Supporting reparations after armed conflict: How discursive ‘memory battles’ affect political solidarity with Guatemalan Indigenous survivors

Abstract

Literature on survivor mobilization in transitional justice contexts has largely overlooked the relevance and dynamics of solidarity-based support by non-victimized groups. This article studies the relation between contentious processes of discursive ‘memory-making’ and public support for reparations in post-conflict Guatemala. Using a nationwide survey-embedded experiment with 300 respondents, we measure how contrasting representations of the temporality of harm and prospects for peace – drawn from elite versus survivor narratives – influence political solidarity with Indigenous survivors and support for their reparation demands. Findings show that while perceptions of survivors’ continued suffering and reparations’ peace-building potential are key predictors of solidarity and support, the contrasting narrative primes did not significantly influence these perceptions or resulting attitudes. The survey’s open-ended responses suggest that, in engaging with prevalent public discourses, respondents have developed relatively stable yet highly diverse interpretations of the necessity and ability of reparations to address social, psychological, and economic harms, and to promote beneficial outcomes for society at large. Mapping these responses onto the quantitative scores indicates that solidary support is more likely to emerge when non-victimized groups situate conflict-related harms within an ongoing history of structural violence and position reparations as building blocks for recognition, development and social integration – signalling the importance of discursive and expressive dynamics in public engagement with reparation processes.