15.10.2015 (Thursday)

8:00 – 8:45
Reception

Section 1: Assessing Brazil’s Truth Commission(s)

8:45 – 9:00
Welcoming Address – Nina Schneider (GSSC/ Cologne; Zukunftskolleg/ Konstanz)

9:00 – 9:45
Keynote – Vera Paiva (daughter of a disappeared Brazilian deputy):
“WT [Working title]: Human Rights abuses in Brazil”
Moderator: Nina Schneider
Seminar room for 36 people

9:45 – 11:00
Panel 1 – The Brazilian Truth Commission’s contribution to knowledge (new evidence, oppressed, perpetrators?) and socio-political transformation (reform, punishment)

  1. Eugenia Gonzaga (President of the Special Commission of the Dead and Disappeared):
    “Dealing with the Memory of the Dictatorship in Brazil: a brief Report of Activities besides those of the National Truth Commission”
  2. Carolina de Campos Melo (Member of the Final Report Executive Team of the CNV):
    “The Writing up of the Final Report: conclusions and recommendations”
  3. Marlon Weichert (State Attorney SP):
    “The outcomes of the Brazilian Truth Commission – achievements and challenges”

11:00 – 11:15
Coffee – Foyer Ground Floor

11:15 – 12:30
Panel 1 continued: The Brazilian Truth Commission’s contribution

12:30 – 13:30
Lunch – Buffet (and short break)

14:00 – 15:30
Panel 2: Discussing the Novelties of the Brazilian model: Business Support, local commissions, and social media
Moderation: Pedro Teixerense

  1. Jose Otavio Nogueira Guimaraes (Former President of the local truth commission Anisio Texeira, National University of Brasilia):
    “WT: The local Truth Commission of National University of Brasilia”
  2. Ana Migowski (GCSC, Justus-Liebig Universität – Giessen):
    “Communicative memories about the dictatorship in Brazil: the elaboration of ‘truths’ on social network sites”

15:30 – 15:45
Coffee – Foyer Ground Floor

15:45 – 17:30
Moderated Panel Discussion: Assessing the novelties of the Brazilian Model: benefits and challenges local truth Commissions
Moderator: Nina Schneider

Panelists:
Carolina de Campos Melo, Vera Paiva, Pedro Teixeirense, Jose Otavio Guimaraes, Marlon Weichert, Rebecca Atencio

17:30 – 18:30
Time to Visit the Herrenhaeuser Gardens (free tickets available at reception for participants)

18:30
Dinner – Buffet

16.10.2015 (Friday)

8:30 – 10:45
Panel 3 – The National and Local Truth Commissions and Brazilian Society – a New Public/Cultural Awareness? (Seminar room for 36 Persons)

  1. Rebecca J. Atencio (Associate Professor of Luso-Brazilian Literary and Cultural Studies, Tulane University, New Orleans, USA):
    “Beyond Official Truth-Telling: Bernardo Kucinski’s Fiction and its Real-World Synergies with the National and Local Truth Commissions”
  2. Jobst Welge (Professor of Literature, University of Eichstätt):
    “Transgenerational Memory in Recent Brazilian and Latin American Fiction”
  3. Anthony W. Pereira (Director of King’s Brazil Centre, King’s College London, UK):
    “The Truth Commission and institutional reform”
  4. Gisele Iecker Almeida (Ghent):
    “The governmental turn in post-dictatorial memory politics”

10:45 – 11:00
Coffee 

Section 2: Comparing Latin American Truth Commissions: Functions and Outcomes

11:00 – 12:15
Panel 4 –  Latin America before and after Truth Commissions?
Moderation: Gisele Iecker de Almeida

