‘Terrorism’ continues to dominate headlines, it stirs a wide range of emotions in the general public and the fear of it informs numerous domestic and foreign policies worldwide, many of which have cost countless and many more innocent lives than the acts of violence that were labelled ‘terrorism’ in the first place. But what exactly is ‘terrorism’, and should we care to locate or identify an accurate definition for it?
This entry outlines the key debates with respect to transitional justice (TJ), a range of processes that a society may undertake to reckon with the legacies of gross and large-scale violations of human rights and humanitarian law in the past. Although the literature on transitional justice and postcolonialism is emerging, this entry explains why transitional justice might not sufficiently address the complex issue of decolonisation. The entry argues that true decolonisation requires a more radical approach to the future of the field. Transitional justice should not only engage more with genealogies of decolonial thinking; it also needs to be decolonised in itself.
