outsiders sometimes get drawn into memorialization inadvertently or indirectly. Determining their proper role in such situations is not always easy. For example, Barry Hart, 

an expert on trauma alleviation training from Eastern Mennonite University, spent four 

months interacting with family members of missing persons in a small city near Sarajevo. 

This group decided that one way they wanted to address some of their issues and “move 

on” was by building a memorial not only to their missing loved ones but to all victims of 

the war in Bosnia. Although this plan was not the focus of Hart’s original work, he became 

involved in discussions about what shape this memorial might take. 

Outside military forces sometimes find themselves in the middle of confrontations 

when locals try to erect one-sided or partisan memorials and peacekeepers are expected 

to intervene. A politically divisive memorial in Prizren, Kosovo, is a case in point: UN

Transitional justice 

experts, historians, 

museum designers, public 

artists, trauma specialists, and human rights 

activists, among others, 

traditionally do not work 

together and/or view 

themselves as having 

significantly overlapping 

professional concerns, but 

their interests and skills 

intersect in key ways in 

memorial projects.

Outsiders sometimes get 

drawn into memorialization 

inadvertently or indirectly. 
13

authorities insisted that elected city officials make the final decision, which they did—to 

prevent the memorial from being built. International authorities also may be caught up 

in battles over cultural icons. Kosovar Albanians successfully sought the assistance of 

Michael Steiner, head of the UN Interim Administration in Kosovo for eighteen months 

starting in December 2001, to facilitate the return of a 6,000-year-old figurine known as 

the “Goddess on the Throne” to the Museum of Kosovo after it was removed by the Serbs 

and placed in the Belgrade Museum when war broke out in Kosovo. 

Outsiders—both fellow nationals from outside the immediate survivor community and 

international actors—can help plan and implement memorial projects. By insisting on the 

importance of widespread consultation during the planning process, and by helping local 

actors plan and fund assessment and evaluations, outsiders can bring skills and perspectives that may not be available in the survivor community. They may also have access to 

essential funding sources. Given their cultural and linguistic advantages, outsiders who 

are fellow nationals may take on some tasks that are daunting to international outsiders. 

Survivor communities, however, may view some outsiders from abroad as more objective.

One of the difficulties facing outsiders is that it is not always obvious which sites 

have deep meaning for local residents, especially when the sites have not been formally 

developed as memorials. In India, for example, in the wake of attacks against Sikhs, Sikh 

temples took on added meaning as places of refugee and memorials to victims. Their 

architecture also evolved to make them less physically accessible to non-Sikhs. Thus, in 

one sense, Sikh temple architecture has become a memorial to the persecution of the 

Sikhs—something not obvious to outsiders. Outsiders not attuned to a society’s past also 

may not notice the absence of memorials to significant events. In India, for example, it is 

meaningful that there is no memorial to the approximately 600,000 victims of the 1947 

partition of India and Pakistan. 

The Importance of Process

According to Eric Stover (University of California, Berkeley), Hanny Megally (International 

Center for Transitional Justice), and Hania Mufti (Human Rights Watch), effective transitional justice interventions must pass three tests. First, the wider population must see 

the intervention as legitimate and impartial. For public memory processes, this means 

that the process of remembering and honoring is not just victors’ justice, but a thoughtful process of reflecting on the past. Second, any policy decisions or outcomes must be 

subject to a genuine consultation with those most affected by violence. For memory 

projects, this means that survivors must be directly involved in the discussion of what 

should be remembered and how. Third, effective transitional justice interventions have 

to be accompanied by a range of other initiatives aimed at promoting the rule of law, 

respect for human rights, economic and political reconstruction, and other aspects of civil 

society advancement. In short, memorialization is one aspect of the long-term policies 

and processes used in and by countries emerging from violent conflict. 

The merit of a process based on broad community consultation was highlighted in 

South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission report, which states, “symbolic reparations such as monuments and museums are important but should ideally be linked with 

endeavors that improve the everyday lives of victims and their communities. One way of 

combining the two aims is to involve victims prominently in the design and/or manufacture of monuments. . .” (Vol. 6, section 2, chapter 6, para. 4). Memorialization projects 

that follow this advice are more likely to contribute to the economic rehabilitation of the 

disadvantaged communities in which they are located and to create a greater sense of 

local ownership over them.