  1. Antoon De Baets (Professor of History, Ethics and Human Rights, University of Groningen, and coordinator of the Network of Concerned Historians):
    “The Human Rights Committee as an alternative truth commission: memory and history in Latin American citizens’ complaints before the United Nations (1977–2015)”
  2. Thomas Fischer (Professor of History, University of Eichstätt):
    “Latin American Truth Commissions and the Colombian case Latin American Truth Commissions and the Colombian case”
  3. Ann Schneider (Fulbright Scholar, WDC):
    “When Evidence and Impunity Co-exist: Truth Commissions and their Archives in El Salvador, Peru and Brazil”

12:15 – 13:15
Lunch – Buffet

13:15 – 14:00
Panel 4 (continued) – Latin America before and after Truth Commissions?
Moderator: Gisele Iecker de Almeida

14:00 – 14:30
Skype Key Note – Leigh A. Payne (Professor of Sociology and Latin America, University of Oxford, UK):
“Truth Commissions in Comparative Perspective: A study of their impact and their innovations in tracking corporate complicity in past human rights violations.”
– Followed by Q & A

15:00 – 16:15
Panel 5 – Truth commissions’ worldwide dispersion and development
Moderator: Hannah Franzki

  1. Stephan Scheuzger (Bern):
    “A Very Brief Global History of Truth Commissions, or: What Is Important to Understand about this Instrument in Dealing with the Past from a Historian’s Point of View”
  2. Lena Ruessing (Cologne):
    “Truth Commissions in post-colonial societies. The Cases of Canada and Mauritius”
  3. Anja Mihr (Humboldt Viadrina: Center on Governance through Human Rights, Berlin):
    “Truth Commissions and Democratic institution building”

16:15 – 16:30
Coffee

16:30 – 17:00
Panel 5 (continued) – Truth commissions’ worldwide dispersion and development

17:30 – 18:00
Moderated Discussion Panel – Assessing Latin American Truth Commissions: their value and limits
Moderator: Nina Schneider

Roundtable discussants:
Stephan Scheuzger (Bern), Hannah Franzki (Bremen), Antoon de Baets (Groningen), Anja Mihr (Humboldt Viadrina), and Thomas Fischer (Eichstätt).

18:30
Dinner – Buffet

19:00 – 20:00
Keynote – Aleida Assmann (Professor Emeritus of Literatures and Cultures, University of Konstanz, Germany):
“Working Title: The Reckoning process in post-Nazi Germany”

 

17.10.2015 (Saturday)

Section 3: Between the local and the global: Functions and Interpretations of Truth Commissions

9:00 – 10:45
Panel 6: Comparing Truth Commissions’ overall function
Moderator: Lena Ruessing

  1. Fatima Kastner (Institute for World Society Studies, Bielefeld):
    “The Globalization of Transitional Justice: On the Diffusion of Norms, Standards and Institutions of Post-Conflict Justice in World Society”
  2. Hannah Franzki (Bremen):
    “The End of History? Situating Truth Commissions as a Concept of Historical Justice”
  3. Pedro Teixerense (bolsista PDSE/CAPES – UFRJ/Bochum):
    “Is there a room for History? Clashes between opposing narratives and the profile of the victims of the military dictatorship in the National Truth Commission’s final report”

10:45 – 11:00
Coffee

11:00 – 12:15
Moderated Panel Discussion: The role of Truth Commissions Revisited: Local, National, and Global Interpretations – General Reflections and Findings of the Symposium.

Panelists:
Anthony Pereira, Stefan Berger, Vera Paiva, Fatima Kastner, Aleida Assmann.
Moderator: Nina Schneider.

12:15 – 13:10
Lunch – Small Buffet

— Leaving the Conference Venue after Lunch

13:10

Optional guided visit to the Bergen Belsen concentration camp (not part of conference)

Transfer to Bergen-Belsen with shuttle buses in front of the venue.
Please be on time, as we cannot wait for latecomers!

14:00 – 17:00
Guided tour. The guided tour will be in English (no Spanish guides available, I’m afraid)

17:00 – 18:30/19:00
Walk along the former camp territory and transfer back to Hannover

19:00
Final Get Together – Table booked at the restaurant of the City Hotel (at private expense)