ABSTRACT
In 1945, barely seven months after the collapse of Nazi Germany, the Nuremberg trials of former Nazi leaders and officials opened. In 1993, one of the first Acts of South Africa's transitional government set up a Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC). This chapter compares and contrast the TRC and the Nuremberg tribunal. It suggests that some social, political and psychological implications and shortcomings of their work. The chapter examines some analogies between the workings of the TRC and the processes of psychoanalytic psychotherapy, in particular the end of the work and consider some emotional and social issues that may stay unresolved when the TRC's mandate has ended in 1998. The aims of the TRC are both cathartic and educational. The conclusions of the TRC are less dramatic: an historical report and, it is hoped, recommendations for political, social and educational programmes that might modify racist beliefs and prevent racist practices.
