This chapter provides an overview of responses to situations of mass atrocity and armed conflict outside of criminal prosecution. The chapter begins by discussing transitional justice. It then turns to a description and analysis of specific forms of transitional justice: amnesties, truth and reconciliation commissions, lustration, reparations and civil claims, and local justice mechanisms. It defines each of these terms and discusses their international law status, positive and negative features, and, where applicable, the relationship of that form of transitional justice to the International Criminal Court, and use in domestic systems. This chapter provides examples of each form of transitional justice, such as amnesties implemented in Latin American countries, the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission, lustration in Eastern Europe after the end of communism, reparations in Germany after World War II, and local justice mechanisms in northern Uganda.

Chapter 4 discusses transformative effect, that is, the impact of the Rome Statute and the Court on political processes such as peace negotiations, in order to contribute to ending impunity. The chapter discusses the mechanisms of the Rome Statute that seek to balance peace and justice, including Articles 16 and 53 (the “interests of justice” test). It also discusses who determines the interests of victims in peace and justice. The evidence on whether arrest warrants facilitate or hinder peace negotiations is not conclusive, although in Uganda, they may have hindered reaching a final peace agreement. Moreover, in Afghanistan or Libya, amnesties were passed, in spite of the involvement of the ICC. The coming into force of the Rome Statute does not constitute a “paradigm shift” from impunity to accountability as such, but transformative effect may be seen in certain negotiations or peace agreements.

In 1999 the United Nations performed a significant about-face in its policy concerning the use of amnesties in peace negotiations. Where once it had condoned and even supported the use of amnesties, including those that immunise perpetrators of human rights violations against prosecutions and punishment, the UN Secretary-General, Kofi Annan, now issued a statement prohibiting UN peace negotiators from offering amnesties for human rights violations, even when the signing of a peace agreement was at stake. This chapter introduces the United Nations’ anti-amnesty policy, provides an overview of its theoretical underpinnings, development, establishment as a policy norm, and considers its implications for peace negotiators.

Drawing on a new peace agreements dataset, this chapter maps general trends in the use of amnesties in peace agreements from 1980 to 2015 and situates Asian peacemaking practice within them. Focusing on a range of conflict-related, economic and political variables, as well as the engagement of the United Nations (UN) in peace negotiations, it provides a set of preliminary explanations for the continued persistence of amnesties in Asian peace processes. The chapter highlights the existence of an unusually strong relationship between separatist conflict and the rejection of the UN’s anti-amnesty policy in Asia, demonstrates that, in contrast to the global sample, Asian democracies are no more or less likely to allow amnesties for human rights violations than authoritarian regimes, and shows that the relative lack of engagement by the UN in Asian peace negotiations is a significant factor in the continued use of amnesties for human rights violations in the region.

By examining laws, legislation, and legal processes, it is argued in chapter five that the legal system in Bahrain is becoming an increasingly comprehensive tool of repression. Despite the increasing standardisation of law, the arbitrary nature of its execution during political unrest highlights the continuity of particularistic features of tribal law embedded within a standardised system.Also, legal repression has been facilitated by the emergence of specific legal structures and processes. As a consequence, laws have often been enacted as reactionary measures to con-trol dissent, long outliving their initial utility while simultaneously generating future grievances. The extent of impunity as an enabling factor for repression is also investigated and highlighted. In particular, a re-examination of historical sources sheds new light on the trial of the al-Madani killers in 1977, and the trial of the Khawalid shaykhsin the 1920s. While the emergence of ‘rule by law’ instead of ‘rule of law’ is implicit, this chapter sheds light on the nuances within even those repressive authoritarian legal processes.