Podcast Summary: New Books Network – "Memory Politics After Mass Violence: Attributing Roles in the Memoryscape"

Date: September 27, 2025
Host: Kelly McFall
Guest: Timothy Williams, junior professor at University of the Bundeswehr Munich and 2nd Vice President of the International Association of Genocide Scholars

Episode Overview

This episode features a deep-dive conversation between host Kelly McFall and Timothy Williams, author of Memory Politics After Mass Violence: Attributing Roles in the Memoryscape. Williams’s research interrogates how societies remember mass violence, focusing on the political construction of roles like "perpetrator," "victim," and "hero" within collective memory. Drawing on case studies from Cambodia, Rwanda, and Indonesia, the book investigates how these roles are attributed, what silences or simplifications emerge in national narratives, and why these memory politics matter today.

Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. Timothy Williams’ Research Journey and Motivation

• Academic Background

  • Williams began by studying why individuals participate in genocide, which led him from focusing on perpetrators to exploring how societies construct memories of mass violence.
  • Particularly influenced by fieldwork in Cambodia, noticing perpetrators identifying as victims (02:24).

• Personal and Ethical Engagement

  • As a political scientist, Williams is interested in how societies negotiate meaning around traumatic pasts.
  • Ethical challenges included ensuring safety and sensitivity when conducting fieldwork in politically repressive contexts (12:03, 13:35).

2. Core Concepts Introduced in the Book

• Memoryscape (06:26)

  • The “memoryscape” is likened to a landscape: material and symbolic markers (memorials, museums, commemorative events) manifest the collective memory of mass violence, shaped by perspective and social context.
  • "What I love about the idea of it being a scape like a landscape is that depending on where I look at it from, I will be seeing the same things, but they'll have different meanings to me..." – Williams (07:09)

• Mnemonic Role Attribution (08:26)

  • The process of assigning roles such as perpetrator, victim, hero, or bystander in narratives of the past.
  • Societal and political consequences flow from who is included or excluded from these categories.

• Ambivalence (09:46)

  • Societies can simultaneously hold contradictory memories, maintaining multiple perspectives on the past that may not resolve but coexist without open conflict.
  • This "ambivalence" enables contested memories to exist under the surface of apparent consensus.

3. Thesis of the Book (03:46)

• Williams argues that the significance of past violence lies less in "what actually happened," and more in how the past is mobilized for political goals today:

  "What is relevant about the past is not what actually happened... but what is made of it today. And that any history or any rendition of the past also serves political interests today." — Williams (03:49)

• Debates over memory are deeply political, influencing contemporary legitimacy, transitional justice, and societal healing (04:34).

4. Case Studies in Memory Politics

A. Cambodia

• Two Phases of Memory (15:41)

  • Initial phase (1979-90s): Heavy demonization of Khmer Rouge, memorials displaying skulls and bones, focus on delegitimizing the former regime and legitimizing the new government supported by Vietnam.
  • Later phase (1990s-present): The "win-win" policy by Hun Sen led to widespread reintegration of former Khmer Rouge; narrative shifted to "universal victimhood." High-ranking leaders blamed, majority granted victim status.

  "...from the mid-1990s onwards [there is] universal victimhood where really anyone can be a victim." — Williams (19:45)

• Role of Hun Sen (21:28)

  • Hun Sen, once Khmer Rouge himself, recasts his own and others’ roles: only the very top leaders are blamed; ordinary cadres become victims.

• Selective Silence (23:56)

  • Cambodian memory politics omit other traumatic events: US bombing, earlier civil wars, violence against minorities—all sidelined in favor of a unifying narrative.

• Complexities in Practice

  • Former Khmer Rouge could register as civil parties in the tribunal due to their own suffering (25:57).
  • Public generally accepted this, illustrating "complex political actors" who are both victims and perpetrators (28:17).
  • Assigning blame varies by context and role (e.g., cooks vs. high-level cadres) (30:10).

B. Rwanda

• Ethnicized Attribution (33:04)

  • Hutu widely identified as perpetrators, Tutsi as victims/survivors, reinforcing rigid categories that simplify messy realities.

  "...the groups become very ethnicized beyond the actual context of who actually did what." — Williams (33:08)

• Legal and Political Marginalization

  • Community trials (Gacaca) prosecuted massive numbers, individual guilt blurred into collective guilt (33:40).
  • Other forms of violence (prior civil war, RPF atrocities) excluded from public memory/discussion.
  • The RPF uses its savior status for domestic legitimacy and to neutralize international criticism (36:13).

• Suppression of Alternative Memories

  • Any challenge to official narratives ("genocide ideology" or "denial") is met with harsh repression; even acknowledging Hutu victimhood is dangerous (37:31).

