Launching the Comprehensive Database of Victim-Oriented Empirical Atrocity Research: ‘VICDATA’

Session Submission Type: Roundtable

Abstract

The contemporary news cycle is pervaded by reports of the regular commission of ‘atrocity crimes’ (genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity). Despite this global context and the exponential growth in literature calling for ‘victim-centred’ justice, empirical research into atrocity victimisation is rather limited. Existing research has, moreover, been conducted sporadically, across institutions and disciplines: including victimology, criminology, transitional justice, psychology, and post-conflict and development studies. This has seen research into atrocity victimisation largely overlooked and neglected.

For this reason our consortium is formally launching “VICDATA”, a collaboration between:
The Leuven Institute of Criminology, KU Leuven;
Netherlands Institute for the Study of Crime and Law Enforcement, Amsterdam;
School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London; and
International Network of Victims and Survivors of Serious Human Rights Abuses (INOVAS).
This roundtable will elaborate VICDATA’s development as the first database dedicated to collating empirical publications, projects, and datasets concerned with victims of ‘atrocity crimes’. We explain how the VICDATA team is coding this input, in the interests of providing, by 2026, a publicly accessible internet database of searchable metadata about relevant research. VICDATA will, thus, offer a state-of-the-art understanding of the research sphere, including an idea of ‘what is out there’, ‘what it is about’, ‘who has been working on it’, and ‘how the research has been done’.

Beyond providing a sui generis hub for those seeking to navigate the dynamic research landscape, we outline how the VICDATA repository will provide an online forum for stakeholders, including researchers, students, policy-makers, justice practitioners, donors, civil society actors, and victims, to coalesce and collaborate, allowing them to communicate their expertise; build cross-cutting relationships; and facilitate learning, contact, and connection.

VICDATA will contribute to mainstreaming victim research in post-atrocity contexts, ultimately fostering better understandings of victims and improving post-atrocity justice and assistance mechanisms.

Subtopic

• Topic 5: Social Control and Criminal Justice / Transitional Justice (Atrocity Crimes and Transitional Justice WG)

Chair

• James Henry John Rischbieth, KU Leuven

Discussants

• Stephan Parmentier, KU Leuven

• Mina Rauschenbach, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven