When the dead are not our own: the social profiles of the victims in the reports of the truth commissions in Brazil (2014) and Chile (1996)

Abstract

The reports of the National Truth Commissions (NTCs) constitute monument-documents that reorganize memories and narratives about the dictatorships, while also revealing discontinuities and limitations. Although they contribute to reframing victims, strengthening policies of justice, memory, and reparation, and consolidating previous initiatives, they are unable to fully realize a universal conception of truth. A comparative analysis of the Brazilian (2014) and Chilean (1996) reports demonstrates how certain groups remain silenced or underrepresented. In Brazil, particular attention is drawn to the erasure of Black populations and Indigenous peoples; in Chile, to pobladores and the Mapuche people. Thus, the transformation of subterranean memories into collective memories and official narratives occurs selectively, reproducing hierarchies in the recognition of suffering. The NTCs also face tensions between justice, reparation, reconciliation, and historical silences, reflecting negotiated processes of redemocratization and the persistence of social and political structures that limit the recognition of state violence.