According to Sevcenko, process is paramount. In her view, the memorials that have 

the most positive effect are those that promote “dynamic performances of civic engageBy insisting on the importance 

of widespread consultation 

during the planning process, 

and by helping local actors 

plan and fund assessment and 

evaluations, outsiders can 

bring skills and perspectives 

that may not be available in 

the survivor community.
14

ment or democracy.” Memorials that merely list the names of victims without providing 

education about the past or a place for interaction run the risk of being either ignored or 

amended by others who perceive the memorials as frozen in the past. Examples of memorial sites and initiatives that have taken on a dynamic character include the following:

Memoria Abierta in Argentina: Created by a coalition of eight human rights organizations that use a variety of approaches in their work, this initiative has mapped hundreds 

of detention and torture sites, organized the collection of oral histories, built and made 

accessible archives documenting the past, organized training and workshop programs, and 

organized public events in Buenos Aires aimed at educating the public about the human 

rights abuses of past authoritarian regimes. All these activities operate on the assumption 

that memorialization is a long-term process.

District Six Museum in Cape Town, South Africa: Created by local residents to commemorate a flourishing mixed community that authorities declared in 1966 was a “whites 

only” area, this initiative focused on the suffering of some 60,000 nonwhite residents who 

were displaced and whose homes, businesses, and public institutions were bulldozed. The 

museum was created in one of the few buildings that remained—the Central Methodist 

Church—where previous residents now display secretly saved signs from streets that no 

longer exist and on whose floor they created a map of the original community. By inviting 

former residents to write their memories of places and events on this map, the museum 

made the map a place for encounter and dialogue among displaced communities about 

what they lost and where they are today. These encounters contributed to the building of 

a land reparations movement that resulted in one land court held at the museum through 

which former residents sought restitution. The museum has also become a forum for public 

discussions; a performance space for poetry, music, and other forms of remembrance and 

expression; an historical archive that includes oral histories; a sponsor of educational programs about the history of the area; and a space where social services for poor residents 

of the neighborhood are provided.

The Gulag Museum at Perm-36 in Russia: Created by the Memorial Society (an organization founded by Andrei Sakharov) and the Perm regional administration, this museum 

is at the site of the last remaining Soviet-era labor camp. When it first opened, the 

museum invited former prisoners and guards to give each other tours of the camp from 

their own perspectives. Current programs include traveling exhibits about the camp and 

what occurred there, as well as on-site educational and dialogue programs for students 

and others on the meaning of democracy and their role in shaping it. The museum has 

also developed a school curriculum on the history of Soviet repression and its implications 

for young people today, and has organized archives with documentary evidence (including 

videos and oral histories) about the camp and its role in the Soviet system.

Liberation War Museum in Bangladesh: Created by the Muktijuddha Smriti Trust, this 

museum memorializes the conflict in which three million Bengalees were killed and ten 

million were displaced in the civil war that led to the establishment of Bangladesh in 

1971. The museum’s activities include outreach programs for schoolchildren through its 

“mobile museum” and an annual Freedom Festival. 

In her emphasis on process, Sevcenko argues that old memorial and museum traditions 

of creating static spaces need to be set aside. The goal is to make or preserve places for 

“performances of democracy, not static representation of national identity.” In this vision, 

museum and memorial sites use the “power of place” to become the locations of popular, 

peaceful forms of interaction that encourage dialogue, focus on individual human experiences, and promote civic engagement. The process of creating these interactions becomes 

an end in itself. While the space may be designed to promote remembrance of the past, 

conflict prevention is an explicit goal.

Cases from South Africa and Sri Lanka

How does a community determine what memorial project will serve it best? Consultation 

among a variety of stakeholders—who may hold widely differing views of what happened 

Elements of Feasibility 

Studies and 

Needs Assessments

• Define the objectives: Understand the 

needs of the community and share 

information.

• Define the community: Who are the 

different stakeholders and how do 

their views differ?

• Promote transparency: Create a process that makes information about the 

memorial project available through 

public meetings and other means.

• Research the options: Conduct focus 

groups and interviews with experts, 

local politicians, and other key stakeholders; conduct tours of the prospective site to stimulate debate about 

community needs and desires in relation to the site; collect stories and 

memories associated with the site.

• Present findings to the community.

• Conduct ongoing publicity campaigns. 

The feasibility study is an initial 

phase from which the project needs 

to build further momentum.

