When the Action Alliance Unraveling the NSU Complex held its first self-organized tribunal at Schauspiel Köln in May 2017 - parallel to the official trial in Munich - it caused considerable confusion. Was this a theater, a conference, or an actual tribunal? And if it was a real tribunal, why did it have so little in common with legalistic people's tribunals like the famous Russell Tribunals or the proceedings of the Permanent Peoples' Tribunal?

According to Madlyn Sauer, the NSU tribunals cannot be fully understood through the legalistic framework of retributive justice because they do not dispense justice in the name of law. Instead, they enact justice as a social practice through recognition, remembrance, and community building. In her lecture, Sauer traces these aspects by reflecting on the first NSU tribunal in Cologne.