Is parrhesia a need of perpetrators' descendents?

The paper focuses on the interplay between generational transitions, social amnesia and mature reconciliation processes. It explores the way different narratives of collective memories convey social representations of the ingroup history and address psycho-social needs of former ennemies\' descendents -- needs that are at the core of reconciliation processes. In particular it tests the idea that parrhesia could be a crucial need not only for victims, but also for perpetrators\' descendents. An exploratory research was conducted to address this problem. We chose the case of Italian war crimes during the invasion of Ethiopia (1935-36). Due to a widespread social amnesia, these crimes are still hidden to the vaste majority of descendants of the group of the perpetrators. Moreover, this knowledge is deeply incompatible with a widespread national myth (the so-called myth of \'Italians as good fellows\' or Italiani brava gente: cfr. Del Boca, 1995), representing Italian soldiers as highly “humane” and unused to any cruelty . We hypothesised that, if compared to evasive narratives, detailed narratives (based on reification arguments) of these war crimes will be more apt to clarify unwanted self-images of the in-group as perpetrator to the new generation and to promote more restorative behaviours. One-hundred and three young Italian participants read detailed or evasive narratives of war crimes committed during the invasion of Ethiopia by the Italian army. Results indicate that detailed narratives have more impact on participants, in terms of memory, emotions and restorative behaviours. Participants’ identification with the in-group and their level of agreement with the shared myth of ‘Italians as good fellows’ also show significant effects. Our exploratory results suggest that, when the in-group is responsible for violence and crimes, the social sharing of an impartial truth - transmitted trough detailed and reified arguments- seems to be a necessary step towards mature intergroup reconciliation. Links between these results and the more general problem of parrhesia as a basic need not only for victims but also for perpetrators\' descendents will be discussed.