C. Indonesia

• Narrative of Silence and Valorization (38:30)

  • Official narrative: 1965-66 killings are not a genocide but a necessary defense against communism.

  "...violence is valorized, it's legitimized in ways that mean that 65, 66 is a buzzword for threat, for communist agitation..." — Williams (39:26)

  • Political prisoners and their descendants continue to face marginalization; suspicion extends intergenerationally.

• Limits and Contestation

  • Pushes for truth and justice are met with government and militia resistance; memorialization efforts exist only in marginal or coded forms.
  • Digital and cultural spaces (music, art, private commemoration) serve as alternative safe havens for memory work (43:04).

5. Interplay—Local, National, and International Actors

• Local actors sometimes find spaces for nuanced remembrance or quiet support for marginalized voices, working within or around official constraints (44:37, 45:34).
• International actors (tribunals, NGOs, donors) play complex roles: sometimes co-opted, sometimes resisted, sometimes inadvertently complicit in silencing (47:44).

  "In all three cases the international community is important..." — Williams (47:45)

6. Key Takeaways & Broader Lessons

• Centrality of Politics in Memory Work (50:54)
  • No memory project is neutral; narratives are shaped by present-day interests and serve as tools of power and legitimacy.
• Analytical Contribution
  • Focusing on how societies distribute roles of victim, perpetrator, and hero clarifies the political uses of the past.

  "...what we need to look at to understand how the past is made politically relevant today is by looking at the way that roles are attributed and the way that that is framed." — Williams (51:30)

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Cambodia’s Shift:
  "At the beginning, Hun Sen said he'd like to dig a hole and bury the past and forget about it. And he didn't really fulfill that strategy. What instead happened is that responsibility was always pinned on those who were Silkhumor Rouge. And basically in the end, it was only those who were most responsible, only really the highest." — Williams (18:50)

• On Rwanda’s Ethnicization:
  "...it also had the suggestion that really almost anyone within the Hutu population was somehow culpable, not least for not stopping it, stopping the violence." (33:44)

• On Indonesia’s Intergenerational Stigma:
  "...this political categorization is handed down almost like an ethnicity. ...their children are also seen as this danger inherited, the danger of communism." — Williams (40:32)

• On Ambivalence:
  "With these different instances of ambivalence, it allows societies to hold multiple perspectives on the past and specific political interests can be foregrounded in one part of that memory without inherently contradicting other parts..." — Williams (10:57)

• On the Irreducible Politics of Memory:
  "Memory is political, that there isn't any neutral way of remembering the past, even if people agree it's terrible what happened and that it should never happen again." — Williams (50:54)

Timestamps for Key Segments

• Host/Guest Introductions: 01:18 – 02:24
• Williams’ research background: 02:24 – 03:40
• Book’s core thesis: 03:46 – 05:57
• Defining “memoryscape”: 06:26 – 08:18
• Mnemonic role attribution: 08:26 – 09:33
• Ambivalence concept: 09:46 – 11:34
• Fieldwork & ethical challenges: 12:03 – 15:18
• Cambodian memory politics: 15:41 – 23:36
• Discussion of Hun Sen: 21:28 – 23:36
• Silences in Cambodian narrative: 23:56 – 25:33
• Civil party status & complexity: 25:57 – 30:10
• Rwanda case study: 33:04 – 38:06
• Indonesia case study: 38:30 – 44:02
• Local vs. national actors: 44:23 – 47:22
• International influences/interactions: 47:44 – 50:26
• Key takeaways/lessons: 50:54 – 52:07
• Open research questions/future directions: 52:45 – 54:27
• Book recommendations: 54:55 – 56:38
• Upcoming projects: 56:42 – 57:19

Book Recommendations from Timothy Williams (54:55)

• On Rwanda:
  Erin Jesse, Negotiating Genocide in Rwanda
• On Cambodia:
  Julie Benat, The Khmer Rouge Tribunal: Power, Politics and Resistance in Transitional Justice
• On Indonesia:
  Sri La Stary, Waryunningrum, Transitional Justice From State to Civil Society: Democratization in Indonesia
• And his own co-authored work:
  Peace in the Politics of Memory (2024)

Concluding Note

Williams’s work reveals how powerfully memory is manipulated and politicized after atrocity, and how critical the roles of “victim,” “perpetrator,” and “hero” are for shaping both healing and ongoing power struggles. The conversation is rich with comparative insights, unsettling examples, and a call for more nuanced, context-sensitive, and honest engagement with the politics of memory.

For a fuller understanding, the episode is highly recommended, as are the specific scholarly works mentioned above for deeper exploration of the cases discussed.