A Call to Peace: How Third-Party Actors and Frameworks Impacted the Peace Processes of Northern Ireland and Colombia

The closing chapter concludes the book by summarising the findings of the analysis into forty years of peacemaking and war experience in Northern Ireland and Turkey, and how these might be applied to other ethno-nationalist conflicts in which similar peace processes have been instituted. This chapter discusses the implications of the policies applied in the two specified conflicts for conflict resolution theory more broadly and lays out a framework for further research in the field. It argues that there is a complementarity between three major aspects of conflict resolution processes: backchannel communications, as the unofficial aspect; peace organisations, as the informal and semi-official aspect; and official negotiations, as the official aspect. The conflict resolution processes in these two cases encouraged the conflicting sides to consider talks and to enter into a negotiation process at the pre-negotiation stage. The processes then intended to reach a peace agreement during the negotiation stage. This book has suggested that a peace agreement requires mediation by an independent third party: between the British government and their adversaries, the IRA and the republican movement, in one case, and the Turkish government and their adversaries, the PKK and pro-Kurdish movement in the other.

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Sinn Féin and the IRA

10.3366/edinburgh/9781474420549.001.0001 ◽

2018 ◽

Cited By ~ 4

Author(s):

Mathew Whiting

Keyword(s):

Northern Ireland ◽

Political Institutions ◽

Sinn Fein ◽

Peace Processes ◽

British Rule ◽

Irish Republicanism ◽

The Republic ◽

British State ◽

State Responses

When Sinn Féin and the IRA emerged in Northern Ireland in 1969 they used a combination of revolutionary politics and violence to an effort to overthrow British rule. Today, the IRA is in a state of ‘retirement’, violence is a tactic of the past, and Sinn Féin is a co-ruler of Northern Ireland and an ever growing political player in the Republic of Ireland. This is one of the most startling transformations of a radical violent movement into a peaceful political one in recent times. So what exactly changed within Irish republicanism, what remains the same, and, crucially, what caused these changes? Where existing studies explain the decision to end violence as the product of stalemate or strategic interplay with the British state, this book draws on a wealth of archival material and interviews to argue that moderation was a long-term process of increasing inclusion and contact with political institutions, which gradually extracted moderate concessions from republicanism. Crucially, these concessions did not necessitate republicans forsaking their long-term ethno-national goals. The book also considers the wider implications of Irish republicanism for other cases of separatist conflict, and has significance for the future study of state responses to violent separatism and of comparative peace processes.

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The exit option: mediation and the termination of negotiations in the Northern Ireland conflict

International Journal of Conflict Management ◽

10.1108/10444061311296125 ◽

2013 ◽

Vol 24 (1) ◽

pp. 40-55 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Niall O´ Dochartaigh ◽

Isak Svensson

Keyword(s):

Northern Ireland ◽

Third Party ◽

British Government ◽

Policy Makers ◽

Content Type ◽

Irish Republican Army ◽

Northern Ireland Conflict ◽

Exit Option ◽

Information Advantage ◽

The Uk

PurposeThe purpose of this study is to examine the mediation exit option, which is one of the most important tactics available to any third party mediator.Design/methodology/approachThe paper analyzes a crucial intermediary channel between the Irish Republican Army (hereafter IRA) and the British Government utilizing unique material from the private papers of the intermediary, Brendan Duddy, including diaries that cover periods of intensive communication, extensive interviews with the intermediary and with participants in this communication on both the British Government and Irish Republican sides as well as recently released official papers from the UK National Archives relating to this communication.FindingsThe study reveals how the intermediary channel was used in order to get information, how the third party and the primary parties traded in asymmetries of information, and how the intermediary utilized the information advantage to increase the credibility of his threats of termination.Research limitations/implicationsThe study outlines an avenue for further research on the termination dynamics of mediation.Practical implicationsUnderstanding the conditions for successfully using the exit‐option is vital for policy‐makers, in particular for peace diplomacy efforts in other contexts than the Northern Ireland one.Originality/valueThe paper challenges previous explanations for why threats by mediators to call off further mediation attempts are successful and argues that a mediator can use the parties' informational dependency on him in order to increase his leverage and push the parties towards settlement.

