Social Constructivism and Restorative Justice

A Reciprocal and Recursive Hermeneutic

For Understanding Structural Violence

In South Africa’s Apartheid and Truth and Reconciliation Council

by Christopher DeBoer

18 November 2013

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Since time immemorial humans have been in conflict with

one another in as many different ways as there are people.

And as long as conflict exists, so too will there be those

that endeavor to resolve it. No one is exempt, including the

author who recognizes that the sense of injustice is the

visceral churn in the pit of his stomach that moves him both

in word and action. In the modern nation-state, when society

formally recognizes an injustice we call upon the collective

conscience of shared values, beliefs, norms, customs,

rituals and other shared perspectives to codify this

injustice and write it into law as a crime. Often this

includes a definition of this crime, who is responsible and

to what degree, and the proper actions that may be taken

against them. This process is known as the modern criminal

justice system. In his book “Changing Lenses” written in the

1980’s, Howard Zehr proposed that we reframe the criminal

justice system in a new paradigm of justice. Before he

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outlined the shortcomings of the modern criminal justice

system he began by returning to the experience of crime by

both offender and victim and the resulting experiences in

the courtroom. His proposal is widely accepted as the

catalyst that brought about the movement, now known as

Restorative Justice, to the public domain. This includes

theoretical models such as Transformational Justice and

Transitional Justice as well.

Rather than expound upon the debate about these models

within this paper, I will use widely excepted definitions to

argue for yet another reframing of these particular models

through a social constructivist lens. This paper is a

proposal to formally incorporate social constructivism into

the discourse within these models of justice as it is may

prove an extraordinarily useful set of tools to bring the

experience of justice to individuals who find themselves

victims or offenders in a wider conflict such as political,

genocidal or other structural violence where civil and human

rights abuses have taken place. The objective of this paper

is to elucidate the use of restorative and transitional

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justice practices, hereinafter referred to as RJ and TJ,

through a social constructivist lens in facilitating a

meeting of stakeholders transforming these individuals and

institutions, and repairing harm caused by such social

injustice and structural violence. Additionally, the author

will explore lessons learned the case of South Africa’s

apartheid and the ensuing Truth and Reconciliation Council,

the implications this particular approach may have for the

field of conflict resolution, and how it may be applied in

the future. This paper is, however, meant to be only an

introduction and proposal for yet another way of viewing

some the world’s greatest conflicts and crimes. It is an

invitation for all those currently presiding in the debates

within RJ, world leaders and large organizations such as the

United Nations, and indeed anyone concerned with the

increasingly interconnected geopolitical climate that calls

for greater cooperation to see the resolution and prevention

of the world’s greatest conflicts. As such, there a great

number of limitations inherent within the content below,

encouraging deeper investigation, further exploration,

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discussion and the interpretation of numerous intersections

across disciplines beyond social constructivism, RJ and TJ.

Such areas of study might include international relations,

human rights, sociology, anthropology, psychology,

development studies, cultural studies and other areas of

study within the humanities. The potential for new insight

through social constructivism, may lead to greater

understanding, resolution and even prevention of future

conflicts at the societal level and provides new hope for

justice to be restored for the desperate and powerless

victims of such violence.

Let’s begin with a basic definition of restorative

justice as a meeting between stakeholders with the goal of

making reparations to right a wrong. Zehr begins his work

“Changing Lenses” with the experience of a crime by both the

victim and offender. For recovery to take place Zehr

outlines financial and material compensation, symbolic

reparations, and the need for answers as general necessities

for recovery from crime (Zehr 26). Zehr recognizes that

victims needs is highly contextual and can be answered only

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by the victim, but do they still hold true in the general

sense when a crime is placed in a wider context such as

structural or political violence, genocide and other or

human rights abuses? In these cases, often times there is no

clear offender that bears responsibility. Or there may be a

more abstract archetype or specific group identity that

victims, usually large in number, may hold accountable such

as a certain political, ideological, ethnic or racial group.

In the case of political violence the offender may be a

member of a rebel group, belong to a particular class, hold

some form of political power or simply adhere to an opposing

political ideology. What is clear is the likelihood that

this victim may not be alone in suffering from this crime

and that these offenses often occur repeatedly and in

different places against other victims for the duration of

the conflict.

