ABSTRACT
The South African “Truth and Reconciliation Commission” (TRC) is an example of what Bessie Head had referred to thirty years earlier as “an extreme effort to find a deep faith to help [Southern Africans] live together.” One finds in the Commission’s unfolding process a unique convergence of several important moral and political concepts. Looking at these concepts brings out the liveliness of this important philosophical discussion in Africa. One also sees through the work of the Commission its relevance to the larger discussion of “justice” related issues throughout the globe. To highlight these larger issues we will, in this chapter, organize the discussion around several interrelated topics:1 First we will look at the legacy of communalism in South African society, then turn to what Elizabeth Wolgast, following Wittgenstein, calls “the grammar of justice” within the South African context. This “grammar” requires that we assess the relative value of truth and reconciliation to justice and also evaluate the meaning of the notion of “restorative justice” within the TRC process. We will then sort out some important critical issues that have generated much controversy among philosophers and other critics in their continuing assessment of the TRC process, particularly whether “justice” was forgotten in the process and whether reparations and restitution to victims of apartheid will be realized. Finally we will ask what the overall value of the TRC process may be in the South African context and as a model for moral and political transformation beyond the
region. In this chapter, and especially in the last section, we will see how the concepts of community, suffering, and poverty discussed in chapter 4 are essential to our discussion of truth, reconciliation, and justice within the African context and for cross-cultural understanding.
