Accountability Shock: Why Transitional Justice Prevents Criminal Wars in New Democracies
A live-streamed video of this launch will appear above at the appointed time. Questions may be submitted through the button below at any time before or during the event.
Join the Kellogg Institute in celebrating the launch of this groundbreaking work produced through Kellogg's Notre Dame Violence and Transitional Justice (V-TJ) Policy and Practice Research Lab. Accountability Shock: Why Transitional Justice Prevents Criminal Wars in New Democracies (Cambridge University Press, 2026) was written by Kellogg faculty fellow Guillermo Trejo, along with Juan Albarracín and Lucia Tiscórnia, who will all be present to share highlights from the book, followed by commentary from our guest panelists.
Accountability Shock explains why some “Third Wave” democracies emerged peacefully while others became highly violent, arguing that robust transitional justice processes play a decisive role. Drawing on six Latin American cases, it shows how combining truth commissions with prosecutions can break state impunity, reshape the use of coercion in new democracies, and prevent criminal violence tied to authoritarian legacies.
Co-Authors:
Guillermo Trejo
Professor of Political Science, University of Notre Dame
Kellogg Faculty Fellow
Juan Albarracín
Assistant Professor of Political Science, University of Illinois - Chicago
Former Kellogg PhD Fellow
Lucia Tiscórnia
Associate Professor, School of Politics and International Relations, University College Dublin
Former Kellogg PhD Fellow
Moderator:
Scott Mainwaring
Eugene P. and Helen Conley Professor of Political Science
Kellogg Institute Faculty Fellow
Guillermo Trejo
Guillermo Trejo is professor of political science at the University of Notre Dame, faculty fellow at the Kellogg Institute for International Studies, and Director and Principal Investigator at the Notre Dame Violence and Transitional Justice Lab (V-TJLab). He has been a Kellogg Institute faculty fellow since 2012...
Juan Guillermo Albarracín Dierolf
Former Phd Fellow and Dissertation Year Fellow Juan Guillermo Albarracín Dierolf is currently an assistant professor of Political Science at the University of Illinois Chicago (UIC) and a co-principal investigator of the Kellogg Institute's Notre Dame Violence and Transitional Justice Lab (V-TJLab)...