Truth and Reconciliation

Germany's Racial Reckoning Offers Warnings for US

"Seen from an American perspective, Germany is often portrayed as the wise and capable professor of remembrance; the U.S its difficult student."

The Trouble with Truth, Reconciliation, Peace and Friendship Treaties: Indigenous Land and Resource Rights Among the Mi’kmaq  

by Rachel Herrington

Honoring the history of the treaties is not just about the past but also about the present and future of indigenous Canadians. 

Germany Faced its Horrible Past. Can the US Do the Same?

by Michele Norris

"A full accounting of slavery is one of terror and trauma, and for decades the natural inclination was to ask, why would anyone want to claim that history?... What happens if we don’t?" Michele Norris's essay features University of Texas historian Daina Ramey Berry.

Will We Need a Truth and Reconciliation Commission for the Trump Years?

Jill Lepore's recent op ed suggests that the real fight is to preserve documentary evidence for future historians to render judgment on Trump. That view is not universally shared among historians. 

The German Model for America

West German society intially sought to repress evidence of the Holocaust and Nazi crimes, preserving a myth that German civilians were also victims. The work of owning up to those crimes took decades and encountered bitter resistance. 

Unlike the Germans We Have Failed to Recognize and Atone for Our Holocausts

by Walter G. Moss

Reconciling America's racial divisions requires honest reckoning with the past, and teaching history as a search for the truth, not an effort to inclulcate patriotism, placate parents, or pander to censorious textbook commissions.

How an American TV Mini-Series Helped the Germans Acknowledge the Holocaust

by Robert Brent Toplin

An American television minseries overcame initial skepticism by German authorities to rouse public conscience about the Holocaust and the complicity of ordinary Germans with persecution and genocide. Americans hesitant toward "political" popular culture should consider its contributions to truth and reconciliation.

The Reconciliation Must Be Televised

by Wesley Morris

The United States has flirted with truth and reconciliation. But it abandoned Reconstruction and failed to act on the warnings of the 1968 Kerner Commission. Most of all, these failures reflect the vain hope that overcoming the country's racist past can be done quickly. 

Historian David Perry: After Trump, We'll Need a Truth and Reconciliation Commission

A Truth and Reconciliation commission would be a necessary first step in documenting the Trump regime's crimes and assaults on truth, reality and America's collective memory. 

A White Republican Mayor Seeks the Truth about Tulsa’s Race Massacre a Century Ago

Bynum, a white Republican in deeply red Oklahoma, said he would not back down from trying to find answers to what happened.