COMING TO TERMS WITH THE PAST - A FRAMEWORK FOR THE STUDY OF JUSTICE IN THE TRANSITION TO DEMOCRACY

After the transition from an authoritarian to a democratic regime, one commonly observes trials of the agents of the former regime and effor ts to compensate its victims. In our century waves of transitional jus tice have occured in German-occupied countries after 1945, in South-Ea stern Europe in the 1970s, in Latin-American countries in the 1980s, a nd in post-Communist countries after 1989. The article proposes a fram ework for the behavioral study of these phenomena. The dependent varia bles are political decisions to pursue retroactive justice after the t ransition. Independent variables include the constraints of the actors , their motivations and beliefs, as well as the mechanisms by which in dividual policy preferences are aggregated into binding collective dec isions.