Francesca Lessa
Biographic Data
| ID | 1115728 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Francesca Lessa |
| GIVEN NAMES | Francesca |
| FAMILY NAME | Lessa |
| SIGNATURE | LESSA F |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Oxford |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-1029-1628 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 15 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 25 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 14 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 1 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2011 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 3 |
Archives and Algorithms: The Plancondor.org Experience and the Human Rights Potential of New Technologies
∞ This article explores the transformative role of new technologies in documenting human rights violations. While much has been written about the promise of new tools in amplifying truth seeking and memorialization, this article examines how technologies are reshaping three key stages of documentation: data collection, analysis and visualization. Grounded in the authors’ experience building the plancondor.org platform, the article offers a reflec…
No Safe Haven: Operation Condor and Transnational Repression in South America
Transnational repression, i.e., the deliberate targeting of refugees and dissidents by states across borders, is a relatively understudied subject in international relations. This article analyzes why states act together to persecute political opponents abroad and explains variations in such practices. It proposes a theory of cooperation in transnational repression and uses the case study of Operation Condor in the 1970s to test it. Through Opera…
The Condor Trials: Transnational Repression and Human Rights in South America
Remnants of Truth: The Role of Archives in Human Rights Trials for Operation Condor
Since General Augusto Pinochet’s detention in 1998, an unprecedented number of human rights trials has taken place across Latin America. The main source of evidence employed in these proceedings are victims’ testimonies: in fact, records documenting human rights violations are generally unavailable, having either been destroyed or hidden. When archives do exist, they do not usually identify individual perpetrators or victims, nor do they directly…
Operation Condor on Trial: Justice for Transnational Human Rights Crimes in South America
In May 2016, an Argentine federal court concluded a momentous trial, convicting 15 defendants of illegal kidnappings and torture committed against over 100 victims of Operation Condor, and ofasociación ilícita('illicit association': conspiracy to commit a criminal offence) to perpetrate these violations. Operation Condor was the codename given to a continent-wide covert operation devised in the 1970s by South American regimes to eliminate hundred…
Justice beyond Borders: The Operation Condor Trial and Accountability for Transnational Crimes in South America
Journal Article Justice beyond Borders: The Operation Condor Trial and Accountability for Transnational Crimes in South America Get access Francesca Lessa Francesca Lessa * * Post-Doctoral Research Officer, Latin American Centre, University of Oxford, UK; International Consultant, Observatorio Luz Ibarburu, Uruguay; and Affiliate Member, Latin American Transitional Justice Network. Email: [email protected] Search for other works by thi…
From Blanket Impunity to Judicial Opening(s): H.I.J.O.S. and Memory Making in Postdictatorship Argentina (2005-2012)
With the increasing opportunities for justice ushered in by the repeal of the Full Stop and Due Obedience laws in 2005, the struggles for memory and justice by Argentina's H.I.J.O.S. (Sons and Daughters for Identity and Justice against Forgetting and Silence) have shifted focus. Pre-2005, the organization used escraches (public demonstrations in which the perpetrators of human rights violations are "outed") to respond to the problem of top-down i…
Respuesta a Carmen Pérez y Vincent Druliolle. Memory and Transitional Justice in Argentina and Uruguay. Against Impunity
.-
Overcoming Impunity: Pathways to Accountability in Latin America
How and why do democratic governments overcome amnesty laws and cultures of impunity to allow for trials for past human rights violations? To confront this question, we first identify widespread agreement on four key factors associated with the degree of accountability in a new democracy: civil society demand, domestic judicial leadership, the absence of veto players and international pressure. We then outline the interactions among those factors…
Memory and Transitional Justice in Argentina and Uruguay: Against Impunity
Conclusion
This book began with the moving story of Simón; it now ends with an extract from a letter written by Juan Gelman in April 1995 when he was still looking for his missing grandchild. This touching extract painfully captures the dreams and the sorrows that Juan had to live through until he was eventually reunited with Macarena in 2000. Macarena—born of Argentine parents and now living in Montevideo—embodies the horrors of the dictatorships of Argent…
Civil Society and the Resurgent Struggle against Impunity in Uruguay (1986-2012)
With the approval on 27 October 2011 of Law 18.831, the Uruguayan parliament voted to overturn the 1986 Expiry Law, a law long criticized by human rights advocates because it prevented the criminal prosecution of human rights abuses committed during the country’s military dictatorship (1973–1985). By overturning what many considered the lynchpin of institutionalized impunity in Uruguay, the new law restores the state’s capacity to prosecute human…