Source: Ereshnee Naidu, Center for the Study of 

Violence and Reconciliation
15

during the conflict—is essential. Such consultations may take the form of feasibility 

studies or needs assessments, ideally conducted before a memorial project is built. They 

can also provide useful input even while a memorial or museum is being developed or 

once it is in place to determine whether it is addressing the needs of the communities it 

is meant to serve.

The Centre for the Study of Violence and Reconciliation conducted a needs assessment for a memorial in Sharpeville. That memorial commemorates the 1969 massacre by 

South African police of sixty-nine peaceful protesters demonstrating against the pass laws 

designed to restrict the movement of black South Africans and others of mixed descent. 

In this case, the memorial had already been built, and the objective of the study was 

to understand survivors’ needs and identify how to assist them in developing a memory 

project that could be integrated within the site. 

The study found that the consultation process surrounding the monument’s development had become politicized: The community as a whole felt no ownership of the project, 

and local victims of apartheid felt that their suffering had received no recognition through 

the memorial. Moreover, through the study it became evident that survivor groups, represented by different political forces, continued to disagree about what had happened at 

Sharpeville, and that survivors had little or no access to the finished site. 

Memorials planned and built through a top-down process without significant participation from key stakeholders run the risk of becoming irrelevant. A beautiful and moving 

memorial to victims on both sides of the civil war in Sri Lanka, which was created by artists and human rights activists in the 1990s near the Sri Lankan Parliament in Colombo, 

now lies abandoned and in shambles, according to Itty Abraham of the East-West Center. 

The reason, says Abraham, is that “It was a top-down effort with no broad base of support; once completed it was quickly forgotten, even by those who put it up.”

The Centre for the Study of Violence and Reconciliation conducted a study concurrent 

with the development of a memorial site in Kliptown, South Africa. Kliptown is a sprawling collection of largely informal settlements where, in 1955, black opposition movements 

adopted the Freedom Charter, promoting equality, peace, and equal opportunity for all 

South Africans. The purpose of the study was to identify the community’s needs and 

interests regarding the site, assess the impact of its development on the surrounding community, and create a vision of the community’s future role in the development of the site. 

The study found unmet development needs among a very poor population suffering from 

a lack of basic infrastructure and services; continued racial and class divisions that belied 

the myth of “unity in diversity”; significantly different memories about the site among old 

and new residents; and controversy over what should take priority—developing the local 

community or building a memorial site that would earn tourism revenue. 

These examples underscore the fact that memorialization is a highly political process in 

which complex dynamics are at work. Proceeding without adequate study of local needs, 

priorities, and interests can lead to the development of a site that carries little meaning for the local survivors of the conflict, breeds hostility toward it, or raises unrealistic 

expectations about it.

Measuring Impact

As difficult as it is to assess the impact of memorialization initiatives, evaluation is 

essential to understanding whether they contribute to social reconstruction or to further 

conflict. Evaluation is also an essential tool in designing and implementing memorial 

projects—by facilitating input from local stakeholders on project design, helping identify 

ways to fund projects, and the like. Conducting effective evaluations is time-consuming, 

technically difficult, and expensive. It is difficult to isolate the impact of a specific memorial from that of other cultural, social, economic, and political influences at work in a 

society. In designing evaluation plans for memorial activities, researchers face a number 

Memorials planned and built 

through a top-down process without significant participation from 

key stakeholders run the risk of 

becoming irrelevant.

Memorialization is a highly 

political process in which complex 

dynamics are at work.
16

of challenges, including political sensitivity; methodological problems (such as achieving random samples in unstable environments, applying standardized scales developed 

elsewhere, and maintaining the confidentiality of respondents); and linguistic and cultural barriers. There is also the problem of securing funding for evaluations that are best 

implemented periodically over extended time frames—ideally many years—to measure 

attitudinal and behavioral differences.

According to Randi Korn, an expert in the field of museum visitor studies, project managers should conduct or arrange for evaluations during each phase of the project—before 

the project begins to determine needs and interests; during project development to refine 

approaches; and after project completion to evaluate impact. The most effective memorial 

projects are those that are developed with the public through ongoing consultations. Korn 

contends that the following questions need to be asked before, during, and after project 

implementation: 

Planning the project: What cultural, political, and gender differences divide the 

community? How do these differences affect people’s social interaction, learning, and 

emotional responses, and their views about what should be memorialized and how? How 

much do people know about the subject or event addressed by the site, and what are their 

preconceptions or misconceptions about it? What are the project’s goals and objectives, 

and who are the target audiences for the site and the groups least inclined to visit it? 

