Reimagining National Community through Truth and Reconciliation: A Rhetorical Analysis of Truth Commissions in South Africa, Kenya, and the United States

Abstract

This dissertation studies the rhetoric of truth commissions to reimagine configurations of national community and modes of belonging. Following the international attention and acclaim received by South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC), truth commissions have become the principle mechanisms of transitional justice. They are now nearly ubiquitous in societies seeking to address histories of past violence or transition from authoritarian regimes. With no doubt, their popularity is in part due to the abstract but widely appealing key terms of their mandates: terms such as truth, reconciliation, justice, accountability, and national unity. The wide appeal of these terms is too easily mistaken for universal meaning. They are interpreted according to the values and assumptions of Western liberal democracy, which are assumed to have universal referents across the disparate contexts in which truth commissions are established. Drawing on decolonial and rhetorical perspectives, I study truth commissions in South Africa and Kenya and a proposed commission in the United States. In each case, a particular key term—truth, reconciliation, and justice—orients my analysis of how the commission understood and pursued national unity. My analysis demonstrates how the various configurations and mobilizations of these key terms reimagine national community and belonging in ways that decenter Western liberal democratic forms.