It should be recognized that structural violence,

“is typically built into the very structure of social, cultural, and economic institutions…[and] according to Galtung, participate in settings within which individuals may do enormous amounts of harm to other

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human being without ever intending to do so, just performing their regular duties as a job defined in thestructure” (Barash and Webel 8).

And beyond even this there are often patterns and themes

that run throughout various conflicts across both time and

space.

So what then is to be done when there is no clear,

identifiable or traceable offender to the offence committed?

It may be that symbolic reparation retains more flexibility

and effectiveness in addressing multiple victims’ needs for

recognition of the crime, but even this has limitations.

Even if an offender is held accountable by means of a public

trial and makes a formal apology in addition to other

reparations or penance, the extent to which each of his

victims feels that justice has been restored may be diluted

due to the vast nature of gross violations such as human

rights abuses. Perhaps one of the most exemplary attempts in

seeking justice and healing for such issues inherent in a

systemic and widespread conflict is South Africa’s Truth and

Reconciliation Council following the years of apartheid in

the 20th century. For further exploration of these issues

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and their relation to RJ and TJ let us take a deeper look at

both the conflict and the search for a resolution in South

Africa before moving to possible cases in the general sense.

A proper understanding of the complexities of a

conflict such as apartheid in South Africa not only places

it in South Africa’s cultural context but also takes into

account the events leading up to apartheid. Due to the

limited nature of this paper it will suffice merely to

mention such events and in foregoing the deeper

investigation into South Africa’s modern history the author

takes full responsibility for any inaccuracy, incongruities

and missing factual representations pertaining to the topic.

Chief Justice DP Mahomed puts South Africa’s conflict into

vague historical perspective by opening with,

“For decades South African history has been dominated by a deep conflict between a minority which reserved for itself all control over the political instruments of the state and a majority who sought to resist that domination. Fundamental human rights became a major casualty of this conflict ... the legitimacy of the lawitself was deeply wounded as the country hemorrhaged inthe face of this tragic conflict ...” (TRC Report Vol. 1 Chp. 2 p. 24).

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The second chapter of Volume One of the TRC Report attempts

to place apartheid “in fuller political and historical

perspective” by examining both “violence and the law, and

the relationship between them” as two primary factors

contributing to the conflict in South Africa in the limited

time frame from 1960 to 1994 to be investigated (TRC Report

Vol. 1 Chp. 2 p. 24). The report cites this period as the

climatic consequence of decolonization in both South and

southern Africa with roots in issues such as the importation

of slaves to the Cape and the brutal treatment they endured,

the many wars of dispossession and colonial conquest, the

systematic hunting and elimination of indigenous nomadic

peoples. Also conflicts such as the Difaquane or Mfecane

where thousands died and tens of thousands were displaced in

a Zulu-inspired process of state formation and dissolution,

the South African War of 1899-1902 and the genocidal war in

the early years of this century directed by the German

colonial administration in South West Africa at the Herero

people are mentioned as precedents for the culmination of

the conflict when the National Party government enacted

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racial segregation and violence became institutionalized and

written into law (TRC Report Vol. 1 Chp. 2 para. 2).

Such acts as the Population Registration Act of 1950

with provisions classifying four different racial identities

and a mandate to carry a racial identity pass, the Group

Areas Act which partitioned the country into exclusive

inhabitation of racial groups resulting in the eviction and

displacement of millions of blacks from their land and

property into townships, the Prohibition of Mixed Marriages

Act of 1940 and the 1950 Immorality Amendment Act prohibited

all forms of sexual contact and marriage between peoples of

different race, all exacerbated and gave form to racist

sentiments between descendents of white settlers and the

indigenous Bantu peoples (Bubenzer 5). In 1923, an

opposition organization, which then became known as the

African National Congress, hereafter referred to as the ANC,

was formed. As racial segregation became more and more

entrenched, by the time the National Party won elections in

1948 the country was rife with civil rights abuse. As

conflict festered for several more decades it the black and

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colored populations response was an additional party called

the Pan Africanist Congress in 1959 (Bubenzer 7). As

peaceful protests were continually squashed this lead to

armed resistance on both sides. The conflict escalated until

president F.W. Klerk, due to internal unrest and

international pressure released Nelson Mandela in 1990 and a

process of democratic and constitutional reform was

initiated. Negotiations between the prevailing government

and opposition parties lasted for several years when Nelson

Mandela was democratically elected president in April of

1994 (Bubenzer 8).

