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Transitional justice in postwar Austria

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 November 2019

Céline Braumann Open the ORCID record for Céline Braumann [Opens in a new window]
Céline Braumann*
Affiliation:
Researcher and lecturer, Department of European, International and Comparative Law, University of Vienna
*
*Corresponding author. E-mail: [email protected]
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Abstract

Austria's post-World War II transition from two consecutive, abusive regimes (the Austro-fascist and the Nazi regime) to a functioning democracy has not yet been thoroughly assessed through the lens of transitional justice. An evaluation of what could now be dubbed transitional-justice measures shows that Austria was reluctant in accepting its collective responsibility vis-à-vis the victims of World War II. Another defining factor of Austria's transition is that it never encouraged the surviving victims of the Nazi regime to return. An appraisal of Austria's transition in light of the two final ends of transitional justice, namely democracy and reconciliation, culminates in two conclusions: first, Austria attained the goal of democracy but failed with reconciliation; second, the current model of transitional justice is ill-equipped to assess the non-linear course of long-past transitions.

Keywords

legal historytransitional justiceAustro-fascismnational socialismreconciliation
Type
Article
Information
International Journal of Law in Context , Volume 15 , Issue 4 , December 2019 , pp. 390 - 407
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2019

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