Once a war has ended, and a settlement has been reached, communities and governments face multiple tasks in order to build sustainable peace. These may include rebuilding the political machinery and the civil service, holding free elections, drafting a national constitution, guaranteeing a minimum of physical security, establishing a nonpartisan judiciary, prosecuting human rights abusers, stabilizing the currency, and rebuilding the economic infrastructure. A further part of the task of postwar reconstruction is to build better relationships between the previously warring factions through reconciliation. Postwar reconciliation usually falls within the remit of the transitional justice process.

The term reconciliation has various meanings, but it often refers to processes through which societies engage in community building, recover from trauma, reestablish justice, and engage in social reconstruction. Whereas ...