'Desaparición'

The current situation in Argentina is unprecedented. In compliance with prescribed timings and procedures, the crimes committed by the state in recent history are being prosecuted and penalized. This book traces the path of the trials for crimes against humanity in Argentina, from the Trial of the Juntas that began during the presidency of Raúl Alfonsín to current developments under Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, analysing the ideas of memory, truth and justice. In the volume, judges, lawyers, historians, journalists and witnesses from the era of terror give a lucid and critical reconstruction of the last thirty years. The contributors also point to other states where crimes against humanity are still being committed on a daily basis, despite being notionally proscribed.
This book is translated from Spanish, originally appearing under the title Juicios por crímenes de lesa humanidad en Argentina (2011).

Gabriele Andreozzi is a political scientist specializing in political systems and institutional change in Latin America. He has a particular interest in the political processes of democratic transition and the retrieval of memory in Argentina, as well as relations between Italy and Argentina. He has participated in international seminars on the subject of memory and disappearance and is the author of the Italian documentary ESMA, una sentencia italiana ('ESMA, an Italian judgment').

Contents: Horacio Verbitsky: Argentinean Society Today: Between Memory and Forgetting - Marcos Novaro: The Politics of Human Rights in Argentina, from Alfonsín to Menem - Bruno Napoli: Memory, Truth and Justice: Ideas of an Institutional Justice - Chiara Forneris: The Narrative as a Formative Influence on the Norm: The Experimental Aspect of the Critical Interpretation of the Argentinean Past - Carlos Slepoy: Impunity and Justicia Universal (Universal Justice) in Relation to Crimes Against Humanity - Giancarlo Maniga: The Trials in Italy - Rodolfo Yanzon: The Trials from the End of the Dictatorship Until Today - Daniel Rafecas: The Reopening of Judicial Proceedings for Crimes Against Humanity in Argentina - Carlos Rozanski: Crimes Against Humanity and Genocide: Origins and Meaning of the Prohibitions - Ana Oberlin: The Process of Justice for the State Crimes Committed in Argentina During the Last Civil-Military Dictatorship. The View of a Lawyer Representing Victims and a Militant in HIJOS - Vera Vigevani: The Role of Testimony as a Tool for the Creation of a Political Project - Marina Franco: Gaps in Memory and Political Silences - Emilio Crenzel: The Memories of the Disappeared in Argentina - Hugo Vezzetti: The Uses of the Past and the Politics of the Present - Alejandro Kaufman: History and Memory: Some Theoretical Investigations for the Latin American Context.