reparations

Claims to material reparations for historical injustices are typically based on the nature of the lasting impact, and claims to symbolic restitution are often grounded on the moral quality of the wrongs committed. This article considers the theoretical underpinnings of arguments about reparations, responsibility for past injustices, and…

…give rise to claims to reparations today if such claims can be understood to presuppose an indefensible interpretation of property entitlements. The American philosophers David Lyons and Jeremy Waldron argued against the claim that once we acquire entitlements, they continue until we transfer or relinquish them. They dismissed that claim…

Commemorative acts of symbolic reparation—for example, a day of remembrance—can be understood as aiming to fulfill that duty toward dead victims of injustice.

…carrying out its policies of reparation.

Reparation consists of restitution of the original situation if possible, compensation where this is not possible, or satisfaction (i.e., acknowledgment of and apology for the breach) if neither is possible.