Post-Communist Transitional Justice in Albania

Written by Robert C. Austin and Jonathan Ellison, this article appeared on the second issue of Vol. 22 of East European Politics & Societies in the spring of 2008.
 
The article provides a detailed and informative account of the transitional justice process in Albania and examines the logic behind the initiation of lustration process. Describing the accurate historical context of the country’s communist past, the authors explain the factors that prevented the successful implementation of the post-communist transitional justice in Albania, such as its political culture, the impact of the communist regime, and most importantly, the lack of political will from Albanian political leadership to break away from its communist past. A pioneer in initiating transitional justice laws in the Balkans in the early nineties, Albania failed to successfully implement them, as the leadership saw the lustration process as a political means to crush the opposition and consolidate its power.
 
The article explains that transitional justice process in Albania became highly politicized and was used by politicians for political gains, which ultimately led to loss of trust from general public failing to detach the Albanian political scene from its communist past.