Abstract
Victim issues have received increasing attention under the ethic of ‘victim-centeredness’ in peace
and conflict studies. Resting on the belief that victim-driven practices are an effective
peacebuilding strategy, scholars have investigated the roles of victims and victimhood in peace
and reconciliation in deeply divided societies. While most researchers focus on victims’ needs and
roles, little research has inquired into the victims’ internal processing of endorsing reconciliation
in the presence of suffering. The conventional approach to victim-centeredness requires a more
nuanced explanation of victims’ perspectives on the value of reconciliation, to more adequately
associate the ethic of victim-centeredness with peacebuilding practices.
Investigating this research gap, this thesis examines how victims interpret their suffering and
perceive themselves as subjects of peace, which produce generative meanings of reconciliation in
the aftermath of political violence in South Korea. The thesis employs the narrative theories of the
self, identity, and meaning, which assert that individuals are narrative selves who compose life
stories based on their identity, which affects the emplotment of storylines and mobilizes meaningmaking
processes. The study focuses on victims’ identity-based narrative processing and its
implications for making sense of the social world after violence. This involves self-recognition and
an acknowledgement of the social value of reconciliation. A qualitative narrative inquiry was
adopted to investigate the autobiographies of eighteen surviving and bereaved family members
of civilian massacres during the Korean War.
The thesis focuses on national, familial, and religious identities. Each identity leads victims to
construct a particular set of storylines, scaffolding their subjective views on violent events and a
life of guilt and suppression. Their perspectives are formed by identity-based autobiographical
reasoning, presenting different mindset and worldviews to make sense of their victimization and
suffering. Self-recognition serves not only to develop images of selfhood, but also to underline
their roles in national history and within their families. Meanings of reconciliation are generated
in concert with this narrative processing. This study found that victim-centred reconciliation is
multi-layered, with both redemptive and practical characteristics. It connects strongly with the
ethics of peace, justice, and historical correction. Reconciliation eventually needs to play a role in
social transformation.