Human Rights Violations in Latin America: Reparation and Rehabilitation

ISBN-13: 9783030975418 / Angielski / Twarda / 2022

Lira, Elizabeth

Opis

A timely contribution to the study of peace psychology in Latin America, this volume describes clinical, psychosocial, and community interventions with victims from Mexico to Chile from the 1970s onward. Chapters analyze how to conceptualize complex processes such as the appropriation of children and political repression, raising psychological, juridical, and political implications for the victims, their families, human rights organizations, and society. Also included are studies and analyses of political processes in countries currently undergoing crises such as Venezuela and Colombia and the challenges posed by the peace process from a political psychology perspective. All authors present the results of studies or clinical cases illustrating creative methodologies and practices in different contexts.This book provides the context for differences in the victims' damages and the treatment approaches and methodologies adopted in each case. The authors outline psychological perspectives grounded in ethical and professional choices based on recognizing people's dignity while seeking rehabilitation and reparations for victims, families, and communities. It paves the way for reparations and rehabilitation, and ultimately to the establishment of democracy and peace in this part of the world.

Readers will benefit from

• understanding the relationship between mental health and human rights
• understanding ethical and professional dimensions
• a broadened knowledge of working with victims

Spis treści

SECTION I – HISTORY, CONCEPTS, AND APPROACHES

1. Psychology and Human Rights in Chile. Assistance, Registration, Denunciation, Rehabilitation,

and Reparation

Elizabeth Lira & Marcela Cornejo, Chile

Widespread torture, forced disappearance, extrajudicial executions, and other human rights violations

characterized the political repression since the 1973 military coup in Chile. Civil society generated forms

of professional solidarity with victims, including social, legal, medical, and psychological support. This

chapter describes the mental health programs of human rights organizations implemented in Chile during

the dictatorship and subsequent political transition, in the truth commissions, and reparation policies.

Some research lines concerning the political past and its consequences in the present are summarized

thereby contributing to field studies that explore memories in the aftermath of political transitions.

2. Method of Forced Disappearance and Trials for Crimes Against Humanity: A Dialogue between

the Legal and Subjective Dimensions. Specifics of the Argentine Case

Mariana Wikinski, Mariana Biaggio, Rosa Matilde Díaz Jiménez & Marcelo Marmer, Argentina

Argentina experienced one of the most savage forms of biopolitical exercise of power: the forced

disappearance of people, an extermination tool whose massive, prolonged application produced profound

trauma in victims and the population (1976-1983). The chapter offers a systematic view of the work done

to bridge these legal and psychological dimensions. Topics include: the consideration of forced

disappearance as torture; the conceptualization of trauma; the mourning caused by disappearance; and

the narration of the trauma in court. The authors illustrate the importance of the joint efforts of

legal and psychological professionals to influence decisions of the court taking into account the

conditions of suffering and the psychic impact of trauma.

3. Locating Children Appropriated by Dictatorships of the Southern Cone: Questioning Identities

Sonia Mosquera, Uruguay

The situation of children appropriated and later found as adults have opened ethical and political dilemmas

and theoretical challenges for psychology. This chapter analyzes how the theft and appropriation of babies

contains an exceedingly complex network of dimensions that require hard work to untangle:

the psychosocial, the legal, and the ethical, with a strong emphasis on subjective constructs. By examining

the processes of seven young interviewees, the article shows the singularity of each story and context

while also drawing attention to recurrences in their narratives and processes.

4. Photography and Film in the Experience of Identity Restitution: A Writing of Light

Juan Jorge Michel-Fariña & Florencia González Pla, Argentina

Forty-five years after the military coup in Argentina, the Grandmothers (Abuelas) of Plaza de

Mayo continue their search for people, now adults, who disappeared or were born in captivity in their

childhood or early childhood. This chapter establishes the theoretical categories at stake and

the essential perspectives in four dimensions: (a) the right to identity and its implications in

new fields of technological, scientifi development; (b) the symbolic and subjective value of genetic data; (c) the psychological implications

related to the parental function and the role of memory in the construction of identity; and especially, (d)

the psychosocial influence through cinema, literature and photography, which made this topic a heritage of

humanity.

SECTION II – PSYCHOSOCIAL ASSISTANCE AND INTERVENTION METHODOLOGIES

5. The Method and Methodology of Psychosocial Accompaniment Work: A Contribution for At-

Risk Defenders in Mexico

Clemencia Correa, Laura Espinosa, & Rodrigo Morales, México

“ALUNA - Acompañamiento Psicosocial” provides psychosocial accompaniment to individuals,

collectives, and human rights organizations, all of which are at risk because of the work they carry out

in contexts of sociopolitical violence in Mexico. In this chapter, Correa et al. describe and analyze their

accompaniment model as applied to the case of an organization that defends territorial claims of victims

and has been subjected to threats, harassment, and other aggressions. Issues of mental health, human

rights, safety, fear, and protection arise when applying the accompaniment model.

