"The problems in Northern Ireland are an inter-group phenomenon. It's a mistake to think that making individual victims happy will bring peace," says Professor Ed Cairns, whose recent research has begun to compare the 'them and us' perceptions of groups living in segregated and mixed areas of Northern Ireland.
The research, which has been presented to the consultation on the controversial Eames/ Bradley proposals into how to deal with the legacy of the Troubles, confirms that people who live in mixed communities have a more complex perception of their own, as well as other people's, identities. "There is a greater tendency for people who live in mixed environments to make a clear distinction between the perpetrators of violence and intimidation and the bulk of the religious group to which they belong. 'They' are not all tarred with the same brush," Professor Cairns explains. "People living in mixed areas are also more likely to acknowledge that members of their own group are not all the same," he adds.
The research, which was conducted by a group of multi-disciplinary experts from the universities of Ulster, Oxford and Sheffield, was part of the recently completed ESRC Identities and Social Action research programme. The findings, which help to endorse the government policy of encouraging desegregation in Northern Ireland, suggest that concrete moves to bring Protestant and Catholic communities into closer contact, both at home and at school, are an essential component in building real peace. "At the moment, what we have is merely an absence of violence," says Professor Cairns, who has been researching conflict and post-conflict in many parts of the world for the past 30 years.
The findings are based on data gathered from focus groups, interviews and a survey conducted in four segregated and mixed Catholic/Protestant working-class estates in market towns. The focus groups were used to identify themes, which were followed up first in individual interviews and then in a survey of 1,948 respondents who were interviewed face-to-face in their own homes.
Residents of mixed communities said they preferred 'mixing', even if they had experiences of sectarian violence and intimidation
The results of the focus groups and interviews suggest that there is a stronger sense of community cohesion and solidarity in segregated communities where there are strong family and social networks. There is also more active support for community organisations in segregated communities than in mixed areas, where such groups are commonly perceived as being politicised or hijacked by sectarian groups.
Paradoxically, residents of mixed communities said they preferred 'mixing', even if they had experiences of sectarian violence and intimidation. One young Catholic interviewee who had previously been chased by masked militants from a Protestant organisation said that he had Protestant neighbours 'who had been brilliant'. In mixed areas such sectarian acts tended to be excused as the actions of a minority, and were not seen as representative of a whole group. Many would agree with the 23 year-old Catholic man who said: "To me there are two types of Protestant and two types of Catholic; Catholics and Protestants who want to get on with their lives, and those who are bitter and want to cause trouble."
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