The Promotion of National Unity and Reconciliation Act

in 1995 decided that the period of transitional justice

would be sought through the Truth and Reconciliation

Commission which was charged ”to provide for the

investigation and the establishment of as complete a picture

as possible of the nature, causes and extent of gross

violations of human rights committed’ between 1 March 1960

and 6 December 1993.” The terms indicated that,

“a gross human rights violation constitutes any act of

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killing, abduction, torture or severe ill-treatment of any person or anyattempt, conspiracy, incitement, instigation, command or procurementto commit such an act (Bubenzer 9).

For the purposes of this paper, the author will examine

several excerpts form the TRC Report primarily from Chapter

five of Volume One. We will then compare these aspects of

the TRC Report to various RJ values. The Commissioners

appointed in December of 1995 consisted of three committees:

a committee on human rights violations, a committee on

reparations, and a committee on amnesty (Bubenzer 10).

Although the TRC included both perpetrators and victims

within the TRC overall, their separation resulted in few

face-to-face meetings, something often regarded as an

essential element in RJ (Llewellyn, Johnstone and Van Ness

364). Perpetrators where encouraged to participate with the

incentive of a proposal process for amnesty when applicants

“offered full disclosure of their acts, demonstrated a

political motive and showed proportionality between their

motive and the means,” as outlined in the Promotion of

National Unity and Reconciliation Act (Llewellyn, Johnstone

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and Van Ness 362). By discounting a blanket proposal for

general amnesty but allowing for the opportunity for

perpetrators to apply and participate in public trials that

were broadcast in the media, the TRC set an important

precedent for incorporating restorative values into truth

commissions. Victims’ stories and statements were also

widely circulated and represent a colorful collection of

data and testimony the likes of which had not been seen

before. Also included were victims’ relatives and dependents

touting the restorative principles that the impact of

“wrongdoing extended beyond direct victims to those

connected to the victim” (Llewellyn, Johnstone and Van Ness

363). This is formally recognized in the TRC Report’s

statement that,

"Restorative justice demands that the accountability ofperpetrators be extended to making a contribution to the restoration of the well-being of their victims … The fact that people are given their freedom without taking responsibility for some form of restitution remains a major problem with the amnesty process. Only if the emerging truthunleashes a social dynamic that includes redressing the suffering of victims will it meet the ideal of restorative justice" (TRC Report paragraph100).

Zehr clearly outlines this by stating that crime “is a

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violation of the just relationship that should exist between

individuals,” and that, “indeed, the effects of crime ripple

out, touching many others. Society too has a stake in the

outcome and a role to play” (Zehr 182). Llewellyn concludes

that one lesson from the South African experience is the

“importance of preparation for the participants… so that

they can understand the nature of the process and its goals

(Llewellyn, Johnstone and Van Ness p. 366). These elements

clearly illustrate an attempt of the TRC and its

commissioners to incorporate restorative values into the

reconciliation and transitional process.

Also of paramount importance in any truth commission is

the definition of truth. The TRC identified four core forms

of truth that included factual or forensic truth,

personal or narrative truth, social or ‘dialogue’ truth, and

healing or restorative truth. Factual Truth was found by

bringing to light factual corroborated evidence of accurate

information through impartial and objective sources whereas

personal or narrative truth was found both individually and

collectively through the testimony and statements, both

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archived and given publicly, of human rights violations as

well as daily life under apartheid. “It was in its search

for social truth that the closest connection between the

Commission’s process and its goal was to be found,” and by

which “the truth reached was itself important because it was

through this process that the essential norms of social

relations between people were reflected” (TRC Report Vol. 1

Chp. 5 para. 29-42). Court Judge O’Regan spoke to the

restorative aspect of the fourth form of truth by saying,

“Apartheid was a denial of a common humanity. Black people were refused respect and dignity and thereby thedignity of all South Africans was diminished. The new Constitution rejects this past and affirms the equal worth of all South Africans. Thus recognition and protection of human dignity is the touchstone of the new political order and is fundamental to the new Constitution (TRC Report Vol. 1 Chp. 5 para. 81).

