This article compares Chile and Spain based on three predominant collective interpretation frameworks of post-dictatorial trajectories (transition, memory, and human rights). This comparison identifies that the union between memory and human rights is typical in Chile since the end of the dictatorship, while in Spain it turns out to be a recent strategic alliance. In both countries the framework of political transition can have encounters with the memory and human rights discourses depending on the conflictive potential of the latter.