See also: Memory

The duty to remember is the Owe which the memory would have a State to maintain the sufferings undergone in the past by certain categories of the population, especially when it carries the Responsabilité from there. He is opposed to the duty Amnistie. He is the subject of debates between associations representing the populations victims and the Historien S. the duty to remember found an official recognition in certain cases through official declarations and legal texts (mémorielles Lois) starting from the end of the 20th century.

The object of the duty to remember

The duty to remember initially consists in recognizing the reality of the state of Victime and/or persecutions undergone by Population S and them Environnement; for reasons ethical S, to meet the needs for the History, and because the Psychologie showed how much this recognition was essential with the Résilience, for the rebuilding of the individuals and the companies after the Crise S, so that these crises do not generate of them others. It supposes that the groups and the State S analyze and thus recognize their Responsabilité S, or that of the Nation, in these major persecutions or crises. One of the difficulties is that the Victime S of serious acts have often initially, even all them Vie of the difficulties of speaking about what they lived, without for all this the traumatism, unvoiced comment or deeply driven back, can be really forgotten or not to have consequences sociopsychologic durable, conscious and Inconsciente S, individual and collective.

Associations and representatives of the Population S concerned estimate that an official recognition of the last crimes of the State, even a request for forgiveness, allows the populations victims or their descendants to better find their place within the nation. In particular, the Racism and the current Discrimination S would be partly due to permanence in the national mentality of old feelings of superiority. Moreover, the memory of the last events should make it possible to avoid repeating them in the future.

The Historien S recognize the need for the memory, but some warn against the abuse a “injunction to remember”. The collective and official duty of memory does not have, according to them, to replace the personal work of Mémoire, nor to become a “moralizing short cut” which would elude “the extreme complexity of the questions” that it raises.

For example, the Antisémitisme can have religious roots in the Histoire, in the form of in particular Christian antijudaïsme, that it is necessary to deepen. Moreover, “the history is not the memory”: one should not confuse the memory of the Victime S, which results from a subjective vision and takes an eigenvalue with each one, with the critical work of the historian who aims at releasing a common truth.

Application of the duty to remember

The duty to remember can as well as take the form of official declarations of texts of Loi. It can also apply within the framework of the programs of Enseignement.

France

The duty to remember was initially called upon in France to require of the nation to recognize the Responsabilité for the French State (Mode of Vichy) in persecutions and the Déportation of the Juif S during the Second world war, which led to the Shoah. It is in 1993 that the president Mitterrand founded one Day national of commemoration of racist persecutions and Antisémite S. Two years later, the July 16th 1995, the president Chirac recognized the responsibility for the State in anti-Jewish persecutions of the period 1940 - 1944. Hitherto, the theory gaullienne, while refusing to admit the legality of the mode of the marshal Pétain, considered that the France was not responsible for its acts. This recognition was confirmed by the Prime Ministers Lionel Jospin and Jean-Pierre Raffarin.

Meanwhile, the law of July 13rd 1990, known as Law Gayssot, made an offense of the dispute of the existence of the crimes against humanity. Then the law of January 29th 2001 recognized the genocide officially Armenians by the Turkish forces in 1915. Lastly, by the Law Taubira of May 21st 2001, France recognized like Crimes against humanity the Traite négrière and the Esclavage. She imposes on the school programs and the research programs to grant on these subjects “the consequent place (sic) that they deserve”, not disputed by researchers who estimate that the law cannot define the framework of the historical research. Lastly, the law Taubira led to the institution in 2006 of a day commemorating slavery and its abolition. This day is fixed at the May 10th, date of adoption of the law.

The SNCF was directly concerned with the Déportation of the Juif S during the Second world war, and required that a book be written to clear up the role of the company during the occupation (see bibliography of the history of the SNCF during the occupation).

Another example, the law of May 21st, 2001, known as law Taubira and the commemoration of May 10th take part - to differing degree - in the duty to remember of the draft négrière. This example shows well that the duty to remember is not only in connection with the alive populations but necessary to the generations which directly did not know oppression. It contributes so that populations start to feel to exist, released from complex of inferiority d' for the ones and superiority for the others and makes it possible to adapt its history and its culture, to make a value of it and not to live it like a shame or to be an object of conflict. This duty to remember allows also the transmission of the knowledge and roof the vacuums.

Austria

The Austrian Service in memory of the holocaust, created in 1991-1992, is an alternative to the military service.

The Recherche of the Roots (or Spurensuche in German) is a project of exchange which was initiated by the République of Austria in 1994. 15 young people Israéliens having Austrian ancestors are thus invited to remain in Austria during 10 days for one to carry out project with 15 young Austrians. They thus try to learn what arrived at their ancestors, visiting the places where they lived and seeking to find their traces.

Although the stress of the project is laid on the research of the family roots the aspect to create Israeli friendships austro- is important also, because the young people visit cities typical Austrian and have also enough spare time with their own employment.

The goal of this project is to establish better relations between the two countries and to discover L `Austria by the sight of the others. (Articles in Wikipedia on this service, in, in and in)

References