Recognizing the need for social and institutional

reparations is an important part of restorative justice (TRC

Report Vol. 1 Chp. 5 para. 99). Ubuntu, a word with origins

throughout southern Africa in the Bantu languages is

translated as ‘humaness’ and commonly used in the phrase

‘umuntu ngubuntu ngabantu’ or ‘people are people through other

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people’. On this matter, Constitutional Court Justice

Langa’s and Makgoro’s words’ respectively that “during

violent conflicts and times when violent crime is rife,

distraught members of society decry the loss of ubuntu.

Thus, heinous crimes are the antithesis of ubuntu. Treatment

that is cruel, inhuman or degrading is bereft of ubuntu,”

and the “spirit emphasizes respect for human dignity,

marking a shift from confrontation to conciliation,” (TRC

Report Vol. 1 Chp. 5 para. 85). The notion that there isn’t

just one Truth is grounds for fruitful exploration of how it

is socially constructed and is an aspect we will revisit

further in subsequent sections of this paper. Let us now

examine some basic definitions and concepts of social

constructivism before we relate it to RJ, the South African

experience of apartheid and the ensuing Truth and

Reconciliation Council.

Essentially, social constructivism is “a sociological

theory of knowledge that applies the general philosophical

constructivism into social settings, wherein groups

construct knowledge for one another, collaboratively

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creating a small culture of shared artifacts with shared

meanings (Wikipedia). This is in contrast to positivist

theory that asserts an objective reality. Instead, social

constructivism contends that our reality is constructed both

from experiences and reflections upon them, as well as other

social constructs such as cultural ideas, symbols, myths and

any knowledge embedded within a socio-cultural and

historical context. Topics of particular relevance to the

purposes of this paper are concepts of the institution,

knowledge creation, power, self-referencing systems,

semiotics and the use of language. Also examined is the

issue of reflexivity and ethnomethodology.

Also a common assumption within social constructivism

is that truth-claims take on the pervading majority and

group consensus. This has interesting implications for the

dominant political ideology and the conforming institutional

power structures, and “because such discussions are linked

to the legitimizing rationale used by institutions, they

cannot be divorced from the discourse on political

repression. These power structures are seen as self-

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referencing systems,” with which the “internal,

institutional discourse establishes the concepts and

language to be used in communications… Control is exercised

by conditioning the content of communication.” So,

“universalizing the contingent [truth] claims will take them

out of the contexts that gave them meaning, force, and

legitimacy,” and thus “truth is a product of institutions

and processes that seek to extend their power and legitimacy

(Koch 100). Although universalizing these truth claims may

rob them of their verity in other contexts, this should not

prevent us from remembering lessons learned in places such

as South Africa, merely that we ought to be aware of our

assumptions that these lessons will hold true in places

elsewhere in which the context has changed.

With distinct attention to semiotics and linguistics,

Potter’s Representing Reality provides insight into descriptions

and their agents, introducing the dilemma of stake.

Additionally, Potter outlines the epistemological

orientation of description and how it can either be built up

in credibility, or deconstructed so as to be discounted. As

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we will see later, this is quite relevant in its application

to various stakeholders in the South African apartheid and

the TRC’s search for truth.

Potter delineates that “anything that a person (or

group) says or does may be discounted as a product of stake

or interest” (Potter 110). He clearly states that the

argument here is not that any description should itself be

analyzed according to the descriptor’s interests or stake,

but merely that in discourse, participants treat each other

in this way. In other words, two different descriptions of a

single fact or event may be framed differently, with

selective word choice and syntax, to either prove or

discount such a fact or event; this may result in vastly

different conclusions drawn.

Descriptions are usually made up of one or more facts,

and in social constructivism facts are manufactured. Several

different methods may be employed during fact construction,

three of which are interest management, category entitlement

and empiricist discourse. Interest management, is primarily

when “a description can attempt to take the sensitive

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concern away from the speaker and make it a part of what is

described” (Potter 113). So by a descriptor actively

choosing to focus on describing a particular area of interest,

they draw attention either away from or in alignment with

their own. Category entitlement simply supposes that

“knowledge is culturally and normatively linked to

categories of actors,” which by nature of their position

have a claim to authority or entitlement meant to further

verify and give validity to a particular description or

argument (Potter 114). This often results in the third

common occurrence during fact construction, namely,

empiricist discourse. This means that a descriptor or actor

may utilize an interpretive repertoire or jargon that serves

to reify the object or event being described (Potter 115).

