The democratic transition and the community’s responsibility for its past

Abstract

In this article, I will try to establish the kind of responsibility that a political community with a past of injustice and suffering must assume in a democratic transition. Even though any society with a troublesome past has to take responsibility and to repair it, this article will analyze the kind of responsibility of a political community in the process of transition to a democratic society, after massive violations of human rights cause directly by a repressive regime and/or its opponents in an armed conflict. The article has two sections. In the first section, I will analyze the relation between the construction of moral and political agency and the political systems where agency is developed. I will defend the idea that the best political system to guarantee the developing of responsible political and moral agencies is within an inclusive and egalitarian democracy. In the second section, I will study three aspects of responsibility in a transitional democracy: political responsibility, moral responsibility and criminal responsibility.

Key words: democratic transition, inclusive democracy, transitional justice, political responsibility, moral responsibility and criminal responsibility.