6. Construction of a Model of Psychosocial Care and Support. Training of Peer Psychosocial

Companions: An Experience from Mexico

José Manuel Bezanilla, María Amparo Miranda & Juan López, México

This chapter formulates a model of mental health professionals' training to create visibility of invisible

structural violence, provide transdisciplinary skills, and foster interdisciplinary dialogue. The Mexican

Model of Psychosocial Attention and Accompaniment was developed, in conjunction with “Uniendo

Cristales” based on the principles of the socionomy of Jacobo Levy Moreno along with a psychosocial

perspective, serving victims of severe human rights violations, particularly forced disappearance. One of

the programs is the “Peer Psychosocial Companions” training, which takes place in face-to-face and online

training, with technical guidance and double tutoring. This training program is aimed at

strengthening collective, community, family, and personal resources in contexts of social violence and

limited safety.

SECTION III – PSYCHOTHERAPEUTIC INTERVENTIONS

7. Psychotherapy with former political prisoners in Uruguay: the vision of the therapists

María Cecilia Robaina, Uruguay

The chapter describes the characteristics of the clinical practice of psychologists, psychiatrists, and

psychoanalysts who worked with torture victims 30 years after the events. The author interviewed

psychotherapists working in a private clinic, an NGO, and state reparation program. The research was

based on in-depth interviews and was conducted between 2011 and 2014. Theoretical and technical

aspects of the treatments are described, analyzing the particularities of this clinic.

8. Arpilleras of Sexual and Domestic Violence in Post-war: Guatemala: accompaniment in processes

of psychosocial reparation

María Luisa Cabrera Pérez-Armiñan, Guatemala

This chapter presents the results of group psychosocial processes for women survivors of gender,

domestic, and sexual violence in Guatemala centered around burlap tapestries (arpilleras), pieces of fabric

that make it possible for victims to materially represent and resignify their experiences of violence. Her

study reveals some potential dimensions of psychosocial reparation and specifies the challenges posed by

the social and personal reconstruction of women who have experienced various types of violence in their

lives, within a national context of postwar political violence.

9. Group Therapeutic Strategies and Human Rights Violations in Chile

Germán Morales & María Isabel Castillo, Chile

This chapter systematizes some of the main therapeutic group strategies developed in Chile by NGOs and

social organizations during the civil-military dictatorship from 1973 to the beginning of the

transition (1990). Group psychotherapy theories, extreme traumatization theory and relational

psychoanalysis are the primary theoretical references. The role of the group is highlighted as a space for

working through traumatic situations experienced at the individual and social level. The group becomes

a third party that recognizes, validates, contains, and contributes to the restitution of the damaged

collective.

SECTION IV – PSYCHOLOGICAL AND PSYCHOSOCIAL SUPPORT DURING FORENSIC

EXAMINATIONS AND TRIALS

10. El Mozote Massacre: Expert Research and Challenges of Psychosocial Reparation

Sol Yáñez, El Salvador

The expert psychosocial assessment is a methodology that was constructed to support claims presented by

the Association of Victims of El Mozote before the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, arising

from its ceaseless struggle against impunity. The first step was to identify the surviving victims of the “El

Mozote” massacre, which occurred in 1981 in El Salvador and resulted in 1000 deaths. Victims' stories,

the damages they suffered and their expectations of reparation are central to the trial. The program's results

described here characterize the psychosocial damage and consequences on the victims and propose

reparations. The author stresses how the identification of victims initiated a psychosocial reparation

process.

11. Psychosocial Work in the Transitional Justice Framework: The Women of Sepur Zarco

Susana Navarro García & Paula María Martínez Velázquez, Guatemala

In 2010, fifteen indigenous Q'eqchi' women of the Sepur Zarco community filed a legal complaint. They

were survivors of sexual violence and domestic slavery that they suffered in a military post during the

Guatemalan armed conflict. In 2016, a Guatemalan court convicted an army officer and a former military

officer of human rights violations against women. This chapter describes the psychosocial work carried

out with the women. Emphasis is placed on addressing the consequences of human rights violations

suffered by them and empowered them to face the judicial process and claim their rights. The authors

analyze how women contributed to truth, justice, and reparation processes through their engagement

with the organizations that supported them. In addition, they show the key role of women in the search

for justice –which resulted in a guilty verdict for the perpetrators– aided their psychosocial reparation and

healing process.