Also relevant to fact construction is the issue of

reflexivity and ethnomethodology. Simply put, when one is

forming a description they are drawing upon concepts that

are themselves socially constructed. This description then

enters the discourse, in a complex recursive manner, itself

adding to the dynamic process and evolution of fact

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construction that may be used for subsequent descriptions

and facts to be constructed. And all this takes place within

a particular context that further affects how the

description is attributed to action. This reflexivity

presents a conundrum not only to the situation described but

also to social constructivism, which is itself socially

constructed with description and theory.

So how do these subjects within the social

constructivist theory intersect not only within the South

African conflict and resolution, but fit within restorative

justice and transitional justice models overall, and to what

degree is it already present? And how does the recursive and

reflexive nature of the social constructivist lens yield

insight through a rather elegant hermeneutic process and

what are the implications across cultures and paradigms? A

proposal on how one might answer these questions both in the

specific case of apartheid and the general will be made in

the following sections.

Starting with a stakeholder’s analysis in identifying “the

needs, interests and responsibilities of various

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stakeholders in restorative processes” over time while

incorporating individuals and groups at the level of any

individual crime and with an aim to restoring justice from

the structural violence overall is a tall order (Shiff,

Johnstone and Van Ness 228). Then moving to look at the

discourse within the relevant institutions and the language

employed, both before and after apartheid, would provide the

foundation to carefully draw further insights. This,

however, is beyond the scope of this paper, which seeks

merely to introduce apartheid in a restorative justice

context through a social constructivist lens. Key

stakeholders during apartheid in the 1980’s include the

Nationalist Party in power and the oppressive government

regime, the opposing ANC and PAC parties, white and black

South African citizens, as well as the international

communities, both regional and global. Other stakeholders

were the victims giving testimony, the offender seeking

asylum, the commissioners and appointed committee members.

Committee members were selected “to ensure that their

membership was representative in terms of race, gender and

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geographical origin. The Commission felt that it was

important that the membership of the committees reflected

the life experiences of all South Africans - black and

white, men and women, urban and rural” (TRC Report Vol. 1

Chp. 6 para. 8). It should be noted that not only are these

identities socially constructed, but so too are the roles

and responsibilities of the committee members and any

discourse that takes place between the tow sides. When

investigating specific cases within the conflict there will

likely be other stakeholders such as death squads, armed

resistance groups, South African Police etc. A proper

stakeholder’s analysis would include the stakeholders, their

specific interests, and some general types of descriptions

or claims they make both during the TRC and in the preceding

decades of the conflict from 1960 to 1994, the period the

TRC was charged with investigating. Looking further through

this lens then entails compiling statements and descriptions

of events that took place, deconstructing them with methods

such as interest management, category entitlement and

empiricist discourse and comparing them with the same

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analysis of other relevant stakeholder’s. This thorough

analysis enables one to then see how each institutional

stakeholder socially constructs knowledge via language and

syntax and relates it to alternative descriptions by

competing stakeholders and other institutions. The TRC in

South Africa, itself an institutional entity and thus

presenting yet another source of reflexivity, is fertile

ground for these types of analyses due to the extensive

documentation of hearings, testimonies and methodology in

information gathering and became a sort of institution in

its own right. One complication, even if this type of

analysis is carried to other conflicts is relativism. There

is no objective standard by which to make comparisons and

any attempt to tease out a universal theory would be

difficult and controversial.

There are two important points to recognize before

shifting focus. Firstly, there may be a tendency to

dehumanize or objectify the people involved when we use

terms such as construction, stakeholder, when looking merely

at language and syntax and such. It is imperative to

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remember that structural violence implies that a systematic

process by which violence occurs whereby the system involves

large numbers of people with many rules and channels through

which resources and information and actions are passed. But

there are victims of this violence, many of them, and these

victims are people like you and me. These victims have been

both subjugated to and witnesses of heinous evil crimes, and

the vacuous hole preventing healing and closure when no one

is held responsible much less even identifiable, is the very

problem that restorative justice is trying to address. So

this truth commission and social constructivist analysis,

must be infused with Ubuntu, must be re-humanized. Only when

a perpetrator is brought before their victims and confronted

with the pain, anguish and suffering that resulted from a

simple and seemingly small decision such as ‘yes’ or ‘no’

can we begin to close that gap and see justice restored and

a society healed.