How does the community feel about the site and their access to it? How do people react 

when confronted with specific ideas to be presented at the site, and what ideas catch 

their attention? 

Evaluating the implemented project: What have visitors experienced or learned? What 

parts of the visit were confusing, understandable, upsetting, or most compelling? How do 

people “use” the memorial and its educational materials? What do people do when they 

visit the site, and how much time do they spend there? Who does and does not visit, and 

why? Has the project achieved its goals and objectives?

Evaluations rely on a variety of methods, including standardized questionnaires, interviews, observations of visitors, and focus groups. Each method represents advantages and 

disadvantages in terms of cost and information yielded. Qualitative assessments through 

interviews and focus groups provide rich insights into visitors’ attitudes, motivations, and 

experiences but generally produce inconclusive findings because they are based on small, 

nonrepresentative samples. Researchers relying on quantitative survey methods will lose 

rich personal details but may be able to produce more broadly representative and “generalizable” findings. 

Audrey Chapman of the University of Connecticut argues for the use of multiple methods to develop a comprehensive assessment of the impact of memorialization projects, 

and for repeated evaluations over many years to see if attitudes, knowledge, or behavior 

have changed. She also stresses the importance of defining clear goals and objectives 

against which to assess projects. Even limited evaluations can be expensive—generally 

10 percent of the overall project budget. While it may amount to a sizable sum of money, 

this investment may prevent higher costs later on to fix ill-conceived projects that have 

not achieved their goals.

Some projects, such as museum exhibits, lend themselves more easily to evaluation 

than others. How can one evaluate an informal, unplanned memorial? Korn cited the case 

of a study that assessed the items left behind by visitors to the Vietnam War memorial 

in Washington, D.C. Some of the items later ended up in a museum commemorating the 

event.

Difficulties of Determining Impact

Because memory is not static and “received” memory is reinterpreted from one generation 

to another, getting a fix on the impact of memorials as time passes is complicated and 

difficult. Memorials at Gettysburg, the site of an American Civil War battle in 1863 that 

Because memory is not static and 

“received” memory is reinterpreted 

from one generation to another, 

getting a fix on the impact of 

memorials as time passes is 

complicated and difficult.
17

resulted in 51,000 casualties, illustrate how the impact of memorials can shift over time. 

Initially, many of the regiments that fought in the battle erected their own memorials, 

around which they organized separate reunions. Eventually, however, these sites became 

the basis for joint reunions among relatives of Union and Confederate soldiers. 

In short, the meaning of memorials often shifts over time and depends on the life 

experiences of the viewer. A memorial that helps one victim regain his or her psychological balance may be viewed by someone from the other side of the conflict as a provocation. Young children will respond differently to memorials than adults. Outsiders to the 

conflict and direct participants may also interpret the same memorial in diverse ways. 

Rising generations may have different reactions to a memorial site than their grandparents 

who lived through the conflict. In the latter case, it may be necessary for memorial sites 

to evolve to accommodate social transformations. The Hector Pieter Museum in Soweto, 

South Africa, for example, commemorates the 1976 Soweto Uprising in which police 

killed young students who protested against the use of Afrikaans in the schools. Today, 

to address the political apathy of South African young people, the museum has begun to 

focus on social issues of direct interest to today’s youth.

How do states deal with the problem of “negative” memorials that appear to be more 

divisive than healing? Some—especially those still in transition from authoritarianism to 

democracy—may remove memorials that contradict current government policies. While 

doing so may yield short-term benefits, an opposing view is that the destruction of 

these memorials represents a lost opportunity to continue dialogue about a past that the 

society would do well not to repeat. Interestingly, public perspectives about the value of 

such memorials may vary according the age of the respondent. Naidu reported that survey 

research in Sharpeville, South Africa, revealed that the older generation (aged 45–80) 

believed that monuments representing apartheid should be preserved as a reminder of the 

awful past, while the younger generation (aged 18–30) felt that such monuments were 

meaningless and should be removed.

