Genocide or crimes against humanity: the Argentine legal debate as a dispute over the meaning assigned to the past

Abstract

In the aftermath of the Argentinean genocide (1975-1983), the judicial arena quickly became a privileged area for the disputes over the meaning of the past. Once the obstacles that prevented full judgment were removed, trials were reopened in Argentina in 2005. With the acceptance of survivors, family members and human rights organizations as plaintiffs, different debates were installed that allowed the process to go beyond the limits of the court-rooms. The main one of them was the dispute over the qualification of genocide (as a differentiation from the “crimes against humanity” label). After thirteen years of continued trials, a critical analysis of the whole process is presented through the lenses of this debate. Opposite legal arguments far transcend the boundaries of the courts and they are articulated with disputes over the meaning assigned to the past, thus permeating the ways in which the courts assume responsibility for judging the facts and attributing responsibilities. The analysis of the judgments issued between August 2006 and June 2019 shows the progress of the debate in argumentative terms as well as the incidence of these conceptualizations when condemning or acquitting the accused, or deciding on the penalties and sanctions of the convicted ones.