ABSTRACT
This chapter describes psychology’s contribution to the recognition and reparation of victims of human rights violations committed in Chile during the military regime. It also describes the contribution of psychology to the recognition and reparation of victims in therapeutic, social and political relations in the reparation public policies after dictatorship. Moral (and political) resistance to human rights violations found expression in acts of solidarity with victims through legal defence and documented the repressive policies through cases filed in court. These organisations created an array of medical, psychological and social assistance programmes in support of victims. In searching for work methods to help people manage the effects of experiences that for many were cataclysmic, the FASIC team employed testimony as a therapeutic tool inspired by old social sciences methodology. The Valech Commission’s report described medical, psychosocial and psychological consequences of torture and stated that: The psychosocial impact of torture cannot be gauged by an inventory of effects that comprise anatomy of pain.