“Reprogramming” the meaning of a monument glorifying an oppressive political order 

takes conscious effort. Two years after the fall of apartheid, the premier of Gauteng (a 

provincial area of which Pretoria is a part) visited the Voortrekker Monument in Pretoria, 

which honors the courage and determination of the Afrikaners. In a very public media 

exercise, the premier (a prominent member of the African National Congress) reinterpreted 

the meaning of the site by stating that the original fence built around the monument, 

which was made of spears symbolic of the spear of a powerful Zulu leader, represented 

the power of the Zulu people in protecting the site rather than the victory of the Afrikaner people over the Zulus (which was the site’s original meaning). Moreover, almost a 

decade after the transition to democracy, the aforementioned Freedom Park, designed to 

celebrate the country’s multicultural heritage, is being developed directly across from the 

Voortrekker Monument.

Efforts to rebuild sites destroyed during violent conflict sometimes take on unintended 

meaning. The historic Krue Se mosque in southern Thailand was largely destroyed by the 

Thai army in a battle in April 2004 in which thirty-two Muslim militants were killed. The 

Thai government rebuilt the mosque in an attempt to reach out to the Muslim community 

in a gesture of reconciliation. The Thai Muslim community, on the other hand, perceived 

the rebuilding as the creation of a memorial to the fallen militants.

Helping Outsiders Approach Memorialization

International missions and peacekeepers, humanitarian organizations, foreign NGOS, and 

international organizations involved in helping societies emerging from violent conflict 

face a number of challenges related to the urge to remember and honor victims of conflict. 

The following matrix outlines some key assumptions and practical recommendations to 

guide their involvement in memorialization. It is followed by a chart that outlines the life 

cycle of conflict and memorialization.

Cautions

• Memorialization is a politically charged 

process that can stir up the worst in a 

community.

• Memorials initiated, controlled, or 

dominated by outsiders are doomed 

to failure.

• Memorial sites highly meaningful to a 

community may be largely invisible to 

outsiders. 

• A memorial that helps individual survivors feel more at peace may promote future conflict.

• “Static” memorials that do not promote active learning or interaction 

among survivors lose their meaning 

for future generations. 

• Impact assessment is time-consuming and expensive, and it needs to 

be repeated to capture changes in 

attitude over time.
18

MEMORIALIZATION AND SOCIAL RECONSTRUCTION MATRIX

STARTING ASSUMPTIONS

a. Memorialization occurs throughout the conflict life cycle: before conflict begins, during conflict, and after conflict ends. Memorialization takes different forms depending 

on the nature, duration, and stage of the conflict. At certain stages of the conflict, 

memorialization initiatives may be ill-advised, such as when violence continues, highly 

contested versions of the past exist, or intergroup tensions are extremely high.

b. Outsider actors entering the country to do apparently unrelated tasks will be confronted with challenges relating to memorialization: 

• Peacekeepers will be asked to protect historic sites and documents.

• International organizations (such as UNESCO) will be expected to help with cultural 

preservation tasks. 

• NGOs working on humanitarian aid and psychosocial development (including trauma 

relief) may be confronted with local needs or demands for memorials.

c. Regardless of their roles, outsiders cannot and should not control or direct memorialization initiatives. Instead of initiating projects, outsiders should work either to (1) prevent harmful memorialization developments likely to retard social reconstruction or (2) 

assist memorialization initiatives by local actors designed to aid social reconstruction.

d. Priorities for outsiders include (1) building or supporting indigenous expertise/capacity; (2) promoting participation by local actors from all sides of social/political/ethnic 

divides; (3) encouraging transparency and accountability; (4) promoting widespread consultation and assessment of options before taking action, with the understanding that 

process may be as important as outcomes.

e. Conflicting impulses are likely to exist within the society (even within what might be 

conceived as unified groups, such as survivor groups) about what and how to commemorate. There may be a strong desire to forget or move on versus an impulse to remember 

and document. Should the former be true, it is important for outsiders to honor that 

sentiment and not push memorialization on a community.

f. There is no such thing as complete objectivity. Local actors generally perceive outsiders as being on one side of the conflict or the other, which affects the roles they play in 

memorialization/social reconstruction.

