With socio-economic development a crucial priority in Africa, transitional justice practitioners are asking whether methods of addressing past human rights abuses can also help tackle development issues. ICTJ, in conjunction with the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA), explored this question during a workshop on Transitional Justice and Development in Cape Town, where participants concluded that transitional justice mechanisms need to be shaped by the socio-economic and political contexts in which human rights violations took place if the justice measures are to be relevant to the public.