CORE Lecture: The Effects of Post-Conflict Injustice Gaps on Local Leaders’ Legitimacy: Empirical Evidence from Iraq (Kristen Kao)

In post-conflict settings, bringing perpetrators to justice is a key component of re-establishing the rule of law and achieving durable peace. Authorities face the challenge of walking a fine line between under- and over-punishment of former enemies. Seminal work in the psychology of forgiveness finds that when punishment of a transgressor falls short of what victims believe is commensurate to the wrong committed, the resulting “injustice gap” decreases the likelihood of forgiveness. Whereas the original conceptualization of the injustice gaps focused on under-punishment, research in the field of peace studies suggests that excessive punishment can also be problematic. Overly harsh punishments may be perceived as “victor’s justice,” causing the punishing authority a loss of legitimacy. Employing an original survey experiment with 4,592 Iraqis across three governorates receiving citizens who fled the Islamic State, this study provides empirical evidence that injustice gaps—whether from under- or over-punishment—undermine punishing authorities’ legitimacy. These effects are more pronounced for state versus customary authorities and vary across Sunni and Shia subpopulations. This research seeks to develop our understanding of micro-foundational linkages between post-conflict justice mechanisms and shifting legitimacies of justice-providing authorities. I argue that there is great potential to leverage local leaders’ authority in transitional justice processes if we remain sensitive to differing logics of legitimation across contexts and individuals. This work addresses an empirical gap in the existing quantitative work on post-conflict transitional justice by refocusing our attention on the crucial roles that non-state, customary authorities play in justice provision, challenging state-centric paradigms that dominate the field. Finally, it offers substantive insights to development practitioners and policymakers working with local actors on the ground to re-establish the rule of law and foster reconciliation in post-conflict settings.