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    From the ‘Long War’ to the ‘Long Peace’: An introduction to the special edition


    Coulter, Colin and Shirlow, Peter (2019) From the ‘Long War’ to the ‘Long Peace’: An introduction to the special edition. Capital and Class, 43 (1). pp. 3-21. ISSN 0309-8168

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    Abstract

    In this introduction, we set out to provide the appropriate historical context for the nine essays that follow. The article documents all of the tortuous course that the Northern Irish peace process has taken over the last two decades, but its principal focus falls on the period in which the previously unlikely pairing of Sinn Féin and the Democratic Unionist Party agreed to share power at Stormont. While the coalition partners were often at odds over ethno-national issues such flags and parades, they frequently found common cause when it came to the introduction of distinctly neoliberal social and economic strategies. The decade in which the two parties shared office seemed to offer the prospect, finally, of stable government in Northern Ireland. At the beginning of 2017, however, the tensions between Sinn Féin and the Democratic Unionists became insurmountable and led to the Stormont institutions being mothballed for a fifth time. Although often attributed to the introduction of a controversial green energy scheme in the six counties, the collapse of the power sharing executive owes its origins rather more to seismic political developments elsewhere in the United Kingdom. The outcome of the Brexit referendum has meant that Northern Ireland is now at the centre of a political storm that threatens/promises to usher in an era of radical constitutional change for the region.

    Item Type: Article
    Keywords: long war; long peace; introduction; special edition;
    Academic Unit: Faculty of Social Sciences > Sociology
    Item ID: 11949
    Identification Number: https://doi.org/10.1177/0309816818818084
    Depositing User: Colin Coulter
    Date Deposited: 02 Dec 2019 15:56
    Journal or Publication Title: Capital and Class
    Publisher: Sage
    Refereed: Yes
    URI:
    Use Licence: This item is available under a Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial Share Alike Licence (CC BY-NC-SA). Details of this licence are available here

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