PLANNING FOR OUTSIDERS

1. DESIGNATION AND TRAINING OF STAFF

a. Before entering the country, recognize 

that staff will encounter “negative” and 

“positive” memorialization sites/initiatives 

designed by locals, and that such interventions may affect their other work. Designate 

staff with responsibility for addressing ad 

hoc and formal memorialization processes.

b. Provide training to designated staff 

regarding (1) local and national political 

dynamics driving memorialization processes; 

(2) the nature of memorialization initiatives; (3) their potential either to support 

or undermine efforts to promote social 

reconstruction/reconciliation; (4) appropriate 

responses to local memorialization efforts.

c. Designate funds for training in-country 

staff/local institutions about memorialization, archiving, and handling documents and 

artifacts. Budget for initiatives to help international staff and local groups to learn about 

initiatives undertaken in other contexts and 

to coordinate activity within the country.
19

MEMORIALIZATION AND SOCIAL RECONSTRUCTION MATRIX

2. PLANNING AND MAPPING

a. Map the main local players relevant to 

memorialization (e.g., government officials/ministries, security authorities, victim/survivor groups, local NGOs, educators, 

mental health professionals, historians) and 

the main international players/interveners 

(e.g., peacekeeping troops, humanitarian aid 

workers, other foreign NGOs, international 

organizations such as UNESCO heritage 

staff, historians, academics). Identify local 

“spoilers” determined to undermine positive 

memorialization initiatives or attack important cultural sites to destabilize or undermine peacebuilding.

b. To the extent possible before entering the 

country, map existing cultural/historic/heritage/symbolic sites and document collections. Investigate who “owns” and controls 

them. Understand conflicts over “stolen” 

artifacts.

c. Conduct a cultural assessment about local 

practices, beliefs, and rituals related to conflict resolution, death and dying, burial, and 

similar matters to understand the underlying 

social and psychological dynamics of grieving 

and commemoration.

d. Identify actual or pending transitional 

justice processes in the country to promote 

truth-telling, legal accountability, documentation of war crimes, and preservation of 

historical sites/memory, and the key players 

involved in them.

e. Strategize about how to integrate memorialization into other peacebuilding and transitional justice initiatives. For example, explore 

options for including memorialization plans 

in peace agreements and in truth commission recommendations.

f. Plan how to best coordinate all the players in the field relevant to memorialization 

through the creation of joint working groups 

or task forces.

ON-THE-GROUND IMPLEMENTATION FOR OUTSIDERS

1. PROTECTION AND PRESERVATION

a. Complete mapping of (1) existing cultural/historic/heritage/symbolic sites and (2) 

extent and location of collected and “uncollected” documents and artifacts. Determine 

who “owns” and controls them.

b. Work with local and international authorities to (1) ensure the physical security of 

existing cultural/historic/heritage/symbolic 

sites and document collections; (2) guarantee a “chain of evidence” documenting the 

relationship of materials to the sites where 

they were found so that they can be used in 

legal proceedings; (3) determine appropriate 

policies regarding public access.
20

MEMORIALIZATION AND SOCIAL RECONSTRUCTION MATRIX

1. PROTECTION AND PRESERVATION

c. Promote collection and protection of additional, important “uncollected” documents/

artifacts with an understanding that they 

may support many functions, including legal 

prosecutions, forensic investigations, memorialization, and historic site preservation.

d. Consult with local actors to create a priority list of needs for protection of sites, 

including the provision of key resources 

(e.g., airtight plastic storage bins, dehumidifiers) for collection and storage of documents and artifacts. Work with donors and 

others to provide necessary resources.

e. Monitor potential “flash points” in memorialization initiatives that could trigger 

renewed hostilities, and work with key players to manage conflict when it arises.

2. BUILD LOCAL CAPACITY

a. Provide training to improve local capacity 

in collection and preservation of documents, 

artifacts, and sites.

b. Set up regular meetings between memorialization actors and transitional justice 

actors (e.g., tribunals, truth commissions, justice officials) to connect the dots 

between rule-of-law programs, transitional 

justice initiatives, and memorialization/

social reconstruction initiatives. Consult with 

stakeholders involved with education and 

education reform initiatives.

c. Establish relationships between local 

documentation/memorialization actors with 

experienced counterparts in other countries who have addressed similar issues. 

Establish affinity groups to share technical 

information, best practices, challenges and 

strategies to overcome them and to provide 

support.