12. Contribution of the Psycho-forensic Evidence in the Inter-American Court in the Case

of Lonkos and Mapuche Indigenous Leaders versus Chile

Ruth Vargas-Forman, Chile-United States

This chapter contextualizes the case “Norin Catriman, Lonkos and Mapuche Indigenous Leaders versus

Chile” in the Inter-American System for the Protection of Human Rights. It reviews the contributions

of forensic psychology in litigation related to human rights violations concerning indigenous peoples.

The Inter-American Court of Human Rights in May 2014 sanctioned the State of Chile for violations of

the American Convention and the rights of eight indigenous leaders wrongly convicted under the

Antiterrorist Law. According to the verdict, forensic psychology examinations influenced the

determination of the sanction against Chile and the reparation measures adopted. This study helps to

illustrate the role of psychosocial evidence and forensic psychologists in the support offered to victims

at the Inter-American Court during cases of human rights violations affecting the individual and collective

rights of indigenous peoples.

SECTION V – PSYCHOSOCIAL REPARATIONS: CHALLENGES OF VICTIM’S

RECOGNITION

13. Testimony and Symbolic Reparation: The Clinica do Testemunho Project in Rio de Janeiro Vera

Vital-Brasil, Brazil

This chapter briefly describes the social and political context of the Brazilian civil-military dictatorship

(1964-1985), its effects on subjectivity and the struggles for reparation for victims of human rights

violations. It studies the work of the clinical political team at the Clinica do Testemunho, a project

implemented in Rio de Janeiro (2013-1015) by the Ministry of Justice as psychological reparation public

policy arising from its Amnesty Commission. This project includes clinical assistance, the training of

professional psychologists and the production of written material regarding its application in the national

territory. The process of giving testimony has allowed the harmful effects of political repression to be

shifted from the private sphere, resulting in the rebuilding of social ties, valorization of its power to

produce subjective changes and contributing to the construction of individual and collective memory.

14. The Clinics of Testimony: New Ways of Recognition through Group Listening to Military

Personnel

Alexei Conte, Ângela Flores, Bárbara De Souza, Carlos Augusto Piccinini, Karine Szuchman & Lísia da

Luz Refosco, Brazil

The Clinics of Testimony Project (Amnesty Commission / Ministry of Justice) aimed to facilitate the

psychic reparation of people who suffered State violence during the civil-military dictatorships in Brazil

between 1964 and 1985. This chapter discusses the clinical intervention work of the team of psychologists

and psychoanalysts of the Sigmund Freud Psychoanalytic Association, a non-governmental institution that

carried out this project in Porto Alegre / Rio Grande do Sul. The interventions were with members of the

military who wanted the State to recognize them as victims of the violence when they served in the Armed

Forces. The Testimonial Clinics allow them to consider a resignification of what it means to be a victim of

State violence by opening symbolic paths for coping with suffering as well as alternative orientations to

claims for truth, memory, and justice.

15. Colonia Dignidad: Lights and Shadows in the Recognition of the Victims

Evelyn Hevia Jordán, Chile-Germany

Colonia Dignidad - Dignity Charitable and Educational Society (1961-2005)- was a German institution

founded in Chile in 1961, in the countryside in the south of Chile. The authorities of this institution

collaborate to commit crimes against humanity (torture and disappearances) during Chile's civil-military

dictatorship (1973-1990) and sexual abuse against children after 1961. The chapter discusses the institution,

its internal operating system, its victimizing structure, and its collaborations with political repression during

the dictatorship. There are different groups of victims at present, and the victimizing pattern and its effects

on victims are well-known. The chapter concludes by identifying today's challenges concerning the

process of building historical memory and recognizing and repairing all victims.

SECTION VI – POLITICAL AND PSYCHOSOCIAL CHALLENGES OF TRANSITIONS

16. Political Transition and Social Reparation in Venezuela: Challenges of Democratic

Reconstruction

Mireya Lozada, Venezuela

This chapter adopts a psychopolitical perspective to examine social reconstruction and

reparation challenges in a potential democratic transition taking place in a country under an authoritarian

regime. The chapter offers some keys to favoring the processes of democratic reconstruction. Parallel to

the urgency of the changes required in the economic, political, and institutional spheres, what

also stands out are those actions tending to depolarization, the rebuilding of the social fabric

fractured by the conflict, the fight against impunity and the search for justice for the victims, as well as

the construction of scenarios of a shared common future, which favor peaceful and democratic

coexistence in the country.

