‘If There's No Justice …’: Trauma and identity in post-dictatorship Argentina

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Notes

¹ Unless otherwise noted, all translations and interviews were made by the author. Some names have been changed.

² The use of the Spanish form of the acronym ‘H.I.J.O.S.’ has become an important identity marker since a split organization emerged in Buenos Aires in 2001 using the same name but no acronym. Sometimes the two groups are referred to as the ‘H.I.J.O.S. with dots’ and those ‘without dots.’ By 2006, H.I.J.O.S. had two regional groups in Buenos Aires City: H.I.J.O.S. Capital and H.I.J.O.S. Zona Oeste. No longer active, H.I.J.O.S. Zona Norte had been a third. However, Hijos (Buenos Aires) (note the lack of acronym) is a different organization that does not respond to the National Network (Cristal et al. 2002; H.I.J.O.S. Capital 2001). In this article, Ido not report on Hijos (Buenos Aires), and Ionly refer to different regional chapters of H.I.J.O.S. National Network.

³ ‘Full Stop’ Law 23493 of 1986 gave judges sixty days to bring charges against all those implicated in human rights violations; after that, cases would be invalid. ‘Due Obedience’ Law 23521 of 1987 exempted from guilt those who tortured or murdered following orders. Presidential Pardon Decrees 1002–05 of 1989 ordered the end of proceedings against those not covered by the previous laws; Decrees 2741–43 of 1990 pardoned those already imprisoned, together with three political prisoners.

⁴ The 1948 United Nations definition of ‘genocide’ excluded political persecution as some member states could be liable otherwise (Delacampagne 1998: 53-55). Some authors understand that ‘genocide’ could obscure the centrality of politics in the Argentine massacre (Vezzetti 1998). H.I.J.O.S. emphasizes the political nature of the massacre, but has insisted on using ‘genocide’ to underscore the totalizing goal and systematic nature of the dictatorship's extermination campaign. H.I.J.O.S. also uses the Spanish word genocida, which Itranslate as ‘genocide criminal’, for its agents. Represor/es (repressor/s) is another word used for the military involved in the dictatorship's (repressive) campaign against dissidence. CELS (1999) utilizes this word; Kaiser (2002), writing in English, leaves it untranslated. The Spanish courts started applying the word ‘genocide’ to the Argentine case in the 1990s and the Argentine justice used it for the first time in 2006.

⁵ In 2005, the Supreme Court declared the impunity laws unconstitutional, and trials restarted, posing a challenge to the escrache. For, if escraches happened ‘if there's no justice’, what would happen after prosecution restarted? Far from stopping them, this virtual success of the escraches would expand and diversify these actions – certainly after a reworking of their identity and goals (see Benegas Loyo 2009: 230–95).