Bridge to Human Development or Vehicle of Inequality? Transitional Justice and Economic Structures

There has been much theorizing, but little empirical exploration, of the relationship between transitional justice (TJ) and economic structures. In this article, we articulate three models implicit in present studies: TJ as a roadblock to economic growth; TJ as a bridge to human development; and TJ as a vehicle of inequality. We then perform a plausibility probe of these models using a new cross-national dataset of human rights prosecutions, truth commissions and reparations. We find that TJ is correlated with both increasing inequality and human development, while it appears unrelated to economic growth. In order to clarify the nature of these relationships, we examine the case of Argentina. We conclude that TJ, while perhaps a byproduct of global inequalities across countries, does not necessarily contribute to the expansion of aggregate inequality within specific countries. In fact, it might provide some tools for resisting economic abuses.