3. CONSULTATION AND EVALUATION

a. Conduct feasibility studies to determine 

the interests, needs, and desires of local 

communities vis-à-vis memorialization. Identify the major stakeholders.

b. Consider needs of diverse audiences (e.g., 

schoolchildren, victims’ families, foreign 

visitors).

c. Make results of feasibility studies widely 

available to government officials, community 

stakeholders, local and international NGOs.

d. Use feasibility study findings to set major 

goals and desired outcomes. They will help 

form the basis of later evaluation.

e. Help local actors design strategies to 

evaluate the impact of their memorialization initiatives.
21

MEMORIALIZATION AND SOCIAL RECONSTRUCTION MATRIX

LEAVING THE COUNTRY

1. COORDINATION

a. Establish funding mechanisms to ensure 

continued funding for local initiatives to 

cover operating costs, training, and other 

costs. Work with created sites to develop revenue streams (through tourism, endowment 

campaigns, etc.).

b. Continue to support affinity groups that 

combine inside and outside expertise on 

memorialization challenges.

2. EVALUATION

a. Evaluate your impact as an outsider actor.

b. Share findings with local actors and other 

interested parties.
22

Issues of ultimate ownership and use of these materials/sites mustbe considered by outsiders: how and when to turn over control ofsites/materials and to whom?

UNSTABLEPEACE

New, ad hoc sites with historic/symbolic meaning are likely to be created.Negative, one-sided memorials are likely to proliferate.Control over existing sites may be contested.

Confrontation

Outside forces, particulary peacekeepers or internationalorganizations, may play the role of preserving culturally significantsites and artifacts and/or collecting archival material. Outbreak of Violence

CRISIS

WAR

Materials collected for tribunals/truth and reconciliationcommissions have value for memorial initiatives.

Outsiders can monitorthe creation of “negative”memorials that may signifyan escalation in conflict.

STABLEPEACE

Social Reparation/Reconciliation

National memorials likely to be planned and implemented.

Long-established memorials take on new meaning or lose meaning for subsequent generations.

Settlement/Transitional Justice

Memorialization included in peace agreements/transitionaljustice initiatives. Outsiders can help with providing models,facilitating networking both within the country, and withother helpful international actors.

STAGES OF PEACEOR CONFLICT

New, ad hoc sites with historic/symbolic meaning are likely to be created.Negative, one-sided memorials are likely to proliferate.Control over existing sites may be contested. STAGES OF PEACE

OR CONFLICT

Discovery of mass graves likely to give rise tonew memorials.

THE LIFE CYCLE OF CONFLICT AND MEMORIALIZATION

United States 

Institute of Peace

1200 17th Street NW

Washington, DC 20036

www.usip.org

An online edition of this report can be 

found at our website (www.usip.org), 

together with additional information 

on the subject.

Of Related Interest

This report is part of a series of special reports that have been issued by the United States 

Institute of Peace’s Filling the Gaps series of working groups. The special reports will 

address the causes of failure in specific areas in reconstruction and stabilization as well 

as generate policy options. The other reports in the series (all published in 2006) are:

• Measuring Progress in Stabilization and Reconstruction, Craig Cohen

• Transitional Governance: From Bullets to Ballots, Beth Cole and Christina Caan

• Filling the Gaps: Managing Natural Resource Wealth, Jill Shankleman

• The Role of Women in Stabilization and Reconstruction, Camille Pampell Conaway

Please visit www.usip.org to download this and related reports.

Related Resources

• Biggar, N. Burying the Past: Making Peace and Doing Justice after Civil Conflict. Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press, 2003.

• Bloomfield, D., T. Barnes, and L. Huyse. Reconciliation after Violent Conflict: A Handbook. Stockholm: International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance,

2003. 

• Cairns, E. and M.D. Roe. The Role of Memory in Ethnic Conflict. New York: Palgrave 

Macmillan, 2003.

• Hamber, B. and R. Wilson. Symbolic Closure Through Memory, Reparation and Revenge 

in Postconflict Societies. Paper presented at the Traumatic Stress in South Africa Conference, Johannesburg, 27–29 January 1999.

• Jelin, E. State Repression and the Labors of Memory. St. Paul: University of Minnesota 

Press, 2003.

• Kgalema, L. Symbols of Hope: Monuments as Symbols of Remembrance and Peace in 

the Process of Reconciliation. Research paper written for the Centre for the Study of 

Violence and Reconciliation, 1999.

• Linenthal, E. Preserving Memory: The Struggle to Create America’s Holocaust Museum. 

New York: Columbia University Press, 2001.

• Stover, Eric and Harvey M. Weinstein. My Neighbor, My Enemy: Justice and Community 

in the Aftermath of Mass Atrocity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004.

• Winter, J. Sites of Memory, Sites of Mourning: The Great War in European Cultural 

History. Cambridge: Canto, 1998.