Gov/en/Portal:R&D/Innovations:Truth Reconciliation

💡 In simple words: If two people have hurt or distrusted each other in the past, WikiDeal offers a fair way to talk it out, say sorry, and rebuild trust instead of splitting apart.

🎯 In 20 seconds (scientific summary): Commercial Truth & Reconciliation is a proposed process, parallel to Arbitration, for parties whose past disputes created structural distrust. It combines mutual recognition of damages, third-party harm estimation, symbolic compensation such as public acknowledgment, and calibrated preventive measures, facilitated by trusted mediators to restore cooperation.

Origin	🟢 WikiDeal concept
Status	Prototype 1, In testing

Some conflicts do not end when a verdict falls. Two contractors who clashed years ago may still avoid each other, split communities, or duplicate projects out of distrust. The damage is systemic: the whole ecosystem loses when people who could cooperate fragment instead. Commercial Truth & Reconciliation aims to give those users a structured way back to working together, inspired by the restorative logic of truth and reconciliation commissions rather than by punishment alone.

The need: repairing trust, not just settling cases

Imagine two members, Paul and Dora, whose collaboration on a renovation project ended badly two years ago. An arbitration decided who owed what, but they still cannot work in the same User Group, and their friends have taken sides. What is missing is not a ruling; it is a way to acknowledge what happened on both sides and rebuild the relationship. That is the gap this process is designed to fill.

How it is intended to work

The process runs parallel to Arbitration and includes:

• mutual recognition of damages by both parties,
• third-party estimation of harm on each side,
• symbolic compensation, such as a public apology and acknowledgment of wrongs,
• calibrated preventive measures, for example stricter penalties for repeat lapses on deadlines or confidentiality.

The full procedure and facilitator roles are being documented progressively as the platform evolves.

Who does what

• The parties choose to enter the process voluntarily and recognize each other's harm.
• Trusted third-party facilitators mediate, estimate damages and propose measures.
• The community benefits from the outcome: cooperation or merging instead of forks and fragmentation.

Why it matters for the ecosystem

Preventing project forks caused by personal conflicts keeps communities whole, which supports citizen participation (people stay engaged rather than walking away) and lowers costs for everyone (no duplicated infrastructure born of grudges). The approach deliberately avoids blaming individuals: it treats broken trust as a shared condition to repair, with transparency about what happened as the first step.

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Related scientific research

A formal reconciliation process for commercial communities is inspired by the literature on truth commissions, restorative justice and nonviolent communication. The works below are its main documented sources.

• Desmond Tutu (1999), No Future Without Forgiveness, Doubleday: Desmond Tutu on Wikipedia · South African TRC on Wikipedia.
• Priscilla B. Hayner (2011), Unspeakable Truths: Transitional Justice and the Challenge of Truth Commissions, Routledge: publisher page · author page on Wikipedia.
• John Braithwaite (1989), Crime, Shame and Reintegration, Cambridge University Press: doi:10.1017/CBO9780511804618 · reintegrative shaming on Wikipedia.
• Howard Zehr (2002), The Little Book of Restorative Justice, Good Books: author page on Wikipedia · restorative justice on Wikipedia.
• Marshall B. Rosenberg (2003), Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life, PuddleDancer Press: concept and book on Wikipedia.

See also: All innovations · R&D Portal