Just another battleground: resisting courtroom historiography in the extraordinary chambers in the courts of Cambodia

Abstract

This paper examines how Case 002/01 in the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia emerges as a space within which the roles of history and international justice are contested. It focuses on how the criminal trial appear to fortify the hegemony of some contested historical narrative over others in dealing with the past. The paper introduces, discusses, and analyzes the ‘strategy of rupture’ as coined by Jacques Vergès, and the ways in which this legal defense has been applied in practice not only to resist the Tribunal in itself, but also historical knowledge-making in the Cambodian transitional justice process.