Amnesty in the Age of Human Rights Accountability: Comparative and International Perspectives
Barriers to Justice: The Ley de Caducidad and Impunity in Uruguay
In 1974, Uruguayan senator Zelmar Michelini traveled to Rome to denounce the human rights abuses perpetrated by the Uruguayan dictatorship before the Russell Tribunal. Torture, incarceration, and terror had become commonplace in this tiny South American country – previously a land of relative peace, democracy, and freedom. Senator Michelini paid the ultimate price for exposing internationally the Uruguayan regime and its human rights repression w…
Beyond Transitional Justice: Exploring Continuities in Human Rights Abuses in Argentina between 1976 and 2010
The article constitutes an initial attempt to combine the insights provided by the disciplines of Transitional Justice (TJ) and human rights, and it originates from a concern with the current situation of human rights in Argentina. Although there have been significant improvements since democratization in the mid-1980s, conditions favouring human rights abuses still persist. In particular, specific human rights abuses (torture, disappearances, an…
Beyond Transitional Justice: Exploring Continuities in Human Rights Abuses in Argentina between 1976 and 2010
The article constitutes an initial attempt to combine the insights provided by the disciplines of Transitional Justice (TJ) and human rights, and it originates from a concern with the current situation of human rights in Argentina. Although there have been significant improvements since democratization in the mid-1980s, conditions favouring human rights abuses still persist. In particular, specific human rights abuses (torture, disappearances, an…
Operation Condor on Trial: Justice for Transnational Human Rights Crimes in South America
In May 2016, an Argentine federal court concluded a momentous trial, convicting 15 defendants of illegal kidnappings and torture committed against over 100 victims of Operation Condor, and ofasociación ilícita('illicit association': conspiracy to commit a criminal offence) to perpetrate these violations. Operation Condor was the codename given to a continent-wide covert operation devised in the 1970s by South American regimes to eliminate hundred…
Overcoming Impunity: Pathways to Accountability in Latin America
How and why do democratic governments overcome amnesty laws and cultures of impunity to allow for trials for past human rights violations? To confront this question, we first identify widespread agreement on four key factors associated with the degree of accountability in a new democracy: civil society demand, domestic judicial leadership, the absence of veto players and international pressure. We then outline the interactions among those factors…
No Safe Haven: Operation Condor and Transnational Repression in South America
Transnational repression, i.e., the deliberate targeting of refugees and dissidents by states across borders, is a relatively understudied subject in international relations. This article analyzes why states act together to persecute political opponents abroad and explains variations in such practices. It proposes a theory of cooperation in transnational repression and uses the case study of Operation Condor in the 1970s to test it. Through Opera…
Justice beyond Borders: The Operation Condor Trial and Accountability for Transnational Crimes in South America
Journal Article Justice beyond Borders: The Operation Condor Trial and Accountability for Transnational Crimes in South America Get access Francesca Lessa Francesca Lessa * * Post-Doctoral Research Officer, Latin American Centre, University of Oxford, UK; International Consultant, Observatorio Luz Ibarburu, Uruguay; and Affiliate Member, Latin American Transitional Justice Network. Email: [email protected] Search for other works by thi…
From Blanket Impunity to Judicial Opening(s): H.I.J.O.S. and Memory Making in Postdictatorship Argentina (2005-2012)
With the increasing opportunities for justice ushered in by the repeal of the Full Stop and Due Obedience laws in 2005, the struggles for memory and justice by Argentina's H.I.J.O.S. (Sons and Daughters for Identity and Justice against Forgetting and Silence) have shifted focus. Pre-2005, the organization used escraches (public demonstrations in which the perpetrators of human rights violations are "outed") to respond to the problem of top-down i…
Civil Society and the Resurgent Struggle against Impunity in Uruguay (1986-2012)
With the approval on 27 October 2011 of Law 18.831, the Uruguayan parliament voted to overturn the 1986 Expiry Law, a law long criticized by human rights advocates because it prevented the criminal prosecution of human rights abuses committed during the country’s military dictatorship (1973–1985). By overturning what many considered the lynchpin of institutionalized impunity in Uruguay, the new law restores the state’s capacity to prosecute human…
Beyond Transitional Justice: Exploring Continuities in Human Rights Abuses in Argentina between 1976 and 2010
The article constitutes an initial attempt to combine the insights provided by the disciplines of Transitional Justice (TJ) and human rights, and it originates from a concern with the current situation of human rights in Argentina. Although there have been significant improvements since democratization in the mid-1980s, conditions favouring human rights abuses still persist. In particular, specific human rights abuses (torture, disappearances, an…
Amnesty in the Age of Human Rights Accountability: Comparative and International Perspectives
Barriers to Justice: The Ley de Caducidad and Impunity in Uruguay
