External Reports

External Reports refer to a variety of documents relating to specific Case Studies, as well as related publications in the field of history and memory. If you have suggestions or believe some essential reports are missing, please contact us at contestedhistories@euroclio.eu.

Unstable Pedestals – Controversial monuments in public spaces

Wankele Sokkels - Omstreden Monumenten in de Openbare Ruimte

By Koninklijke Nederlandse Akademie van Wetenschappen

Public monuments can evoke strong emotions. In recent years, under the influence of movements such as Black Lives Matter, social awareness and the growth of historical knowledge, our views have changed radically. On occasions past heroes of have been pulled from their pedestals, but removing statues does not erase history. An Academy committee is going to advise on how we should deal with controversial heritage and how we can best conduct the related debate. Read More

Russia

Crimes Against History

By FIDH June 2021

In this report, FIDH analyses the human rights situation of historians, NGOs, activists, journalists, and other history producers working on historical memory of the Soviet past in Russia. We do so through the prism of what historian Antoon De Baets calls “crimes against history,” a term denoting a range of extreme abuses of history committed by authoritarian and totalitarian regimes. This term has a particular pertinence to Russia, where State authorities have accorded an increasingly central role to historical memory… Read More

Report of the Special Committee to Review Historical Inequalities in Commemoration

By The Commonwealth War Graves Commission 2021

In December 2019, the Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC) appointed a Special Committee to probe the early history of the Imperial War Graves Commission (IWGC) to identify inequalities in the way the organisation commemorated the dead of the British Empire from the two world wars. Where such inequalities were identified, it was asked to produce a set of recommendations that might assist and guide the present-day CWGC in responding to them. Read More

UNGEGN Strategic Plan and Programme of Work 2021-2029

By UNGEGN Extended Bureau May 2021

The ‘new’ United Nations Group of Experts on Geographical Names (UNGEGN) was established by the United Nations Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) resolution 20/18/2 in November 2017, replacing both the United Nations five-yearly Conferences on the Standardization of Geographical Names and the former UNGEGN. This Strategic Plan presents the vision, values and aims of UNGEGN, together with the following five strategies and their collective alignment to the relevant goals of the United Nations 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development: 1. Technical… Read More

Past Due

Report and Recommendations of the LA Mayor's Office Civic Memory Working Group

By Los Angeles Mayor’s Office Civic Memory Working Group April 2021

Los Angeles has long been celebrated—and caricatured—as a “city of the future.” Does it follow that this sensibility invites or even requires minimal attention to the past? Given recent and ongoing upheavals across the United States regarding commemorative monuments, statues, and the like—underpinned by increasingly widespread and resonant cries for social justice—the conclusions of the Civic Memory Working Group and its subcommittees collected in this report may act as a corrective to metropolitan amnesia and a guide for public memorialization… Read More

Handbook on the Prevention and Resolution of Self-Determination Conflicts

By Permanent Mission of the Principality of Liechtenstein to the United Nations & Liechtenstein Institute on Self-Determination March 2021

The Handbook on the Prevention and Resolution of Self-Determination Conflicts is the latest product of a long and fruitful collaboration between the Mission of Liechtenstein to the United Nations, New York, and the Liechtenstein Institute on Self-Determination at Princeton University to assess the relationship of self-determination to conflict. The Handbook includes four case studies: Aceh, Bougainville, Mindanao, and Northern Ireland, in addition to setting out guidelines specifically aimed at those working to prevent and resolve self-determination conflicts. Read More

Getting the Balance Right?

An Inspection of how Effectively the Police Deal with Protests

By Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services 2021

The report is a investigation into how effectively the police manage protests. An assessment is made of the extent to which the police have been using their existing powers effectively, and what steps the Government could take to ensure that the police have the right powers to respond to protests. Read More

Interim Report on the Connections between Colonialism and Properties now in the Care of the National Trust, Including Links with Historic Slavery

By National Trust 2020

The report includes sections on the global slave trades, goods and products of enslaved labour, compensation for slave ownership, abolition and protest, the East India Company, and the British Raj. A factual gazetteer lists the 93 places and collections that have strong historical links to Britain’s colonial past. Read More

Holocaust Memorial Days

An overview of remembrance and education in the OSCE region

By OSCE January 2020

This publication provides information on when, where and how OSCE participating States promote the commemoration and study of the Holocaust, including the genocide of Roma and Sinti, in line with their OSCE commitments. The information was provided via an online questionnaire disseminated by ODIHR to all participating States. Read More

Japan’s Military Sexual Slavery Issue

(The so-called ‘Comfort Women’ Issue)

By Women’s Active Museum on War and Peace (WAM) October 2018

The report discusses Japan’s military sexual slavery in the case of “comfort women”, and how authorities have responded to the demand of taking accountability for the crimes committed. Includes excerpt from survivals as well as other requests and demands of the Women’s Active Museum on War and Peace NGO. Read More