17.- Psychology and Human Rights in Colombia: Contributions to Peacebuilding

Wilson López-López, Andrea Correa-Chica, Angélica Caicedo-Moreno, Pablo Castro-Abril &

Carlos Felipe Buitrago-Panader, Colombia

This chapter describes and explores the consequences of the social and armed conflict on victims of

human rights violations in Colombia. We also describe a research and intervention model with a

multidimensional analysis perspective that allows us to demonstrate the role of psychosocial processes

such as forgiveness, reconciliation, transitional justice mechanisms (such as truth commissions or JEP in

Colombia- Special Justice for Peace) in the restoration of human rights at the individual, community, and

social levels. The work of psychology is key to promoting human rights and seeking ways to contribute to

sustainable peace.

18. Working Mental Health in Peru

Vivian Valz Gen, Perú

The chapter provides a brief review of the process, development, and current status of mental health work

in Peru. It presents the experience of the Mental Health Unit of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission

of Peru (CVR) and its contribution to the understanding and management of mental health issues. This

work gathered contributions from various teams of mental health professionals in the country from

previous decades and at the same time promoted and inspired the current commission. It proposes a

methodology that recognizes the individual as the axis of transformation processes. It also shows

how the living conditions associated with submission, abuse, and violence, generate emotional suffering

in individuals and people, giving rise to severe mental health problems that must be addressed,

prioritizing a community approach.

O autorze

Elizabeth Lira:  Psychologist (Universidad Católica de Chile, 1971), MSc. in Development Sciences (1977); Post graduate degree in Family Therapy (1989). She worked as clinical psychologist with victims of human rights violations after 1978 in Chile. She received the National Psychology Award “Colegio de Psicólogos”, Chile, 1983; she was awarded in 1991 with the “Sergio Yulis” prize of the Chilean Society of Clinical Psychology;the International Humanitarian Award American Psychological Association in 2002 and the National Prize of Humanities and Social Sciences 2017 in Chile. She was member of the Political Prison and Torture Commission of the Government of Chile: 2003-2005 and 2010-2011. She has published several books and articles on human rights, reparation policies, reconciliation, and memory. Her last book published in 2020 with Brian Loveman (SDSU) is Poder Judicial y Conflictos Políticos. Chile 1973-1990. [Judicial Power and Political Conflicts. Chile 1973-1990]. She has been Dean of the Faculty of Psychology (2014-2022) at the Alberto Hurtado University in Santiago and currently co-researcher in the project “Beyond the victim paradigm: Genealogies of subject performance devices of political violence. Chile, 1973-2018” (Fondecyt N°1190834) in the Interdisciplinary Program in Memory and Human Rights at the same university.

Marcela Cornejo: Psychologist (Universidad Católica de Chile, 1995) and PhD in Psychological Sciences (Université de Louvain, Belgium, 2004). She is the current Chair of the Department of Psychology at the Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile. She is an associate researcher at the Millennium Institute for Research on Violence and Democracy, VIODEMOS [ANID - Millennium Science Initiative Program - ICS2019_025], and an adjunct researcher at the Center for the Study of Conflict and Social Cohesion, COES [CONICYT/FONDAP/15130009]. She has devoted over 20 years to the study of topics associated with psychosocial traumas due to political violence; individual and collective working-through processes produced by political violence; processes of biographical construction and collective memory; generational aspects in the comprehension of psychosocial phenomena; and the rationales and practices of qualitative social research. In these topics, she has conducted research projects in collaboration with Chilean and foreign researchers, participating in and organizing conferences and symposiums, publishing papers in several journals, chapters in books, and supervising doctoral theses in Chilean and foreign universities.

Germán MORALES: Clinical Psychologist and MSc in Clinical Psychology, Universidad Católica de Chile. Postgraduate degree in Family Therapy, Instituto Chileno de Terapia Familiar. He has worked as a psychotherapist in several institutions that serve low-income areas and victims of human rights violations such as the clinical team of the Latin American Institute of Mental Health and Human Rights (ILAS), which received the Chilean National Psychology award (2003). He has taught at several universities and, since 2001, he has been a Professor of the Department of Psychology at the Universidad Católica de Chile. In addition, he belongs to several organizations, including the Chilean Association of Group Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy, the Child Systemic Relational Network, and the Chilean Chapter of the International Association of Psychotherapy and Relational Psychoanalysis (IARPP-Chile). He has authored several publications on trauma, adolescence, self-care, and professional burnout.