Countries can apologize too.<\/p>\n
PRI\u2019s The World did a story last night<\/a> on what might be called \u201cthe national apology,\u201d when a government apologizes.<\/p>\n Australia has had a \u201cSorry Day,\u201d May 26, for twenty years, to express its regret for mistreatment of Aboriginal people. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has made several apologies, including just this month to Inuit people<\/a> for their mistreatment by the government, including its mid-century policy on tuberculosis.<\/p>\n The United States government apologized to native Americans in the 1990\u2019s for mis-management of trust funds, but victims had to sue in order to get reparations (see<\/em> Cobel v Salazar).<\/p>\n Although an apology with reparations might seem like the only way to make it effective, Commentator Alison Herrera believes apologies themselves can be \u201cimportant mechanisms\u201d \u2013 if they\u2019re done right. She believes the \u201cright\u201d apology has to be unequivocal; it must take responsibility; it has to be clear what it\u2019s an apology for; and it must be \u201creally public,\u201d ideally involving a lot of people.<\/p>\n She offered the example of Chile, where the president apologized for crimes committed under its former president, Augusto Pinochet, after which the army \u2013 responsible for many of the crimes\u2014also apologized, a turning point for the country.<\/p>\n