The Role of Victimology in Promoting Peace in Western and Non-Western Countries

Abstract

Victimology has traditionally developed within criminology and criminal justice, whereas peace studies has focused primarily on war, security, conflict resolution and the prevention of armed violence. This article brings these fields together by examining how victimological knowledge can contribute to positive and sustainable peace in Western and non-Western contexts. Drawing on victimology, restorative justice, transitional justice and peace studies, it develops a conceptual framework connecting victimisation with recognition, safety, truth, accountability, reparation, recovery, victim agency, institutional reform and guarantees of non-recurrence. Particular attention is given to Jan J. M. van Dijk’s contributions to making hidden victimisation visible, challenging passive constructions of victimhood and recognising victims as rights-holders and social actors. The article compares Western emphases on individual rights, empirical victimisation research, trauma-informed services, procedural justice and institutional accountability with relational and communal approaches that foreground collective suffering, historical memory, land, spirituality, social responsibility and the restoration of relationships. South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission and Rwanda’s Gacaca courts are examined to illustrate both the possibilities and risks of culturally embedded justice and reconciliation. These cases demonstrate that truth-telling can support acknowledgement and reconstruction but may also expose victims to insecurity, coercion or retraumatisation. The article further argues that victimisation must be addressed across individual, family, community, intergroup, institutional and historical-structural levels. Treating individual trauma without transforming discriminatory institutions, unequal power relationships and narratives that legitimise revenge may relieve suffering while leaving conditions for renewed violence intact. It concludes by proposing a global victimology of peace: an empirically grounded, culturally pluralistic and victim-informed approach that regards victims as participants and agents in justice, social reconstruction and the prevention of future victimisation.