In 1974, Uruguayan senator Zelmar Michelini traveled to Rome to denounce the human rights abuses perpetrated by the Uruguayan dictatorship before the Russell Tribunal. Torture, incarceration, and terror had become commonplace in this tiny South American country – previously a land of relative peace, democracy, and freedom. Senator Michelini paid the ultimate price for exposing internationally the Uruguayan regime and its human rights repression w…
Memory and Transitional Justice in Argentina and Uruguay: Against Impunity
Conclusion
This book began with the moving story of Simón; it now ends with an extract from a letter written by Juan Gelman in April 1995 when he was still looking for his missing grandchild. This touching extract painfully captures the dreams and the sorrows that Juan had to live through until he was eventually reunited with Macarena in 2000. Macarena—born of Argentine parents and now living in Montevideo—embodies the horrors of the dictatorships of Argent…
Civil Society and the Resurgent Struggle against Impunity in Uruguay (1986-2012)
With the approval on 27 October 2011 of Law 18.831, the Uruguayan parliament voted to overturn the 1986 Expiry Law, a law long criticized by human rights advocates because it prevented the criminal prosecution of human rights abuses committed during the country’s military dictatorship (1973–1985). By overturning what many considered the lynchpin of institutionalized impunity in Uruguay, the new law restores the state’s capacity to prosecute human…
Respuesta a Carmen Pérez y Vincent Druliolle. Memory and Transitional Justice in Argentina and Uruguay. Against Impunity
.-
Overcoming Impunity: Pathways to Accountability in Latin America
How and why do democratic governments overcome amnesty laws and cultures of impunity to allow for trials for past human rights violations? To confront this question, we first identify widespread agreement on four key factors associated with the degree of accountability in a new democracy: civil society demand, domestic judicial leadership, the absence of veto players and international pressure. We then outline the interactions among those factors…
Justice beyond Borders: The Operation Condor Trial and Accountability for Transnational Crimes in South America
Journal Article Justice beyond Borders: The Operation Condor Trial and Accountability for Transnational Crimes in South America Get access Francesca Lessa Francesca Lessa * * Post-Doctoral Research Officer, Latin American Centre, University of Oxford, UK; International Consultant, Observatorio Luz Ibarburu, Uruguay; and Affiliate Member, Latin American Transitional Justice Network. Email: [email protected] Search for other works by thi…
From Blanket Impunity to Judicial Opening(s): H.I.J.O.S. and Memory Making in Postdictatorship Argentina (2005-2012)
With the increasing opportunities for justice ushered in by the repeal of the Full Stop and Due Obedience laws in 2005, the struggles for memory and justice by Argentina's H.I.J.O.S. (Sons and Daughters for Identity and Justice against Forgetting and Silence) have shifted focus. Pre-2005, the organization used escraches (public demonstrations in which the perpetrators of human rights violations are "outed") to respond to the problem of top-down i…
Operation Condor on Trial: Justice for Transnational Human Rights Crimes in South America
In May 2016, an Argentine federal court concluded a momentous trial, convicting 15 defendants of illegal kidnappings and torture committed against over 100 victims of Operation Condor, and ofasociación ilícita('illicit association': conspiracy to commit a criminal offence) to perpetrate these violations. Operation Condor was the codename given to a continent-wide covert operation devised in the 1970s by South American regimes to eliminate hundred…
Remnants of Truth: The Role of Archives in Human Rights Trials for Operation Condor
Since General Augusto Pinochet’s detention in 1998, an unprecedented number of human rights trials has taken place across Latin America. The main source of evidence employed in these proceedings are victims’ testimonies: in fact, records documenting human rights violations are generally unavailable, having either been destroyed or hidden. When archives do exist, they do not usually identify individual perpetrators or victims, nor do they directly…
The Condor Trials: Transnational Repression and Human Rights in South America
No Safe Haven: Operation Condor and Transnational Repression in South America
Transnational repression, i.e., the deliberate targeting of refugees and dissidents by states across borders, is a relatively understudied subject in international relations. This article analyzes why states act together to persecute political opponents abroad and explains variations in such practices. It proposes a theory of cooperation in transnational repression and uses the case study of Operation Condor in the 1970s to test it. Through Opera…
Archives and Algorithms: The Plancondor.org Experience and the Human Rights Potential of New Technologies
∞ This article explores the transformative role of new technologies in documenting human rights violations. While much has been written about the promise of new tools in amplifying truth seeking and memorialization, this article examines how technologies are reshaping three key stages of documentation: data collection, analysis and visualization. Grounded in the authors’ experience building the plancondor.org platform, the article offers a reflec…
Political science (12 works) · Law (8 works) · Sociology (8 works) · Criminology (7 works) · Economic Justice (7 works) · Human rights (7 works) · Impunity (6 works) · Accountability (5 works) · Democracy (5 works) · Historical and Contemporary Political Dynamics (5 works)