The
paper attempts to throw light on the dynamic inter-relationships which
influence the process of peace-building and how dominant hegemonic discourses
and policy agendas can both challenge and be challenged by that process.
It focuses
on the experience of grass roots community-based
approaches to conflict, transformation and peace-building in Catholic/nationalist
areas of the north of Ireland, and the interaction between these and hegemonic
discourses over the course of the conflict and the ‘peace process’. It covers both historical and contemporary
developments arguing that both conflict and peace-building should be viewed as
part of the same process, a process within which actors contest for power,
change and the acceptance of ideas and end goals.
Conflict
over access to power in the north of Ireland has, throughout its existence, been
influenced by major ethno-religious divisions in the society and differing
relationships between ethno-religious groups, the state, and the economy. Grass-roots community responses to this
conflict have alternated between the uses of violence, unarmed direct action
campaigning and tension-reduction strategies. The response of the state has alternated
between viewing community groups as something positive, providing a mediating
role, during the days of the old Community Relations Commission (1969-74), and
as a potential threat, during the political vetting era of the 1980s, for
example. Community groups themselves could view the state and its forces as
existing somewhere on a continuum between ‘enemy’ or ‘friend’ based on their
view of the conflict, time and event. Indeed
the relationship between groups and state has often been dynamic, constantly
changing depending on the form or extent of intervention on either side.
With
the onset of the peace process in the early 1990s, community-based groups often
became incorporated into state and EU strategy geared towards conflict
transformation and peace-building as the dominant discourse on the causes and
solutions began to change yet again. As an uncertain ‘peace’ appears to be
emerging ongoing debates around concepts of weak community infrastructure, the
promotion of ’good relations’ and the pursuit of equality, social justice and
human rights nonetheless continue to reflect different ideas about process and end
goals and further challenges to the contemporary dominant discourse and policy
agenda.
http://www.esf.org/activities/esf-conferences/details/2012/confdetail387/387-preliminary-programme.html#c92541