Political apology is a specific type of potentially reconciliatory behaviour. It is almost always an intergroup apology. Transitional justice refers to the transformation of authoritarian regimes and regimes involved in mass human right violations into democracies that overcome such histories and seek social reconciliation and restorative justice.

An apology refers to communications in which offending parties acknowledge responsibility or guilt for an offence and express regret or remorse to an offended party. An apology consists of an expression of remorse or regret (1), expression of responsibility (2), a promise of forbearance (3) and offers of repair.

A political apology is an official apology given by a representative of a state, corporation or another organised group to victims or descendants of victims of injustices committed by the group’s officials or members.

The sender and the recipient of a political apology can be an individual or a group. Apologies often have a bigger effect, even if the apology is one-to-one (i.e. the effect moves on to the rest of the group). Although an apology often contains compensation, this can be interpreted as insulting. There are several requirements of a redress claim:

• A human injustice must have been committed.
• The injustice must have been well-documented.
• The victims must be identifiable as a distinct group.
• The current members of the group must continue to suffer harm.
• The harm must be causally connected to past injustice.

Human injustice refers to the violation or suppression of human rights or fundamental freedoms recognized by international law. A redress can be an apology (1), an apology and compensation (2) and compensation only (3). With reparations, there is an expression of atonement. With settlements, there is no expression of atonement. An apology can be monetary and non-monetary. An apology can also be compensatory (i.e. directed at an individual) or rehabilitative (i.e. directed to a group).

Intergroup apology does not always lead to intergroup forgiveness. Guilt leads to motivation for apology (1), financial reparation (2) and acknowledgement of negative aspects of group history. There is mixed evidence for the link between apology and forgiveness. However, a failure to acknowledge transgressions can breed intergroup conflict in the future.

An apology promotes motivation to forgive but there is a stronger effect for low-identifiers (i.e. people who do not strongly identify with their group). There is also less of a desire to take revenge. People who do not strongly identify with their group are more likely to forgive following an apology.

There is research which suggests that there is no effect of an apology on forgiveness. However, it is possible that the participants in this research felt they were not in the position to forgive. If someone from the in-group states that it is okay to apologize, people are not more likely to forgive.

A transgressor is perceived as having more remorse when this transgressor apologizes. The perceived remorsefulness leads to more forgiveness but only for interpersonal apology and not for intergroup apology. The perception of sincerity appears to be important.

When the victim group assigned high collective guilt to the transgressor group then apology led to forgiveness. This was moderated by high perceived sincerity of the apology. The link between apology and forgiveness appears to weaken over time, likely due to expectations not being met. An apology is not seen as sincere when strategic motives are assumed.

For the victim, apologies represent an acknowledgement of past harm (1), an affirmation of shared moral standards (2), a recalibration of power and status relationships (3), a bestowment of dignity (4), a symbolic gesture of intent for the future (5) and a chance to move forward (6).

An apology typically displays the emotions remorse (1), regret (2), shame (3), guilt (4) and anger (i.e. directed against the in-group) (5). Infrahumanisation refers to the phenomenon that the ingroup is seen as more human than the outgroup. This leads to a tendency to attribute secondary emotions more to in-group than to out-group members (e.g. shame, guilt). However, there is no difference in attribution of primary emotions to out-group members (e.g. happiness, sadness).

There is an intergroup bias in forgiveness. People are more forgiving when the transgressor is part of the ingroup. People are also more likely to forgive when the perpetrator is seen as part of a common, inclusive social category (e.g. human). An attribution of secondary emotions to a group leads to more empathy which leads to greater willingness to forgive.

The outgroups are usually denied the capacity to experience secondary emotions. The more they are denied this capacity, the less likely they are to be forgiven following an intergroup transgression. This means that an apology containing primary emotions is more effective than an apology using secondary emotions.

People trust another group more when there is an apology via primary emotions which leads to more forgiveness. Using a proxy (i.e. in-group member) to deliver an apology is more effective.

The pre-transgression relationship (e.g. history of conflict) between groups is also important for forgiveness. This affects intergroup trust. The cultural distance with the outgroup also affects intergroup trust and thus the effectiveness of apologies on forgiveness.

Process models emphasize the temporal evolution of forgiveness. Apologies and other gestures of reconciliation can lead to future forgiveness after a period of emotional and cognitive processing.

Entity beliefs refer to the belief that personalities do not change. This may make an apology seem empty or meaningless as apologies include a statement of transformation.

Social dominance orientation refers to people’s general orientation to the existence of societal hierarchy. This means that an apology can be seen as restoring power-relations. A high social dominance orientation is associated with less need to apologize.

The exchange theory states that transgressions lead to a disequilibrium in the relationship. Apologies restore equity in the relationship, which leads to a reduced need for additional punishment.

Political conservatism led to a stronger reluctance to apologize. This relationship is mediated by a social dominance orientation and entity beliefs. Political conservatism led to less willingness to forgive after an apology and this relationship was mediated by a social dominance orientation.