Law and Memory:
Towards Legal
Governance of
History
Belavusau, Uladzislau; Aleksandra Gliszczyńska-Grabias (Eds.). (2017)
he volume Law and Memory: Towards Legal T a tenuous connection between Switzerland and the
Governance of History (2017), edited by Uladzislau Armenian genocide and thus differed from Holocaust
Belavusau and Aleksandra Gliszczyńska-Grabias, bans in states that were involved in the commission of
integrates various accounts by both lawyers and the Nazi horrors. Kahn questions these arguments and
non-lawyers and approaches memory laws as a asks if it is logical to require a nexus between the state
phenomenon of global law and transitional justice. enacting the ban and the historical ban being denied?
The volume hereby aims to offer an alternative to legal
These are questions we should consider
approaches to memory laws, which as the editors when discussing the form memory laws should
contend, often focus on geographically limited laws and take, especially when taking into account the many
judgements. The global approach is further reflected in misgivings surrounding the concept of memory laws
the four parts of the book, which focus on International and the various critical questions surrounding their
Law, European Law (Council of Europe and the European relationship with freedom of expression, academic
Union), National Perspectives within the European freedom, and their potential imposition of “truths”
Union, and Perspectives beyond the European Union. on both the past and present. These concerns are
This broad scope of perspectives enables
highlighted by Cajani, who discusses the objections
the volume to focus on the ways international, of historians to the European Union’s adoption of the
supranational, and national memory laws intersect Framework Decision on Combating Certain Forms and
and interact with each other. Chapters by Klymenko Expressions of Racism and Xenophobia by Criminal
and Carrasco, for example, draw attention to the Law as restricting freedom of expression and academic
invocation of European Holocaust denial legislation research, Aksenova who focuses on the performative
by legislators in Ukraine and Peru as a means of role played by the International Criminal Tribunal as
legitimizing their own, often fundamentally divergent, communicating a certain narrative of historical “truth”
memory laws. These examples stress not merely the and making value judgements about history, and Přibáň
importance of studying memory laws beyond a national who states that Czech memory laws inhibited, instead of
perspective, but also the (authoritative) narratives of opened up, public discussion about the totalitarian past,
previous memory laws. Concerning the transnational its impact, and the responsibility of its perpetrators.
character of these memory laws, Kahn’s chapter titled
All in all, the volume does not argue for the
Banning Genocide Denial – Should Geography Matter? abolishment of memory laws, but raises questions,
is particularly eye-opening. Kahn questions the nexus urging for the necessity to be critical of memory laws
argument applied by the European Court of Human and especially their form. By pointing to various non-
Rights (ECHR) in the Perinçek case, where the Swiss regulatory measures, the volume at moments begs the
ban on the denial of the Armenian Genocide was seen question if the punitive format is necessary or even
as violating the protection of freedom of expression in productive, and highlights the necessity to, depending
article 10. The ECHR maintained that there was only on context, consider alternatives.
Palgrave, 2017
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