The blaringly obvious caveat and contradiction

inherent in moving to a general case through a social

constructivist lens to RJ and TJ lies in removing the highly

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contextualized conflict in South Africa and assuming it is

representative of all conflicts to which RJ principles may

be applied. The author welcome’s further analysis of other

social conflicts, admits that perhaps a deductive approach

may be more appropriate and seeks only to participate in

initiating and furthering these types of discussions and

debate.

Interestingly, restorative justice itself is socially

constructed. This is perhaps most evident in how it has been

defined over the last couple decades through definitions of

different degree and scope as well as competing branches of

thought within the restorative justice debate. Zernova and

Wright outline the contentious debate within RJ quite aptly

in Johnstone and Van Ness’ Handbook of Restorative Justice. There is

debate on process versus outcome-based models with outcome-

oriented approaches claiming underlying restorative values

are what distinguish RJ from other forms. Also at play are

competing ideas of whether or not RJ should replace or

conjoin with the modern criminal justice system and whether

a bottom-up or top-down modus operandi is needed. There is

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also disagreement as to the scope of restorative justice and

whether its aim should be kept to a meeting between

stakeholders or “aim at much deeper and wider social

changes” but perhaps “before a large-scale implementation

involving radical institutional transformations is

attempted, certain fundamental changes in public attitudes

and social values need to take place” (Zernova, Wright,

Johnstone and Van Ness 98). Interestingly, critics of

mediation, the most common and widely used context in which

restorative justice initially gained traction as a movement,

“have argued that resolutions of interpersonal disputes may

mask and perpetuate wider social conflicts, inequalities and

oppressions which may have generated a dispute in the first

place” (Zernova, Wright, Johnstone and Van Ness 102). What

is quite evident is that RJ is arguably just now beginning

to progress beyond its infancy stages and as these

discussions and ‘politics of difference’ continue, to borrow

the term from Sawicki, so will it continue to be socially

constructed and evolve. This implies that social

constructivism is already present, and indeed it is in more

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ways than one.

Zehr himself recognizes that our definition of crime

“is an artificial construct” and that, “both victim and

offender are forced to speak the language of the system, to

define their reality in its terms instead of their own”

(Zehr 183 and 72). He goes on to point out that “our

definitions of reality in a particular culture and era are

ways of constructing reality. They are in fact models,

paradigms” and “these constructs can and do change” (Zehr 86

and 89 italics added). And even as some sociologists such as

Durkheim have argued for the necessity for crime and social

deviance, or individuals violently asserting power over

others, there will also be peacemakers working to overcome

intolerance, as stewards of peace carrying justice to all.

Thus far, we have introduced some basic principles of

restorative justice, some relevant concepts within social

constructivism, taken a brief look at apartheid and the TRC

and drawn a few connections between the three. These

connections include ways that restorative values were

incorporated into the TRC, aspects of the TRC that present

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gateways for a social constructivist analysis, areas where

social constructivism and restorative justice have already

been shown to overlap, and finally ways that restorative

justice is itself socially constructed. But perhaps one

important question remains. How and why does social

constructivist theory benefit restorative justice in the

context of structural violence?

The obvious argument here is that structural violence

is socially constructed and thus calls for this very type of

analysis. Although RJ and TJ already contain elements of

social constructivism, formally incorporating and looking

through them as a lens to see structural violence is, as far

as the author knows, a novel idea. This means taking a

social constructivist perspective and approach to structural

violence by drawing connections and inferences in how RJ and

TJ address such conflict. Perhaps too it would be

advantageous to capture a more holistic picture of any

culture subject to this type of study prior to the

manifestation of structural violence. Because this begs the

question to what state of being or affairs are we trying to

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restore? What aspects of any one culture increased the

propensity of violence prior to the actual conflict in

question? These questions are perhaps best answered not

through social constructivism alone but in conjunction with

the knowledge and understanding that comes from other

disciplines as well as the intuitive wisdom indigenous to

that culture. In the end, there are perhaps there have been

more questions than answers in this paper. However if you

are convinced or at least inclined to believe that the

possible consequences and application of a social

constructivist lens to restorative justice and structural

conflict warrants further investigation, analysis and

interpretation, I consider this work successful. I now ask

you to join me in the debate on how to construct a more

peaceful and just world, that provides the social mechanisms

necessary to see the broken relationships of the inevitable

eventualities of violence and conflict restored, and its

victims healed.

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