Beyond the endpoint: the report of the Belgian commission on colonial injustice and the wider tapestry of truth initiatives

In recent years, Europe has witnessed a surge of truth initiatives to address the legacy of its colonial past as well as the enduring consequences thereof in the present. In the summer of 2020, Belgium became the first European country to establish a historical (truth) commission to investigate the historical and ongoing injustices related to its history of overseas colonialism. In this article, I analyse the report of the Special Parliamentary Commission on the Socio-Economic Impact of Colonialism in Congo, Rwanda, and Burundi, to assess its contribution to broader debates on accountability and transformative change through the lens of disruptive accounts of the past. Additionally, the article explores Belgium's truth initiatives ecosystem - of which the Commission was part of - to highlight the interplay between official truth-seeking processes and alternative narratives in confronting historical injustices.