CURTAIN CALL AT CLOSING: THE MULTI-DIMENSIONAL LEGACY OF THE INTERNATIONAL CRIMINAL TRIBUNAL FOR RWANDA

The mandate of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) to prosecute those most responsible for the 1994 Rwandan genocide is drawing to a close after nearly two decades. This Comment analyzes the substantive, structural, memorial, and symbolic inheritance that the ICTR bequeaths to international criminal law. This unique area of international law is not only judge-made, but also developed through the norms and conventions of states, alongside the rich participation of nongovernmental actors and international policy-making agencies that define what norms become law. Given this reality, the multi-dimensional legacy of the Tribunal is fundamentally important in determining the forward movement of an area of law where such extra-legal influences are indeterminately determinative. This Comment argues that, for all of the Tribunal's flaws, and despite being originally set forth as a very specific type of criminal justice mechanism with a limited mandate and narrow jurisdiction, the ICTR has managed to further the field of international human rights through its perhaps unexpected contributions to memory, imagination, and hope at the heart of human rights.