CGIS Knafel Building, Room K354, 1737 Cambridge Street, K450, Cambridge, MA 02138
Outside Speaker Seminar Series with Kristen Kao (co-sponsored by the Global Scholars Network on Identity and Conflict)
Abstract: In post-conflict settings, bringing perpetrators to justice is a key component of re-establishing the rule of law and achieving durable peace. Authorities face the challenge of walking a fine line between under- and over-punishment of former enemies. When punishment of a transgressor falls short of what victims believe is commensurate to the wrong committed, the resulting “injustice gap” can be expected to increase desires for vengeance. Yet, excessive punishment can also be problematic and may be perceived as one-sided victor’s justice.
To gain causal leverage on the effects of injustice gaps on state and customary authorities’ legitimacy I run conjoint analysis on factorial survey experiments fielded across three governorates (n=4,592) in Iraq grappling with transitional justice in the destructive wake of the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS). As in many post-conflict settings, a mix of state (i.e., court judges) and local customary authorities (i.e., tribal and religious leaders) are involved in transitional justice processes in Iraq. The study elicits a baseline preference of respondents concerning punishment (or amnesty) for a hypothetical accused collaborator accused of cooperation with ISIS, and then imposes a randomized punishment deemed appropriate by one of three local authorities: state court judges, tribal leaders, or religious authorities.
This study finds that injustice gaps—whether from under- or over-punishment—weaken punishing authorities’ legitimacy. Furthermore, the effects are proportional to size of the injustice gap. Yet, state authorities suffer harsher penalties to their legitimacy compared to customary authorities. Finally, the legitimacy of differing authorities in leading these transitional justice processes varies across Sunni and Shia subpopulations.
Joining burgeoning research calling for thicker and more meaningful engagement with grassroots stakeholders in post-conflict settings, this research recognizes justice as a multidimensional and socially constructed concept that is locally diverse. It offers a research design that can develop and deepen our understanding of micro-foundational linkages between post-conflict justice mechanisms and shifting legitimacies of justice-providing authorities. This work refocuses our attention on the crucial roles that non-state, customary authorities play in justice provision, challenging state-centric paradigms that dominate the field of post-conflict peacebuilding. It suggests there is potential to leverage local leaders’ authority in transitional justice processes if we remain sensitive to differing logics of legitimation across contexts and individuals.
Bio: Kristen Kao is a Docent (Associate Professor) with the Department of Political Science at the University of Gothenburg. She holds a Ph.D. and M.A. in political science from the University of California, Los Angeles. Kristen has published work on post-conflict reconciliation, non-state authorities, ethnic politics, and forced migration in the American Political Science Review, the American Journal of Political Science, Comparative Political Studies, Comparative Politics, the American Journal of Comparative Law, World Development, and the Oxford Handbook of Politics in Muslim Societies, among others. Her edited volume Decentralization, Local Governance, and Inequality in the Middle East and North Africa with Ellen Lust was recently published with the University of Michigan Press. Kristen is an expert in in-depth interviewing, large-n survey methods, and experimental design. She has been conducting fieldwork-based studies since 2006 across countries as varied as Jordan, Syria, Kuwait, Lebanon, Tunisia, Oman, Iraq, Turkey, Malawi, Kenya, Zambia, and Egypt. She has served as an advisor to the Carter Center, the National Democratic Institute, and the World Bank, and is a country expert for the Freedom House and the Varieties of Democracy Institute. Kristen is a former Fulbright Scholar in Egypt and a Boren Fellow in Jordan and Kuwait. You can read more about Kristen’s research at www.kristenkao.com.