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Unravelling the complexities of poverty in Northern Ireland, a new immigration destination

Absolute Poverty in Europe ◽

10.1332/policypress/9781447341284.003.0010 ◽

2019 ◽

pp. 211-228

Author(s):

Ruth McAreavey

Keyword(s):

Northern Ireland ◽

Empirical Data ◽

Third Party ◽

National Boundaries ◽

Party Support ◽

The Way

This chapter uses migrants’ experiences of poverty in Northern Ireland to consider the way in which poverty is experienced across transnational boundaries. The research draws from empirical data from Northern Ireland, a place which until relatively recently experienced little in-migration. It begins by considering the meaning of poverty and how it is understood transnationally i.e. across national boundaries. The chapter proceeds by showing how migrants shift their framing of poverty according to different circumstances. Poverty is also shown to bring with it physical and emotional vulnerabilities and can cause anxiety, indignity and insecurity for the individuals involved. Finally, the chapter highlights the importance of third party support from the sending or receiving society for overcoming the consequences of poverty.

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The Strengths and Limitations of the Inclusion of Religious Actors in Peace Processes in Northern Ireland and Bosnia and Herzegovina

International Negotiation ◽

10.1163/15718069-24011143 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 24 (1) ◽

pp. 136-163 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Vladimir Kmec ◽

Gladys Ganiel

Keyword(s):

Northern Ireland ◽

Bosnia And Herzegovina ◽

Political Power ◽

Comparative Approach ◽

Theoretical Frameworks ◽

Transition Processes ◽

Grass Roots ◽

Peace Processes ◽

Religious Actors

Abstract This article uses a comparative approach to analyze the strengths and limitations of the inclusion of religious actors in peace and transition processes. It compares the theoretical frameworks of Bercovitch and Kadayifci-Orellana, and Brewer, demonstrating how the first helps us understand the strengths of religious actors, while the second sheds more light on their limitations. An analysis of the involvement of religious actors in the peace processes in Northern Ireland and Bosnia and Herzegovina supports the argument that religious actors are more likely to contribute to peace when they are excluded from Track One negotiations and are active in other modalities of participation: in wider social peace processes at national or grass-roots levels. Religious actors can contribute to peace processes especially if they choose to exclude themselves from Track One negotiations in order to avoid the pitfalls of becoming too closely associated with political power.

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Theories of International Relations and Northern Ireland

10.7228/manchester/9781784995287.001.0001 ◽

2017 ◽

Keyword(s):

Northern Ireland ◽

International Relations ◽

International Organizations ◽

Peace Process ◽

Religious Institutions ◽

Good Friday ◽

Peace Processes ◽

Middle Range ◽

The World

The peace process in Northern Ireland is associated with the signing of the Good Friday or Belfast Agreement, the arduous and lengthy implementation of this Agreement, and the continuing sectarianism in Northern Ireland. Despite the numerous and various studies about this case, no collection of scholarly analysis to date has attempted to assess a wide variety of theories prominent in International Relations (IR) that relate directly to the conflict in Northern Ireland, the peace process, and the challenges to consolidating peace after an agreement. IR scholars have recently written about and debated issues related to paradigms, border settlement and peace, the need to provide security and disarm combatants, the role of agents and ideas, gender and security, transnational movements and actors, the role of religions and religious institutions, the role of regional international organizations, private sector promotion of peace processes, economic aid and peacebuilding, the emergence of complex cooperation even in the world of egoists, and the need for reconciliation in conflict torn societies. How do the theories associated with these issues apply in the context of Northern Ireland’s peace process? Theories of International Relations and Northern Ireland explores primarily middle-range theories of International Relations and examines these theories in the context of the important case of Northern Ireland.

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