The ‘Us’ in Trust: Who Trusts Northern Ireland’s Political Institutions and Actors?

This article examines levels of interest and trust among the public in relation to Northern Ireland's newly established political institutions and actors, through an analysis of the results of the 2007 Northern Ireland Life and Times Survey (NILT). It is important to reveal the specific groups of people with the highest levels of political disenchantment, particularly in the context of the longer-term stability of the Northern Ireland Assembly and Executive, since the willingness of the electorate to have faith and trust in the workability of these political institutions and in the various political actors in whose custody they lie is considered vital.

Political Discourse and Conflict Resolution:Debating peace in Northern Ireland

This book offers new insights into the close relationship between political discourses and conflict resolution through critical analysis of the role of discursive change in a peace process.

Just as a peace process has many dimensions and stakeholders, so the discourses considered here come from a wide range of sources and actors. The book contains in-depth analyses of official discourses used to present the peace process, the discourses of political party leaders engaging (or otherwise) with it, the discourses of community-level activists responding to it, and the discourses of the media and the academy commenting on it. These discourses reflect varying levels of support for the peace process – from obstruction to promotion – and the role of language in moving across this spectrum according to issue and occasion. Common to all these analyses is the conviction that the language used by political protagonists and cultural stakeholders has a profound effect on progression towards peace.

Bringing together leading experts on Northern Ireland’s peace process from a range of academic disciplines, including political science, sociology, linguistics, history, geography, law, and peace studies, this book offers new insights into the discursive dynamics of violent political conflict and its resolution.

Between Political Folklore and National Populism: Poles Apart?

This chapter offers a wry look at the changing position of Northern Ireland in Europe. From the anomaly of ‘joining Europe’ as part of the UK in 1973 just as ‘The Troubles’ confirmed Northern Ireland as ‘a place apart’, to the twenty first century experience of peace process and the large scale influx of migrant workers from Poland and elsewhere.