Att förena ett land : En fallstudie om Sydafrikas sanning och försoningskommission

Sammanfattning: After decades of repression and segregation South Africa managed to break free from the Apartheid era. The year was 1994 when democracy started to prevail in South Africa. That year a truth commission was created in the country to deal with the human rights violations of apartheid. This thesis will analyze the truth commission’s management through three perspectives. These perspectives are the Truth Commission’s, a report by Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch and lastly a theory by Samuel Huntington. The analysis is designed as a case study of the truth commission’s work. This thesis describes the commissions work and the challenges that followed. The purpose of the thesis is to describe and analyze some of the different approaches on South Africa’s process of reconciliation. This has been done to see if there is parallels or possible contradictions between the perspectives and to highlight challenges. The result shows that the perspectives do have split opinions about the commissions work. The Truth Commission aims to bring the country forward in a fast pace, while Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch stands more critical on how the commission chooses to go about. Clear parallels are also shown between Huntingtons theory and the reality of South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission.