the journal of cross border studies in ireland - The Centre for Cross ...

A word from the ChairmanChris Gibson OBEMarch 2010The Centre for Cross Border Studies enters itseleventh year in 2010 in good health. Its work ofpractical, common sense cooperation betweenNorthern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland is asrelevant as ever, whatever the temporary politicalvicissitudes at time of writing. The Taoiseach, BrianChris GibsonCowen, says as much in his interview in this journal.President Mary McAleese clearly agrees with him. Wewere honoured last September when the board, the staff and some key friendsof the Centre were invited to a 10th birthday reception in Aras an Uachtarainby the President who – along with her husband Dr Martin McAleese – has beenone of its strongest supporters. A year ago the fourth Journal of Cross BorderStudies in Ireland - featuring an interview on North-South cooperation withNorthern Ireland First Minister Peter Robinson – was launched in Dublin andBelfast by the Taoiseach and the Head of the Northern Ireland Civil Service,Bruce Robinson, respectively. We have come a long way since Andy Pollakand Mairead Hughes set up shop in two half-decorated rooms in the oldArmagh Infirmary building in September 1999.Despite the economic recession,financial cutbacks in Dublin andcontinuing problems with the DUP-Sinn Fein coalition in Belfast, thepast year has been another story ofnew developments and significantprogress in the areas of North-Southand cross-border research, informationand networking in which the Centrehas taken a lead. Four of the Ireland/Northern Ireland Cross-borderCooperation Observatory (INICCO)projects started in January 2009 with EUINTERREG IVA funding (managed by theSpecial EU Programmes Body) and arenow up and going strong: the Revivingthe Border Region Economy researchproject, led by Dr John Bradley, formerlyof the Economic and Social ResearchInstitute in Dublin, and Professor MichaelBest of the Universities of Cambridgeand Massachusetts (in partnership withInterTradeIreland); the Cross-borderSpatial Planning and Training Network(CroSPlaN), led by the Centre’s sisterorganisation, the International Centrefor Local Regional Development, and itsdirector John Driscoll; the Cross-BorderHospital Services research project, ledby the Centre’s new deputy director,JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.55

The Taoiseach and Dr Chris Gibson at the Dublin launch of the 2009 journalCoolahan, noted that his proudestachievement was his involvement ininitiating and developing SCoTENS,“regarded as one of the most successfulNorth/South initiatives ever established,thanks to the high level of co-operationand dialogue it has engendered.”SCoTENS is also funding a sixth yearof the pioneering (and CCBS-managed)North-South Student Teacher Exchangeprogramme, which has seen nearly150 students from Belfast, Dublinand Limerick doing a key part of theirassessed teaching practice in schools inthe other jurisdiction.Thirdly, there is the International Centrefor Local and Regional Development(ICLRD), which after six years inexistence, is now widely acknowledgedas a valuable new part of the planninglandscape on both sides of the Irishborder, with an annual conferenceevery January that is a ‘must attend’for senior planners North and Southand further afield. The 2009 conferencein Letterkenny was addressed by thechief planners of England, Scotland andWales, while the keynote speakers at the2010 conference in Enniskillen were theUS Economic Envoy to Northern Ireland,Declan Kelly; the outstanding Irisheconomist, Professor John Fitzgerald;and two senior planners from Boston,Massachusetts, Charlotte Kahn andHolly St Clair. The ICLRD was alsoinvolved in training local councillors andlocal authority officials, and in a range ofresearch projects during the year: ruralrestructuring, sustainable communities,delineating functional terriotories, crossborderimplications of the Review ofPublic Administration (NI) and learningfrom planning best practice in the EUand USA.JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 7

Universities Ireland, SCoTENS and theICLRD show how leading professionalscan benefit greatly from workingtogether in all-island networks. TimO’Connor, the founding SouthernJoint Secretary of the North/SouthMinisterial Council, called SCoTENS a“superb example” of what professionalassociations can do if they work on across-border basis. The Centre is readyand able to extend its cross-borderand all-island management, networkingand ICT expertise to other groups,organisations and institutions in eachjurisdiction wishing to work jointly withcounterpart bodies across the border,and looking for an ‘honest broker’third party to facilitate and administerthis. After more than 10 years in thefield, our experience is that for such across-border network to be sustainable,the role of a body like CCBS, whoseonly interest is in bringing the partnerstogether and ensuring they functionharmoniously, is a crucial prerequisite.This year saw director Andy Pollakincreasing his outreach activities. Forexample, in a two month period beforeChristmas he addressed audiences inBrussels (the EU Open Days), Omagh(twice), Cavan, Castleblayney, Dublin(Oireachtas Committee on the GoodFriday Agreement), Maynooth (Irish-Scottish Forum for Spatial Planning) andStrasbourg (University of Strasbourg/Euro-Institute, Kehl) on the work of theCentre in general and its EU-fundedINICCO projects in particular. Out ofthe last of these engagements came aninvitation to join a new network of crossbordertraining and research institutesfrom Germany, France, Denmark, Spain(Catalonia), Italy, Slovenia, the CzechRepublic, Poland, and the FrenchCaribbean in an EU Leonardo fundingapplication to enable a more formalalliance to raise the level of cross-bordertraining in Europe.Unfortunately, our North/South PublicSector Training programme – which hadtrained over 140 civil servants from bothjurisdictions in cross-border cooperationin 2005-2008 – had to be suspendedlast year after its EU funding expired andalternative funding sources (particularlyfrom government) failed to step in,despite the strenuous efforts of CCBSand its partners Cooperation Irelandand the Chartered Institute of PublicFinance and Accountancy. We haven’tyet given up on this mould-breakingprogramme: we still believe in the valueof civil servants from North and Southlearning together, and continue to seekfinance for it.A passionate commitmentThis 2010 Journal of Cross BorderStudies in Ireland breaks new ground byfeaturing an article by one of Ireland’scontemporary literary ‘greats’, thenovelist Colm Toibin. This is a reflectionon cross-border relations in Irelandand Catalonia which he first deliveredat the annual British-Irish Associationconference in Cambridge in September2009. The Journal also features aninterview on North-South cooperationwith the Taoiseach, Brian Cowen TD;an article on community developmentin areas close to the border by theleading social researcher, Brian Harvey;a re-examination of the cross-bordershopping phenomenon using statisticsrecently released by the Central8JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

Statistics Office (RoI), by Steve McFeelyof the CSO and Eoin Magennis andAidan Gough of InterTradeIreland; acall for a Green New Deal for the islandof Ireland by Dr John Barry of Queen’sUniversity Belfast, a former co-chairof the Green Party in Northern Ireland;an article on collaboration betweenUniversity of Ulster and LetterkennyInstitute of Technology by Dr PatMcCloughan of Indecon EconomicConsultants; and a response to RobinWilson’s 2009 article on new formsof Irishness by Eoin Ó Broin, authorof Sinn Fein and the Politics of LeftRepublicanism and a member of SinnFein’s ard comhairle. By publishingthese articles, the Centre is trying toprovoke new cross-border thinking onissues important to the island – it is notagreeing with or endorsing theopinions expressed.Overall, the Centre’s ethos of partnershipand cooperation to bring aboutincreased mutual understanding andrespect on this island continues toenergise and inspire its board, staff andmany supporters. After ten and a halfyears of successful activity, the boardand senior staff are taking a ‘day out’this month (March 2010) to reflect onwhere we might go in the next 10 years.One key question to be discussedis whether the Centre’s core work ofpractical North-South cooperation insocial areas like education and healthshould be complemented by new workin the areas of science, technology andinnovation, which will create the jobsand prosperity that will be vital if peace,stability and a socially just society aregoing to be embedded in NorthernIreland over the next decade. What willbe the continuing role of the governmentand people of the Republic of Irelandin this? One thing is certain: we remainpassionately committed to the tasks ofresearching and developing practicalcooperation for mutual benefit in Irelandas a vital element of the continuingpeace and reconciliation process.Once again, the Centre owes a greatdebt of gratitude to the Special EUProgrammes Body for its continuingfaith in the work of the CCBS. Throughthe SEUPB, the Centre has beengranted £1.44 million in EU INTERREGIVA funding to carry out the five INICCOprojects listed above in the yearsJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 9

Making the here and now a better place:Interview on North-South cooperationwith the Taoiseach, Brian Cowen TDWould you agree that North-South cooperation overthe past 12 years since the Good Friday Agreementhas been one of the quiet success stories of theNorthern Ireland peace process? What do you thinkare its main achievements over this period?Brian CowenIt has been a success story in that theGood Friday Agreement and the StAndrews Agreement have been aboutresolving sets of relationships that havebeen fractured by historical eventswithin the North, between NorthernIreland and the Republic, and betweenGreat Britain and Ireland. Theseagreements have enabled us to rebuildrelationships, and the North-Southcooperation process is about rebuildingrelationships between the two partsof the island on the basis on mutualbenefit. Unfortunately, in the past theabsence of constructive dialogue andthe overwhelmingly negative impact ofconflict meant that there was no spacefor those relationships to be mended, forbuilding trust and normality so that wecould achieve good neighbourly relationsbetween people who have a lot morein common than what separates them.So I think North-South cooperationis a manifestation of normalisingrelationships in Ireland.In doing this, we have moved onfrom the paramilitarism of the pastto a political culture which is aboutdemocratic principles and consensuallyworking together, accommodating eachother’s differences and seeing strengthin diversity, rather than not exchangingbecause of past differences. If youlook over the past 10-12 years at thejoint infrastructural projects we haveundertaken; at the promotion of theisland of Ireland for tourism purposes;at the joint trade missions; at the fargreater levels of cooperation betweenour educational institutions, particularlyin research and development – these areall strategic gains from the principle andpractice of North-South cooperation.And by emphasizing that commonality ofinterest and identifying the mutual benefitthat comes from cooperation, this is themeans by which trust can be built andrelationships can be restored to normal,as well as to the natural competitionthat communities engage in in orderJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.511

There are also communities, North andSouth, which are suffering from socialexclusion. In the 1980s we devised waysand means of targeting and overcomingdisadvantage here in the South, and ifthe process we are all engaged in, Northand South, is going to be successful, ithas to involve everybody. So we shouldbe able to devise common approacheswhich show disadvantaged communitiesthat we are trying to work togetheron their behalf. We saw, for example,the outreach to loyalist paramilitariesrecently as an example of how peoplewho start from an extreme position canbe helped to develop confidence bygiving assistance to their communitieswhich they see as a new way forwardand not threatening to them.North-South cooperation is an evolving,flexible mechanism which can targetdifferent areas of policy. I believe thepeople want us to work together.Everyone has anxieties and worries,for example about employmentopportunities for young people and towhat extent we are equipping themfor a more difficult and competitiveenvironment over the next 10 years.For all of us, North and South, whathappens outside this island is important,but we can do a lot internally to equipus to meet these external challenges.To come to the North-South agendawith this philosophy will enable us todevelop structures and mechanisms inharmony. Obviously we have to do it inways that people are comfortable with.Obviously the political culture will alwaysbe cautious in both administrations,but I think the people on the groundwant to see positive, cooperativeNorth-South structures that will helpthem and be seen to help them. It’snot in any way to be churlish about thetremendous improvements we’ve seenand the existing examples of very goodcooperation, but I often feel that weneed to move it on, although I acceptthat we must move it on at a pacethat everyone is happy with so that wereinforce the stability of the process.How have the economic recessionand the government’s financialproblems affected North-Southcooperation?Obviously the recession has affected it.However, look at cross-border shopping.That’s a function of volatile exchangerates, not of volatile differences betweenus about where people should shop.People go for value, and if the exchangerate favours the sterling area against theeuro, people make their moves on thatbasis. Of course there is an obligationon us as a government to be more costcompetitive,to keep our costs down,and we have been working on doingthat. Now, for example, you see theexchange rate going down to 87 centsto a pound sterling, where it was 94cents a few months ago (Note: interviewdate was 21 January) – so that’s atransient, changeable scenario.However, rather than saying the currencydifferential determines the tradingrelationship between North and South,we should concentrate on increasingthe volume of trade between North andSouth. This maintains and safeguardsjobs, and we’re still seeing a lot ofcross-border investments going on, withcompanies having a presence North andSouth, and that’s good and natural and14JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

helps to overcome the distortions of thepast. We have to recognise that in themarket economy there will be ebbs andflows both ways; what we really needto concentrate on is the creation of azone of stability on the island in whichtrade can expand according to marketdemand far more freely and organicallythan would have been the case in thepast. InterTradeIreland have done andare doing excellent work in this area. Ioften remind myself that when peoplethink politics determines everything, ofcourse it doesn’t. At the time of the Iraqwar, for example, the level of Americaninvestment in France was at its highestwhen political differences were at theirmost glaring over that issue. At the endof the day business is determined byits own logic, its own opportunities. Ioften stress the importance of the morenormal political situation we have now,which has helped business on the islandto expand and attract more prospectivecustomers worldwide.Is there a danger of both politiciansand people in the South turning inon themselves during this period ofrecession and forgetting the peacethat was so hard won in the Northand – more specifically – the North-South strand of that peace process?That could be a trend. I don’t thinkit will be because these structuresare so embedded now and so muchpart of how we do our business. Thelast 12 years have shown that. Evensince 2008, in a difficult period whenwe have seen quite severe recessionin the Republic – perhaps less so inNorthern Ireland – business people haveadapted and moved on, consolidatingand moving into new areas, and lookingout for market opportunities whereverthey can find them. I think difficulttimes reinforce the logic of the island ofIreland economy, because again we’refar better working together than goingout to compete in that big bad worldseparately. We’ll all survive in our ownway, but we must tap the potential thatcollaboration would bring rather thanclosing off those opportunities.So I don’t see that ‘turning in’happening. For example, in termsof showing our commitment to theprocess, I would be very much of theview that when the time for fundingthe Northern roads network wascoming up for decision, that was thetime to show that we were definitelycommitted – it wasn’t a question ofsaying “we’ll do certain things in goodtimes but we won’t do those things inbad times”. Those roads are strategicallyas important for this jurisdiction as theyare for the Northern Ireland jurisdiction– so why wouldn’t we proceed, there’sno reason not to proceed, and we’llprobably get it done far cheaper nowand more quickly derive the benefitsfrom it. We need to look at the mediumand long-term and doing these projectsis all the more important in that longerterm; they give confidence that theprocess is for real, that these arestrategic objectives which reinforce thebenefits for both jurisdictions. To regardthese things as optional extras ratherthan a basic necessary part of an islandinfrastructure would be a totally wrongsignal to send.You mention roads, but as moneygets tighter you obviously have to16JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

prioritise what you put into North-South cooperation initiatives.Apart from infrastructure, arethere any other future North-Southpriority areas you would see thegovernment investing in?Higher education and research is onethat has to be prioritized, particularlyR & D. Once again North-Southcollaboration is the obvious way forwardhere. There are natural hinterlandswhich need to be accommodated: forexample, in the north-west betweenLetterkenny Institute of Technologyand University of Ulster. For thatcollaboration to be developed you needgoodwill, determination and people ofability to make it happen – again it’sabout reinforcing trust and confidencethat this is to our mutual benefit. Moreand more people are looking at this kindof project on the basis that ‘if it makessense, let’s do it’. What the peaceprocess is allowing us to do is to seethings as they are: to look at potentialcooperation on the basis of intrinsic,measurable benefits, and then to say‘Why wouldn’t we do this – we’d bemad not to.’Are the North/South bodies safein this time of recession – is theirfunding ring-fenced?The whole North-South concept andarchitecture is safe because it works.Can it work better? Of course it can.Should any area of public expenditurebe immune from critical analysis? Noit shouldn’t. Can we see better waysof doing things and thus expand intoother areas in the future? Of course weshould. Should we insist on the samemeasure of efficiency and effectivenessthat you would expect in other areas ofpublic sector activity? Of course thosecriteria should apply. I don’t believe inring-fencing something by saying that’sthe way it should be because that’sthe way it has always been. Peoplehave to justify what they’re doing.We’re doing it in every other area ofadministration here: the McCarthy reporthas looked at how we’re deliveringservices in the South at the moment,and what amalgamations should takeplace and which organisations shouldperhaps be discontinued. But the North/South bodies are an integral part ofthe agreements we’ve reached, andit was envisaged in those agreementsthat this would be an evolving process,that we would begin with these bodiesand then look at others on the basis oftheir potential benefits. The letter andspirit of those agreements means thatwe should proceed along those linesand the review of the bodies should beapproached in that way.What would you like to see comingout of that review? Are there anyother areas where you would like tosee us moving into further and widercooperation?I’m not prescriptive about that but I dosay that public service delivery couldbe an area of further cooperation.There’s no doubt at all in my mindabout this when you see what we’redoing in cross-border cancer serviceson the island: Altnagelvin hospital inDerry providing a resource not onlyfor its own immediate jurisdiction butalso for people in Donegal; or whatDaisy Hill hospital in Newry is doing forJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 17

enal services in the Cooley area. Thatmakes obvious sense. These are simpleexamples of a whole range of areaswhere we can do more together.When you consider that in this countryhealth, education and welfare makeup 80% of total day-to-day publicexpenditure, then it seems to me there’sa huge argument for North-Southcooperation that should be exploredhere. With a background of very tightbudgets, it’s incumbent on us to look atthese things – not just to look at them,but to devise initiatives to show to thepublic on both sides of the border thatboth administrations are mindful of thefact that they must spend taxpayers’money to best effect, and to do that in away that provides better serviceson both sides of the border is a nobrainerreally.Would it be fair to summarise yourposition on future North-Southcooperation as more economiccooperation plus cooperation in thedelivery of public services in certainareas on a cross-border basis?Yes, some of which we’re already doing.The question of economic cooperationis very important given the challengeswe have externally, and given the factthat historically we have never tappedthe potential of intra-island trade andeconomic activity. So we need toovercome that historical legacy. Theagreements we have reached providefor that opportunity and the North/Southbodies which emanated from those giveus the means to do that.Then on the social side – on health,education, the environment, localgovernment, waste management,energy (particularly sustainable energy),public services generally – there areso many obvious points of commoninterest. What we really need to do isto allow these to develop organically. Irecognise that the bedrock of that is theestablishment of trust and confidencein each other’s capacity to cooperate,to identify the problems and to agreethat mutual benefit is the sole criteriaby which we’ll proceed. If that’s lookedat objectively and in a sensible way –recognizing all the political sensitivities– it seems to me that this is anevolving agenda which can only bringadvantages to everybody on the islandand should be seen to be the only wayforward for 21st century Ireland.Do you think North-Southcooperation has a role to play ingetting both jurisdictions out ofrecession?Absolutely. Macro-economic policyissues obviously dictate much of that:improving our budgetary position andhaving sustainable public finances.North/South bodies themselves can’tdeliver that, but if they’re built on asolid foundation of sustainable publicfinances, and those structures areworked to best effect in the areasof economics, social policy, theenvironment, energy efficiency, andright across the spectrum of publicadministration generally, they canplay a role. I’m convinced that weneed to recognise the potential ofthe mutually beneficial North-Southeconomic cooperation which can beachieved in the immediate term. This isa positive pathway which can play anobvious contribution to getting us out18JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

Along the Catalan and Irishborders: politics of memory andprogress through good mannersColm ToibinOn St John´s Eve, 23rd June, each year in the village ofIsil, in the province of Lleida, in the area known as thePallars high in the Catalan Pyrenees, the same ritual isenacted, which has its roots deep in the rich earth ofEuropean rituals, a core aspect of which is always tolight a fire to mark the longest day of the year and wardoff evil spirits. In Isil, what happens begins slowly. Onceit is fully dark, from the small square in front of thechurch you can look up and see glimmers of burningwood in the wooded hill above as the men of the villagecarry down logs, or long trunks of trees, which arealready burning.Colm ToibinYou can watch this strange slowprocession cork screw its way downthe hill, the trunks beginning to burnbrighter. The feeling that this ritualhas been going on since time begandeepens as you realize that no onearound you believes that any of the mencarrying the logs is in any danger. Theyknow, from time immemorial, how tochoose the wood, how much of eachtrunk to set alight and how many menare needed to carry it down and at whatpace. It is easy to feel in these villageswhich are close to the French borderas the crow flies or using half forgottenpathways, that life, with all its traditionsand rituals, has had the same rhythmas the seasons. Most people who livein these villages were born in them, aswere their parents, and it is easy to seethat the light from the big bonfire onwhich all the trunks are placed is alsothe light of regeneration, it is where theyoung men and women from this villageand the other small villages around canmeet and stay up late and dance witheach other under the tender eye of theolder generation.It is easy to feel that this territory andits people have been undisturbed forcenturies, that life has developed asslowly and organically as systemsof building using stone, or ways ofcooking, or curing meat, or doing theharvest, or speaking Catalan with arural accent. It is easy to feel that this isan old, untouched, traditional Europe,JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.521

and that the proximity to France andeven the borderline itself that runsbetween France and Spain throughthese mountains belong to easy traditionin the same ways as the rituals of StJohn´s Eve in Isil do, or the idea ofbirth and marriage and death in thesevillages. It is easy to see the border inthis undisturbed world as somethingwhich belongs to nature as much asto culture, which is as fully acceptedand understood as the change in theseasons, something not made byhistory, but made by more elementalforces which have always been in place,or made indeed by God.But then there is a photograph. Andif that photograph had come to usuncaptioned it could be any group ofvillagers, all the generations, gatheredin front of a municipal building sometime in the first half of the twentiethcentury. The fact that they all look soserious need not matter. In those yearsin formal group photographs people sawno reason to smile. They understoodthe camera as a serious instrument ofrecord. But the caption gives us thedate and the place and the origin of thepeople. It is 1938, and it is ClermontFerrand on the French side of theborder, and the people, around eightyof them ranging from the very old to thevery young, are from the village of Alosd´Isil, about four kilometers from Isil, thevillage described above. At first glance,they could be the entire population ofthe village until you notice the presenceof very few men aged between eighteenand fifty. Recently, an historian, workingwith this photograph, has been ableto identify most of the people in it, andhas been able to interview some whowere in that photograph and who arestill alive, and has been thus able topiece together what happened in thosemonths of 1938 to the quiet traditionallife in a village in Spain close to theFrench border that caused most ofits population to flee to France usingmountain paths.The new politics of memorySuch historical investigation has onlybeen possible in the past few years,in a time when the silent pact made in1975 on the death of Franco betweenboth sides not to re open old wounds,or put anyone on trial, or have a truthand reconciliation commission, nolonger seems necessary or useful. Thesilence had done its work, had alloweda democratic society to emerge fromthe shadows. In the past few years,however, these very shadows and thatvery silence have come to seem likepoison from the past. Not only are themurdered dead of the war being dug upand identified from communal graves allover Spain, but in the border area, in thePyrenees which belong to both Franceand Spain, the paths used in theseterrible years between 1936 and 1945have been re-opened in memory ofthose who were forced to use them.And in all the villages on the Spanish, orCatalan side, of the border last summerthere were lectures and exhibitions,with titles like ´The Path of Freedom´,´The Pallares Exile in France´, ´TheCatalan Exile of 1939´. The exhibitionshave included photographs of thelandscape as it is now, and as it wasthen, actual diaries of those who fledacross the border, and mementoes22JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

and found objects from that time. On11 September, which is not only theanniversary of the attacks on the TwinTowers and the Pentagon Buildingin 2001, and the murder of SalvadorAllende in Chile in 1973, but alsoCatalonia´s national day, in a villageclose to Isil called Valencia d´Aneu,there will be a public act of homage tothose from the village who were shot byFranco´s troops in 1938.All of this is part of a new politics inSpain, the politics of memory. At theend of last September there was a weeklong course for tourist guides on thesemountain paths in the Pallars, whichhave been cleared and signpostedfor tourists and visitors, as walkwaysthrough a beautiful mountain landscapeand also walkways into the past, a pastthat was hidden for so long, first bya dictatorship and then by a fledglingdemocracy, which now has become asubject for serious investigation and asmall tourist industry.It might seem then that all is settledagain: that the events of seventy yearsago, when people fleeing from Hitlerused this border to get into Spain fromFrance and thence to America, andJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 23

war came to an end, and free Spain fordemocracy.A Pyrenean mountain village in Cataloniawhen large sections of the populationof villages which had been loyal tothe Republic and many other Spanishrefugees used this border to get out ofSpain and into France, are now distantand part of history. But nothing is assimple as that. The paths were alsoused by priests who needed to flee fortheir lives from Republican Spain in 1936and 1937. The same mountain guides,working for money, led the priests tosafety as they later did those fleeingboth Hitler and Franco. Any diggingup of the past has to deal with the factthat some of the more affluent refugeescoming from France, many of themJewish, were robbed on the Spanishside of the border. The paths were alsoused by the maquis between 1944 and1946 who believed that if they coulddestabilize Franco´s regime by acts ofterrorism, then the Allied Forces wouldsee fit to follow their example, as theNo border in Europe is simple. NoLisbon Treaty is likely to affect, forexample, the position of Andorra, whichsits on the border between Cataloniaand France as a semi-independent,tax-free principality. Because of themountain roads and paths best knownto the locals which pour out fromAndorra, vast quantities of cigarettes,alcohol, electrical goods and much moreare smuggled. Since policing in Spain inthe years after Franco was as fraught asin Northern Ireland, a Catalan speakingpolice force was set up in Catalonia,but, since the border with France is anational border, the force used to stopsmuggling are the old Guardia Civil, whodo not speak the local language or knowthe territory. Their lack of knowledgeplus the mobile phone as the smuggler´ssecret new weapon mean that they arehighly ineffective. This border, like theIrish border, is filled with delicious waysof making easy money involving a localknowledge, a culture of secrecy andwatchfulness, and a sense that manypeople are involved at various levelsin a tight web of conspiracy againstauthority.Nor does the border here separate twodifferent nations, with two separateidentities which are absolute. This isperhaps more obvious in the BasquePyrenees with the idea that the Basquecountry straddles the Spanish-Frenchborder, but it exists also here in thePallars. Although less Catalan is spokenon the French side in every generation,there is a still a strong feeling amongpeople on both sides of this border that24JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

the border between France and Spainin the Catalan Pyrenees is a line drawnthrough their identity for the convenienceof others. Last year on Sunday 2ndAugust there was a meeting in amountain village, Port de Salau, on theFrench side between Catalans who havea French passport and Catalans whocarry a Spanish passport to emphasizetheir common identity as Catalans whohave been divided against their will bya line on a map. They carried the sameflags and spoke the same language. Theborder between them was, for that dayat least, their only problem.An unsettled landscapeWhen I walked along the borderbetween the Republic of Ireland andNorthern Ireland in 1986 and retracedthe journey with a BBC radio producerto make a documentary ten years later,I was never aware of walking through alandscape which was settled and stable,as the Catalan Pyrenees seems settledand stable. It was not merely in 1986the broken bridges and the huge uglyroadblocks and the presence of armedpolice and soldiers; it was not simply thesense of watchfulness on faces, of entirecommunities on the look-out or waitingfor the next ghastly event, or in 1996 thebeginnings of the end of this.It was something in the very landscape,a sense in Leitrim and Fermanagh, inDonegal and Derry, in Monaghan andArmagh of a few miles on either side ofthe border when the world seemed tohave come to a strange end, when itwould have been easy to imagine not aborder but a vast ocean at the end of aroad or a field. There were exceptions tothis, but not many, and it was an abidingfeeling, that this was a landscape, in itsvery poverty, in the half drained fields,or the roads that seemed ready to peterout, or the abandoned houses, or themenacing sky, that made you think ofthe world´s end. I thought sometimes offolding the landscape as you can fold amap at the very point where the borderran for three or four miles on either sideand allowing something useful to rise inits place. Because the border itself wasnot any use, except for smugglers andthose intent on killing and escaping.It was hard not to think in twos, in aseries of almost neat binary oppositions.Each town and village in the North hadsomething close to its opposite in theSouth. Each killing seemed to have arevenge killing. It was as though eachperson had a doppelganger and thateach action or statement or religion orpolitical feeling was not individual, but adance with another action or statementor religion or political feeling whichmerely seemed like its opposite but wasin fact its match.It was easier then to write about twoactions rather than one. To write aboutSeamus McElwain and John McVitty,for example, one a Catholic, the other aProtestant, one IRA, one UDR, one livingjust south of the border, one just north.Both died violently of bullet wounds inthe same year 1986 within a few miles ofeach other, one in April, one in July. Onedeath may even have been a reprisalfor the other. Both had large funerals. Iattended one and I visited the family ofthe other. But making the connectionbetween them was too easy, too neat,for every reason, not merely becauseJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 25

McVitty, unarmed, was farming his landwith his twelve year old son when hewas shot and his assailants fled acrossthe border to the Republic.There is another duo who seem moreinteresting now more than twenty yearslater, who I did not connect in my mindor my book with each other at the time,although I grew to know both of themin the years after I wrote the book and,indeed, I grew to like them and admirethem. I will dwell on them now, two menfrom the border, one from each side,one from each religion, both woundedfigures and carrying their wound as adark charm, they were both the bestcompany you could meet, and they bothhad learned something about holdingyour dignity, standing alone and learningto forgive which we might find usefulnow in our own wounded society southof the border and indeed, in its partnerin woundedness, in the north.One is John McGahern, the other BobBain. One lived close to the border inthe Republic, the other close to theborder in the North. They were bothmen of independent views, in a countryknown, at least to me, for its conformity,and men of great charm, which is notsomething you see much in Irelandanywhere. They had both in differentways been wounded, they had bothbeen in the news, and they would bothbe pointed out to you or to others allof their lives. But they both carriedmarks of this within – what they showedbesides the charm, or maybe as partof it, was an immense privacy, a deepspirituality, which is not something yousee much in Ireland either, or in thePallars for that matter.John McGahern: the principle ofgood mannersMcGahern loved the border. It added aninterest to life, he felt. He went once aweek to Enniskillen and he enjoyed theidea that once he was over the borderhe was in a foreign country. The twoparts of the island, he felt, and I agreedwith him about this, would never cometogether, because they had grown apartin ways that even they themselves didnot understand. So there was no pointin talking about that, he would suggest,and anyone who did was foolish. Whatwas worth talking about instead, he felt,was how actual life for actual peopleon both sides of the border might beimproved, and he believed that therewas great room for improvement. Hethought that there was a simple principlethat people might apply to the politics oftheir lives, the principle he called goodmanners. He believed that if peoplenorth and south had good manners,with their families, their friends, theirneighbours, then a great deal couldbe achieved.His second novel The Dark was bannedin 1966 by the Censorship Board of theRepublic of Ireland. When he returnedto Ireland from a year abroad, he wasstill in his twenties and the author oftwo books which had been published inLondon in the knowledge, which provedtrue, that they were likely to becomeclassics. McGahern liked England ashe did France, not only their literatureand people, but he was also grateful toboth countries for how they had treatedhim as a young writer, the amount ofcare and respect he had been offeredin both London and Paris. In Ireland,26JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

John McGahern near his home in Country Leitrimon the other hand, on the orders of theCatholic archbishop of Dublin, he wasremoved from his job as a teacher notonly because of his book which hadbeen banned, but because he hadmarried a Finnish woman in a registryoffice. He did not receive any supportfrom the teachers´ trade union. With hisbook banned and with no job, he left thecountry and did not return for a numberof years.Because he was a novelist, he thoughtsome of this was funny, especially inits details. But behind the smiling facethere was the pain of that time and thesense of having his privacy invaded ina way which had been intolerable forsomeone who remained even in middleage oddly shy and sensitive and solitary,someone much happier in the shadowsthan in the light, in the company of oneor two people than in a crowd. He likedthe privacy of life in Leitrim, maintainedclose and good relations with some ofhis neighbours there. He viewed the riseto the level of minister, or in one casehigher, of a number of men in the FiannaFail party who lived close by, with asort of amused contempt. He knew toomuch about them to believe they weremerely fools, but he knew they werefools. That much at least he could prove.When one of them tried to build anabattoir close to his house which was bya remote lake, he put a Trojan effort withsome neighbours into preventing this.When he won this battle, McGahernreported with great satisfaction that thepolitician in question, on being askedabout the reason for his failure to buildthe abattoir, shouted out that he failedbecause ´that writer cunt has themall riz´.The only time I ever heard McGahernJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 27

speak with admiration of a politician waswhen he was invited to Dublin Castle byJohn Bruton´s government for a dinnerin honour of Prince Charles, and henoticed at the very end of the eveningBruton standing casually talking topeople while drinking a pint of Guinnesswith some of his shirt hanging out, nolackies around or sense of pomposityabout him. He mentioned this severaltimes with amused approval. He lovedthe absence of preening self importancein Bruton, something he saw inabundance in other politicians whom hehad grown up with.In 1992 I asked John McGahern for apiece for a book of new writing fromIreland that I was editing. He told methat he had written a piece aboutCatholicism, that he had finally set downin words his feelings about the church.He had said to me a number of timesthat what North and South in Irelandhad in common was a sort of insecurityin how both states came into being thatcaused them to vie with each other tobecome even more sectarian, one aninsecure Unionist state, the other aninsecure Catholic state. I presumed thathis essay would dwell on that. I wassurprised by the essay, by how personalit was, and how wise and forgiving.It began ´I was born into Catholicism asI might have been born in to Buddhismor Protestantism or any of the otherisms or sects, and brought up as aRoman Catholic in the infancy of thissmall state when the Church had almosttotal power. It was the dominating forcein my whole upbringing, educationand early working life. I have nothingbut gratitude for the spiritual remnantsof that upbringing, the sense of ourorigins beyond the bounds of sense, anawareness of mystery and wonderment,grace and sacrament, and the absoluteequality of all women and menunderneath the sun of heaven. That isall that now remains. Belief as such haslong gone.´McGahern was concerned that theCatholic Church in Ireland in thetwentieth century would be seenas Proust saw the French CatholicChurch in the eighteenth century,when he described it as ´the refuge ofignoramuses´. He himself, despite thedamage it had done to him, did notsee it like that. In his essay he wroteabout the uplifting and exalting natureof Catholic ceremony, but did not ignorethe issue of Catholic authority, addingthat ´much of the power that the Churchhad in my youth has now gone in theSouth. In the North the power andstructures have hardly changed at all,held in place by the glue of intertribalhatred and distrust.´It hardly needs saying that McGahernviewed this intertribal hatred anddisgust with horror. The idea for him ofattacking your own neighbours was avery shocking idea. He would say thatif only people in Northern Ireland couldimprove their manners, then they mightstop shooting each other, or when thatstopped, hating each other or dislikingeach other in ways that caused pain orthe slightest form of civil disturbance.McGahern himself was capable of greatdislikes, but he saw no reason whyanyone should stretch personal dislikeinto the public realm in any way; he sawno reason why he could not pass people28JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

he disliked on the street with a politesalute, and then go to his own houseand mind his own business.Towards the end of his final novel ThatThey Might Face the Rising Sun, JohnMcGahern places an extraordinaryencounter, which is clearly an encounterbetween thinly disguised versions ofhimself and the IRA leader John JoeMcGirl, whom he knew as a neighbour.When I asked him if the encounter hadactually taken place, he said no, he hadimagined it. It was another exampleof McGahern´s interest in dramatizingopposites, including the opposite tohimself, giving someone whose politicshe disliked intensely a life and a charmand a sort of stoical wisdom whilerefusing to gloss over the cruelty, thefanaticism. In this encounter they talk ofeverything except their differences, buteventually Jimmy Joe McKiernan, whois McGirl, addresses Ruttledge, who isMcGahern, directly on the subject. “Youdon´t seem to have any interest in ourcause,” he says. “No,” Ruttledge said, “Idon´t like violence.” “You don´t believe infreedom, then.” “Our country is free.” “Apart of it is not free.” “That is a matter forthe other part. I don´t think it´s any of ourbusiness.” “I think differently. I believeJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 29

it is all our business.” Ruttledge knewthat as he was neither a follower nor aleader he must look useless or worsethan useless to this man of commitmentand action. As far as Jimmy Joe wasconcerned he might as well be listeningto the birds like an eejit on the far sideof the lake, and he made no furtherattempt at speech.´This business of offering to the otherside a full effort at understanding inMcGahern´s novel might be a metaphorfor how progress will be made in Ireland,not only between the tribes within theNorth, or between the North and South,but between those who have healthinsurance and those who don´t in theRepublic, or those who live west of theBann or east of it in the North, or indeedbetween gay people in the Republic ofwhom I am one, and those who run ourstate who would offer our way of lovingless respect than they would offer theirown way of loving. Hatred, division, suchlack of respect arise from a failure ofimagination. Quietly and modestly, JohnMcGahern understood that by practicinghis art he was offering the society whichhad wounded him a way out of its ownprejudices. It seemed to amuse him, orat least he never complained, that onlysome of us took him at his word.Bob Bain: an independent spiritI wish I had been able to introducehim to Bob Bain. As I walked betweenKeady and Darkley in south Armagh in1986 I had trouble finding Pastor Bain´shouse. When I did and when his wifeappeared, there was something abouther, something graceful, almost sweetin her way of watching me, but sheBob Bain in the new Darkley Gospel Hallwas suspicious as well. And as I foundmyself asking her if she were born again,her face opened into a pure brightnessas she said that she was, and she gaveme her husband´s phone number andsaid that if I wanted to come to theSunday service I should ask him. Thecongregation had dwindled, she said,since the shooting, people were afraid.The border was just half a mile downthe road. Later, when I phoned BobBain he said that he had two questionsfor me. One, was I member of the INLAand two, what religion was I. For thefirst I said ‘no’ with as much convictionas I could muster, and for the second Iuneasily told him that I was a Catholic.´You know you must be born again,´ hesaid and I thought that he meant that Icould not come to the service. But then30JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

he explained that I would have to beborn again for my life, but of course Icould come to the service.When I saw him that Sunday conductingthe service in what was more a woodenhut than a chapel, I realized that hebelonged to one of the oldest traditionswe have in Ireland, the tradition of theold fashioned, born again preacher,the sort of man who flourished in theGreat Revival of 1859 when a hundredthousand people were born again. Itwas, I thought that day, terrible that Ihad never met a man like him before,or even read much about his tradition,even though I had studied history atuniversity. It was one of those momentswhen the partition of Ireland seemedto me immensely sad: my communityin the South had been deprived of thepresence of men like Bob Bain as aliving, vibrant, fully accepted part of ourreligious and civic life. We could havebeen nourished by the sheer difference.That day at the service he asked hiscongregation to sing the hymn for methat they were singing three years earlierwhen gunmen from the INLA came tothe outside door and shot the three menwho were standing there dead, and thenbegan to shoot through the thin woodenwalls of the church. They shot lowbecause they knew the congregationwas lying on the floor, and they injuredmany members of Pastor Bain´scongregation before they fled across theborder to the South.Pastor Bain was pure charm. Whenhe preached against other religions infavour of being born again as he was,or even when I watched him trying toexpel the devil from a young girl, he hada way with him that was oddly innocent,likeable, bustling, busy with good intent.When we talked, he made clear that heviewed the South where I came from asa very foreign place indeed, but his maininterest was the state of my soul. Tenyears later, when I came back, he had abrand new church built and he seemedproud of it and filled with hope. By thattime I had learned to drive and someSundays I would go up to Darkley onmy own and attend his service. His facewould light up when I appeared, and hewould walk past me winking as thoughwe were both conspirators in something.For a time, he was sure he had me, anew soul, but each time after a talk withhim instead I would drive back to Dublinunconverted but utterly inspired by hisgood manners, the fierce independenceof his spirit, his resilience, his charm,the hospitality of his congregation, andhis hope. I didn´t agree with him, I nevereven got to argue with him, there werethings about myself that I certainly didn´ttell him. I didn´t share a religious beliefwith him, but I got something from himthat I am grateful for. I wished on someof those visits that everyone in the Southof Ireland could have known this mantoo. Not so they could feel sorry forhim. He was not simply a victim of anact of terrorism committed in our nameby those who looked for safe havens inour country. He was a man who stoodalone, read the Bible on his own, putgreat thought into issues of civil andsupreme authority and out of this hadcome a shining grace.JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 31

Loneliness and dignityOne of the reasons why John McGahernand Bob Bain may be important nowis not merely for how they were pickedon and how they survived and learnedto live with themselves, and howthey developed their forgiveness withelegance and style. But it is somethingelse, something more melancholy. Therewas a loneliness about both of them.Although both of them stayed in Ireland,it was as though they kept one eye onexit routes and had their bags packed,at least metaphorically. It would nothave mattered much to either of them,I think, if they had to leave the country.They would have been the same twomen anywhere. And maybe this is why Iwanted to dwell on them now becauseI think in the next decade, both Southand North, many young people willleave Ireland, and they will do so for allsorts of reasons, and they will becomethemselves outside the confines or thecomforts of home. In their loneliness andtheir fierce dignity, I wanted to invokeboth John McGahern and Pastor Bainas two figures who in one way livedclose to the border, a place others mighthave called home, but in a better way, inan exemplary way, they lived deeply andtruthfully within themselves. It is as muchas any of us can hope for.to the British Irish Association’sannual conference in Clare CollegeCambridge in September 2009.Among Colm Toibin’s novels areThe Master, a fictional account ofa period in the life of the authorHenry James, which was shortlistedfor the 2004 Man Booker Prize andwon the 2006 IMPAC Dublin LiteraryAward, and Brooklyn, which wonthe 2009 Costa Novel Award. Thisis the text of an address given32JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

Community development alongthe border: an instrument for thedevelopment of the cross-border region?Brian HarveyCommunity development began in Ireland in August1891 with the formation of the Congested DistrictsBoard for Ireland. The board used communitydevelopment as a tool to improve the economic andsocial conditions of communities living along the westcoast of Ireland and indeed, far inland. But, just as ‘thewest’ was one of the main problematic issues of theisland at the end of the 19th century, the depressedconditions of the Irish border became one of the mainproblematic issues of the island a hundred years later,at the end of the 20th century. Despite being over sixtyyears old, the border region did not become a distinctarea of economic and social attention until the 1980s 1 .Brian HarveyWith the arrival of the reformed EUStructural Funds in 1989, the Irishborder began to attract EuropeanUnion cross-border funding foreconomic development in the form ofthe INTERREG programmme. Withthe introduction of the EU PEACEprogramme in 1994, there was asubstantial investment in voluntaryand community organisations in theborder counties. The originator of theprogramme, President Jacques Delors,assigned a high priority to the role ofvoluntary and community organisationsin underpinning the peace processand building social inclusion. Indeed,PEACE I saw the allocation of no lessthan 15,000 grants during 1994-1999,most to voluntary and communityorganisations. The border region wentfrom having one of the lowest levels ofinvestment in community developmentto, over a very short period of time, oneof the highest in the island.These developments prompted theCross Border Centre for CommunityDevelopment at Dundalk Institute ofTechnology (DkIT) to investigate, adecade later, the nature of communitydevelopment along the border (thisbeing defined as 15 kilometres oneither side). In particular, it wished toaddress the following questions: To whatextent was community developmentan instrument for the economic andJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.533

social development of the cross-borderregion? What kind of organisationsfunctioned there, who did they work withand what could we find out about them?Did they work and cooperate acrossthe border? What were the crossborderpolicy issues arising from theirwork? Community development hadbeen an instrument of economic andsocial development in Northern Irelandsince the 1960s 2 . In the Republic,the government had introduced theCommunity Development Programme,subsequently considered a modelof good practice across Europe, in1987. Little, though, was known of thespecificities of community developmentalong or across the Irish border.The Dundalk IT investigation was basedon a survey of community developmentorganisations in the study area usingdatabases held by the Northern IrelandCouncil for Voluntary Action (for theNorth) and the Centre for Cross BorderStudies in Armagh (for the South);on interviews with stakeholders andexperts; and on case studies of 20community development organisationsworking across the border. 3 This articledescribes the outcomes and thepolicy issues arising. Here the terms‘Northern Ireland’ and ‘the North’ areused interchangeably purely to breakthe narrative, as are ‘the South’ and‘the Republic’.Community developmentorganisations in the border regionThe Dundalk IT mapping exercise foundthat there were two main concentrationsof community developmentorganisations: Derry (where the largestsingle number is to be found) andthen Newry. There are three minorconcentrations: in descending order,Armagh, Enniskillen and Strabane. Thereare few community development groupsin parts of Fermanagh on the northernside and parts of Cavan-Leitrim on thesouthern side, but this reflects areas oflow population density. Small parish ordistrict-based organisations featuredespecially strongly on the northern sideof the border, but their small number onthe southern side was probably more afunction of the databases used than anindication of their absence.Most of the community developmentorganisations in the study area wereformed in the late 1980s to late 1990s.None was formed in the Republicbefore 1981, but two in Northern Irelandbefore the 1970s. Historically, they area new phenomenon and the surge ofinvestment represented by the PEACEI programme is evident. Most of theorganisations in the Republic datedto the PEACE programme period, butsome pre-dated it in the North. All thegroups studied were formally constitutedas organisations, with managementcommittees or boards.By size and funding, they compriseda mixture of small, parish-basedorganisations (more so in NorthernIreland, with incomes of less than£10,000 a year), medium size bodies(mainly with PEACE programmefunding) and a small number of largerorganisations with revenues over €1million (more so in the North). Manygroups were quite entrepreneurial,attracting not only government funding,as might be expected, but raising34JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

money through fund-raising, sales andservices. The investigation confirmedearlier North-South studies which foundthe voluntary and community sector tobe more mature in Northern Ireland thanthe Republic, a function of the presenceof the welfare state in the North andthe need for voluntary organization todeliver its social services. 4 Communitydevelopment groups in the North werebetter linked to ‘national’ (in the senseof Northern Ireland-wide) networks thanthose in the South, again indicating ahigher level of development ( 87% in theNorth compared to 77% in the South).Typical organisations had an averageof 4.2 full-time staff in the Republic ofIreland and 2.7 in Northern Ireland. Manynorthern organisations were so smallas to have no staff at all. The typicalgroup here had 10 to 12 volunteers.In the South, Social EmploymentSchemes were used by no less thanthree-quarters of all organisations,with an average of 6.3 employees perorganization, indicating a continued,substantial use of these schemes.When asked about their target groups,most described themselves as workinggenerically with local communities,disadvantaged and socially excludedpeople.Specifically, the main target groupswere, in descending order, youngpeople, older people and unemployedpeople. Very few organisations werefound to be working with people withdisabilities or in environmental action.There were few women’s organisations,although some groups were affiliatedto women’s networks. In the North,a number of groups worked in thesocial economy, a category absent inthe South. In summary, communitydevelopment organisations along theborder may be typologized as a fewlarge organisations, with substantialrevenues and large staff numbers; acluster of medium-size organisations,with staff and volunteers, this being theprincipal category in the Republic whereSocial Employment Scheme workersare used extensively; and smallerorganisations, without staff, this beingan important group in Northern Ireland.Cross-border cooperationTurning to the area of cross-bordercooperation, 62% of groups in NorthernIreland and 85% of Southern groupsworked across the border. The tableillustrates the nature of that cooperation:NIRoIOccasional 62% 33%Regular but informal 19% 29%Formal partnership 19% 38%Again, the Southern figures are higherthe more intense the cross-borderrelationship becomes, a point we returnto later. The nature of their work wasstudied in more detail, with case studiesof 20 organisations known to be activein cross-border cooperation coveringsuch diverse fields as ex-prisoners,arts, generic community development,peace-building and reconciliation,mental health, local development,victims of the ‘Troubles’, second chanceeducation, women, Travellers, and thebuilt environment. Here, the objectiveswere to see whether there was a‘typical’ cross border project and to36JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

try to capture the dynamics of such aproject’s relationship.Typically, organisations were ten yearsold. Many had opened contacts orbegun their work during the time of thePEACE I programme in the 1990s. Mostprojects, though, involved individualswho had longstanding cross-bordercontacts that went back many yearsbefore, even during the worst times ofthe ‘Troubles’. Groups here were typicalof organisations that had receivedstart-up money during PEACE I andbenefitted from the more substantialprogramme grants of PEACE II (2000-2006). Typical projects involved twostaff (often one full-time and onepart-time) with a committee of eightto ten activists. These were often‘serial activists’ and involved in othercommunity based organisations, oftensporting (e.g. Gaelic Athletic Association)or educational (e.g. local schools).One of the key findings was the keyrole played by individual leadership,although such ‘leaders’ were universallymodest people who played down theirown significance. It was apparent thatmany of these projects were initiatedand subsequently driven by one person,who had a vision of and passion forcross-border work and cross-borderdevelopment and was prepared tocommit considerable time and energy tosuch a venture, some a lifetime. Thesewere not misty-eyed visionaries, butpeople with a hands-on appreciation ofthe practical difficulties of bridging gapsand differences. Often they appeared tobe motivated by a combination of thedesire for reconciliation between thenationalist and unionist communities, theideal of economic and social integrationbetween North and South, and theaspiration for improved socio-economicconditions for their locality, county orregion.A second, intriguing finding was thedifferent organisational and structuralforms which cross-border cooperationtook. Several forms were evident:• ‘Twin pairs’. Two organisationsworking in cooperation with oneanother for mutual learning, comingtogether purely to execute a singletime-limited project, but eachretaining its organisational structure(e.g. Donegal Travellers Project;Newhaven Trust);• ‘Twin pairs’ but with jointcommittee. Here two organisationsworked together, but had a commonworking committee, drawn in equalnumbers from each parent body(e.g. Riverbrooke, Mind the Gap);• Transboundary. Here, anorganization based in one jurisdictionexpanded into the other (but withoutsetting up another body to workin the other jurisdiction). This wasa northern phenomenon, broughtabout when Northern Ireland-basedorganisations began to provideeither services in the Republic (e.g.STEER in mental health services)or attracted members there (e.g.people who were victims of the‘Troubles’);• Cluster. This was an organisationalform in which a cluster oforganisations came together for aproject, but was anchored by oneorganization, normally in the North(e.g. Derry Well Woman Centre inJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 37

the area of women’s health);• Single company partnership.This was probably the purest formof cross-border organization,with a single company and asingle management, based inone jurisdiction, operating freelyacross the border zone. Thistype of body had probably thestrongest commitment to integrateddevelopment and organisationallyattempted to deny the border asan obstacle. Most were basedin Northern Ireland and typicallycalled themselves ‘partnerships’(e.g. Sliabh Beagh Cross-BorderPartnership, DergFinn Partnership,Tyrone Donegal Partnership).Traditionally, the history of crossbordercooperation in Europe hasbeen a narrative of progression from‘first contact’ between pairs engagedin back-to-back development; tocooperation in projects that traverseborders; and finally to devolved,integrated, single company operationsworking in such a way as to minimizeand eventually eliminate the distortingeffects of land borders. The experienceof the Irish border shows that thesetrajectories are more complex and thatthere was no natural progression from‘first contact’ to ‘pure partnership’.Moreover, the number of ‘pure’ crossborderpartnerships was limited to singlefigures and there was little evidenceof new ones in formation. Some ofthese partnerships were inspired bythe International Fund for Ireland, but inorganisational form they seem to havereached a plateau.Although cross-border working hadnow become routine, this did notmean that it had become easy. Manycommented on how slow it still was andthat the pace was still set by the slowestpartner. Northern organisations weremore than prepared to work across theborder now, but wanted to take onestep cautiously at a time so as to bringall their members along. Courtshipsleading to regular or formal partnershipsgenerally started from the South, as theabove table indicates.Cross-border working was also moreexpensive, the two main complaintsbeing the cost of mobile phone calls,which even if they were only a kilometreaway attracted high, cross-borderrates; and the lack of helpfulness bybanks in handling two currencies, withthe occasional imposition of doubleconversion charges. All organisationsfound funding a big struggle. Manyfunding schemes provided grants foronly a year or two at a time, creating alevel of uncertainty that made it difficultto attract or retain staff. An additionalcomplication was that some fields ofwork which attracted funding in onejurisdiction did not do so in the other,a good example being improvementsto the physical environment, wherethere was no funding scheme forvoluntary and community organisationsin the Republic. One was left with theimpression that these organisations hadachieved much with little.An important finding was that althoughvoluntary and community organisationshad now learned to work across theborder - indeed, it was no longer ‘news’for the local press - governments hadnot. Implementation of legislation was38JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

different, to the extent that (as oneenvironmental project reported) shootingwildlife illegally on one side of the borderwould earn a fine or worse on one side,but no penalty on the other; and fireengines could put out a mountain fire upto the borderline on one side, but notdouse the flames a metre away on theother. One statutory body might fund across-border housing project from thenorthern side, but this was no good ifthe southern opposite number wasnot interested.Especially absurd were fundingrestrictions which prohibitedparticipation from people from the oneside of the border at a location on theother. Thus one men’s health crossborderproject based in the North wasrequired to turn away people withsouthern addresses; an arts project lostits grant for ecumenically but foolishlyholding an event 250 metres ‘on theother side’; and one playgroup in theNorth found an official noting downDonegal-registered plates so as toquestion southern participants whatwere they doing there! These incidentsmight be amusing were it not that theyidentified such an extraordinary level ofinflexibility in the bureaucratic mind andthe still deadening legacy of back-tobackdevelopment.It would be easy to portray these issuesas minor irritants, but they went furtherthan that. Not only were they operationalobstacles to voluntary and communityactivity and contrary to the imperativesJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 39

of European integration, but theynegatively affected the quality of life andefforts to turn the region into a desirableplace in which to live. What was morefrustrating still was that voluntaryorganisations were rebuffed when theysuggested to statutory authorities thatthey should get their act together and tryto sort out these difficulties.Positively, though, there was evidencethat models of good practice in onejurisdiction were successfully appliedto the other. Most of the traffic wasfrom the North to the South andwas evident in the fields of mentalhealth, volunteering and projects toimprove the physical environment.Here, southern organisations began toemulate the activities and approach oforganisations in the North which hadexperience and a track record in theseareas. A weakness of the cross-borderprojects generally, although there wereexceptions, was that few had the timeto document and disseminate their workcomprehensively and develop the policyissues arising. The struggle for fundingtook precedence, to the extent that thepolicy focus of projects was limited andthe lessons arising were not fed into thepolitical and administrative systems.Staying with the funding picture, astriking feature was the limited numberof funding opportunities for crossborderactivity. Apart from the PEACEprogrammes, which included strandsto fund cross-border activities, the onlyother significant funding opportunitywas INTERREG III (2000-2006). Thefirst two INTERREG programmes in the1990s had been entirely governmental,but INTERREG III included animaginative strand to fund cross-borderactivity for voluntary and communityorganisations: Priority 3 - Civic andCommunity Networking. This was a realbreakthrough and was, unsurprisingly,oversubscribed fourfold.Perhaps the most extraordinaryfeature of cross-border funding wasthe absence of a commitment tocross-border cooperation by voluntaryand community organisations fromthe two governments. This mightbe understandable in the case ofNorthern Ireland, but granted theiconic significance of the border to theRepublic’s government, its absencewas more difficult to comprehend.While the Irish Department for ForeignAffairs operated a small ‘reconciliationfund’ for voluntary and communityorganisations, it was precisely that,a reconciliation fund, not a fund forcross-border cooperation. And it wasnot that the government’s attentionhad not been drawn to the issue,for Cooperation Ireland had beenvocal about the problem ever sinceit was established. Ninety yearsafter partition, the two governmentshad still to work out strategies tosupport cross-border cooperationby civil society organisations. Manyvoluntary and community organisationsvoiced the suspicion that so long asEuropean funding was there, they couldcomfortably postpone facing the issue.The issue is actually more profoundthan that, and an extraordinary exampleof a lost opportunity. In the case ofcommunity development, there wasand is no institute to support such workin either part of the island. The border40JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

The Sliabh Beagh hills on the Monaghan-Tyrone border: the Sliabh Beagh Cross-borderPartnership is one of the very few examples of a ‘single company’ cross-border partnershipregion of the island provided an unusualexample in Europe of an intense levelof community development in a borderregion coming out of conflict, one wherethe Irish experience could be mostuseful to other countries. In his masterlyIreland 1912-85, Lee identified as oneof the most serious problems in theisland’s development experience ourinability to develop self-knowledge andbuild our own intellectual infrastructure,especially in those areas in which weactually excel 5 . The Workers EducationalAssociation in Belfast pressed the ideaof a community development institute,one which could support such activityacross the island, but the Departmentof Social Development there was noteven prepared to enter a preliminarydiscussion on the topic.Policy issues arisingThe single most important policy issuewas the question of how the issuesarising from community developmentalong the border could be channelledinto the administrative political systemso as to ensure the socio-economicdevelopment of the border region.European research has shown howgood levels of cross-border cooperation,both at governmental level and at civilsociety level, can transform borderzones from ‘problem’ regions into areasof prosperity, the best example being theMeuse-Rhine triangle between Germany,Netherlands and Belgium. Indeed, theinvestment of PEACE I programmefunding from the mid-nineties onwardswas such that within a few years, theborder counties (with the one exceptionof Donegal) were no longer at the topof the list of the poorest counties ofJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 41

the Republic: the geographical locusof poverty shifted to the midlands andthe south east. A feature of the PEACEI programme was that it included aConsultative Forum of voluntary andcommunity organisations so that theirconcerns could be channelled back totheir respective governments.Unfortunately, that was as far as it got.When the PEACE II programme wasushered in, there was no ConsultativeForum. No explanation was given andthe PEACE II programme documentsmade no reference to it. It was simplyairbrushed out of history, as surely as inan official Soviet history of undesirablepeople and events. Without such aforum, the policy issues arising fromthe cross-border work of voluntary andcommunity organisations had no homewhere the issues could be progressed.Instead, they must be pursuedseparately within the two jurisdictions,whose lack of cooperation was oftenat the root of these policy problemsin the first place. In this situation,problems will continue to be addressedin the traditional, back-to-back way bygovernments and statutory bodies thatseem unable to act or work coherentlyacross borders. They are channelledinto the political system by border regiondeputies, senators and MLAs whocontinue to be marginal in a politicalprocess dominated by the demandsof the respective capitals of Dublin andBelfast. They cannot find institutionalexpression.Article 19 of the Good Friday Agreementproposed ‘an independent ConsultativeForum appointed by the twoadministrations, representative of civicsociety, comprising the social partnersand other members with expertise insocial, cultural, economic and otherissues’ (not be confused with the CivicForum established under the Agreementand limited to Northern Ireland). Article22 of the St Andrews Agreement ofOctober 2006 renewed this commitmentby stating that ‘the Northern IrelandExecutive would support theestablishment of an independent north/south Consultative Forum appointedby the two administrations andrepresentative of civil society’.The continued absence of a formalcivil society dimension in crossbordercooperation remains a pointof extraordinary weakness in the Irishcross-border relationship. Examplesfrom other parts of Europe show thatpeople-to-people cooperation is givenprominence, funding, permanence andinstitutional expression in successfulcross-border relationships 6 . Suchcross-border cooperation is stronglyfocussed on social policy cooperation:health, childcare, older people,education, health and social servicesand young people 7 . To give an examplein the area of health services, severalcountries have developed cross-borderhealth zones where citizens fromone side of the border can use thehealth services of another, and on theSpanish-French border at Puigcerda inthe eastern Pyrenees a cross-borderhospital is opening. By contrast, healthservices along the Irish border remainincompatible - not just a function ofthe apparently intractable difficulties ofintegrating two different systems, but, atleast as important, the lack of a forumwhere civil society is present and where42JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

these difficulties could be resolved.Not only that, but a related problem isthe perception by both governmentsthat cross-border cooperation shouldbe principally around economic issues,rather than the social concerns thatwould come to the fore in ‘people-topeople’cooperation. At the core of thisis the fact that social policy is not at theheart of the North-South relationship.Neither social policy in general norcommunity development in particularwere specified areas of cooperationunder the Good Friday Agreement.Examination of the work of the NorthSouth Ministerial Council finds fewactivities in these areas, the closestbeing in the health and environmentalareas.When the two governmentscommissioned their most recent scopingstudy of North-South cooperation, theirfocus was on economic cooperation,science, technology, innovation, trade,tourism, investment and enterprise 8 .Although there was a chapter on the€68 billion on infrastructure which thetwo governments planned to spendby 2017, this did not include a singleJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 43

cent for community infrastructure,nor was there any reference to socialpolicy, community development, norgovernance structures. The only socialpolicy area where progress has beenmade was free travel schemes forpensioners. For all the expectationthat community development groupswould do the legwork of peace andreconciliation, there was remarkably littlerecognition of their activities in the biggerNorth-South debate, nor in investmentdecisions. The Republic’s governmentseemed to have a limited understandingof the need for investment in ‘soft’ socialinfrastructure: ‘it could find the moneyfor subsidising Derry airport, but notfor community development’, said onecritic. Although there was a strong focuson trade integration, business linksand commercial partnerships, ‘we stilldon’t even have a common directory ofvoluntary and community organisationsand social enterprises’, said another.ConclusionFor much of the century to themid-1990s, the experience of theIrish border was one of conflict andever-deepening social deprivationand isolation. The intervention of EUPresident Jacques Delors in bringing thePEACE programme to Ireland showeda profound grasp of history, politicsand social policy in general, and thedynamic of conflicted cross-borderregions in particular. His underlyingassumption was that a problematic,conflicted border region would notprosper purely in the absence ofviolence: indeed throughout the 20thcentury the economic and social declineof the Irish border region continuedseamlessly, uninterrupted by the earlierceasefires of 1923 and 1963. Pro-activemeasures and investment are necessaryto re-build conflicted border regions,and here the PEACE programme wasthe crucial catalyst for the regenerationof the border region generally, and forcommunity development and crossbordercooperation by voluntary andcommunity organisations in particular.It raised the expectations of peoplelike social entrepreneurs who wouldlike to turn the border region into adesirable place in which to live, a modelof reconciliation and cross-borderintegration, one of balanced economic,social and sustainable development.The Dundalk IT study has enabled usto get a clearer picture of the nature,extent and characteristics of communitydevelopment along the Irish border. Itprovided a portrait of how voluntary andcommunity organisations cooperateacross the border; the organisationalforms and trajectories they follow; asense of the issues arising; a map ofthe way forward, and the formidableinstitutional, political and mindsetproblems that have yet to be overcome.Postscript: not a happy ending yetSadly, this story does not yet seemto have a happy ending. The idea ofa North-South Consultative Forumfailed to progress even when theother institutions of the Good FridayAgreement were restored. Althoughin October 2009 an exasperatedDepartment of the Taoiseach conveneda meeting in Dublin of interested partiesto progress the idea, it became clearthat it could go no further without the44JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

cooperation of the Office of the FirstMinister and Deputy First Ministerin Northern Ireland. It seems thatopposition to civil society is not just ahistoric phenomenon limited to the oldrégimes of eastern and central Europein the 1980s. On the funding side,the situation went backward as theINTERREG III programme’s promiseof Civic and community networkingturned out to be a false dawn. Boththe INTERREG IV programme andthe PEACE III programme (both2007-2013) were governmentalized,with a diminished role for voluntaryand community organisations, thebulk of funding being routed throughgovernment bodies and especially localgovernment.Attempts to develop a North-SouthVoluntary and Community Sector Forumwere initiated by the Department forSocial Development in Belfast. Althoughseveral meetings took place, it fell intodisuse because of lack of supportfrom its opposite number in Dublin.Worse was to follow, for in the Republicthe government, in implementingdrastic funding cutbacks, effectivelyrepudiated community development asan instrument to assist disadvantagedcommunities, closing in 2009 theinternationally acclaimed CommunityDevelopment Programme andwithdrawing funding from the most vocalvoluntary and community organisations 9 .The Combat Poverty Agency, which hadfunded community development groupsin the border region and was a deliverybody for the PEACE programmes, wasabolished. And in a final endnote, theCross Border Centre for CommunityDevelopment in Dundalk was closedat the end of 2008 within weeks of thecompletion of this study.Brian Harvey is an independentsocial researcher who lives inDublin and works for organisationsconcerned with communitydevelopment, social inclusion andequality in both parts of Ireland. Hewas the author of the 2008 DundalkInstitute of Technology study: Auditof community development in thecross border region.REFERENCES1. Harvey, Brian; Kelly, Assumpta;McGearty, Sean & Murray, Sonya:The emerald curtain - the socialimpact of the border in Ireland.Triskele,Carrickmacross, 2005.2. McCready, Sam: Empowering people- community development and conflict,1969-99. Belfast, The Stationery OfficeIreland, with the Centre for VoluntaryAction Studies, Coleraine, 2001.3. Harvey, Brian: Audit of communitydevelopment in the cross borderregion. Dundalk,Institute of Technology,2008. The case studies are:Riverbrooke (Riverstown, Co Sligowith Brookeborough, Co Fermanagh);the Second Chance EducationProject, Donegal and Tyrone; EXPAC,Monaghan; Beyond Borders, DundalkInstitute of Technology; KiltycashelPartnership; Dergfinn Partnership;Communities Connect; The HURTGroup; Donegal Travellers Project,Letterkenny; STEER, Derry; UpstateTheatre Company, Drogheda; NewhavenJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 45

Trust, Newry; FLS Partnership[Fermanagh, Leitrim, Sligo]; SliabhBeagh Partnership; Tyrone-DonegalPartnership; An Teach Ban, Downings,Co Donegal; Mind the Gap, Letterkenny;Newry Confederation of CommunityGroups and Derry Well Woman Centre.4. Acheson, Nick; Harvey, Brian;Kearney, Jimmy & Williamson, Arthur:Two paths, one purpose - voluntaryaction in Ireland, north and south.Dublin, Institute for Public Administrationwith Centre for Voluntary Action Studies,Coleraine, 2005.5. Lee, Joe: Ireland 1912 - 85: politicsand society. Cambridge, CambridgeUniversity Press, 1989.6. Meijer, Rob: ‘A borderline case’ inNo Frontiers: north-south integration inIreland, Democratic Dialogue, Belfast,1999.7. LACE: Socio-cultural cooperation inInfosheet on cross-border cooperation,No 5, June 1998. Association ofEuropean Border Regions, Gronau,Germany 1998.8. FitzGerald, John and others:Comprehensive study on the all-islandeconomy. Newry, InterTradeIreland,2006.9. O Broin, Deric & Kirby, Peadar (Eds):Power, dissent and democracy. Dublin,AA Farmer, 2009.46JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

A sense of proportion in crossbordershopping: what the mostrecent statistics showEoin Magennis, Steve MacFeely and Aidan GoughSince late 2008 the issue of cross-border shoppinghas been a favourite topic of media interest andspeculation. Stories emerged around Christmas2008 about ASDA in Enniskillen being the sixthtop performing store in the global Wal-Mart chainworldwide. 1 Around the same time Irish Minister ofFinance, Brian Lenihan, made the comment that‘people should do their patriotic duty’ and shoplocally rather than across the border. 2 The responsefrom the retail industry lobby groups, North andSouth, has fed the story. One claim was that every150 cross-border trips costs one retail job in Ireland.Contestable, headline grabbing statements such as‘British shops’ war on Irish’, and ‘Shoppers goingNorth are not traitors’ fuelled misguided perceptions. 3Unfortunately, much of what has been written is basedon an imprecise extrapolation from small sample-basedsurveys and anecdotal evidence from shop owners. Inthe absence of robust statistics, a sense of perspectiveon cross-border shopping was in danger of being lost.Eoin MagennisSteve MacFeelyAidan GoughIn February 2009 the Office of theRevenue Commissioners and theCentral Statistics Office (CSO) in theRepublic published a report entitled TheImplications of Cross Border Shoppingfor the Irish Exchequer. The reporthighlighted the ‘significant difficultiesassociated with quantifying the extent ofcross-border shopping and estimatingthe implications for the Irish exchequer’and recommended that the best wayto measure the loss in Irish tax revenuewould be a survey of cross-bordershoppers.As a result, a module on cross-bordershopping was included on the QuarterlyNational Household Survey (QNHS) inJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.547

the second quarter (April to June) of2009. 4 One member of each householdin the Republic answered questions onbehalf of the household about travelto Northern Ireland in the previous 12months and specifically about shoppingin Northern Ireland. The questions onshopping in Northern Ireland focussedon how much households spent, thefrequency of shopping trips and whetherthis had changed in the previous year.The survey also asked about intentionsfor shopping in Northern Ireland in thefollowing year. As a result, we are now ina position to take a more informed viewof cross-border shopping from Irelandinto Northern Ireland.Key FindingsHow many and how often?According to the Quarterly NationalHousehold Survey, 16% of the Republicof Ireland’s households made at leastone shopping trip to Northern Irelandin the 12 months before the secondquarter of 2009. Looking only at the16% of households who shopped inNorthern Ireland, the average numberof trips was 6.7 (equivalent to just overone for every household in the Republicof Ireland).The highest proportion of householdswho shopped in Northern Ireland was,as might be expected, recorded in theBorder region (41%). There was then agap to the next nearest regions: the Mid-East (22%), Dublin (21%), the Midlands(18%) and the West (14%).Unsurprisingly, below a line fromWicklow to Galway the costs oftravelling or lack of market knowledgebecame an inhibitor, with a significantdrop to fewer than 5% going to shopin the North. In individual regions thisfigure was even lower: 4% in the SouthEast; 3% in the Mid-West and 2% inthe South-West. It is noteworthy thatresults from the Household Travel Surveyidentify the same pattern, with mosttourism traffic into Northern Irelandfrom counties north of the Wicklow-Galway axis.In terms of whether or not there hasbeen a sudden upsurge in cross-bordershopping activity from the Republicto Northern Ireland, the QNHS tellsus that in 2008-2009 only one in tenhouseholds did more cross-bordershopping than in previous years.In terms of intentions for the year 2009-2010, 78% of respondents did notintend to cross the border to shop, while14% would occasionally go for ‘onceoff’purchases and 7% more regularly.Regular cross-border shoppers tended,again not surprisingly, to be from theBorder region, with almost one quarter(23%) of households from the Borderregion intending to shop regularly inNorthern Ireland.There is a similar regional variation in thefrequency of trips. Of those householdswho shopped in Northern Ireland, thosein the Border region travelled morethan once a month (14.4 trips in the12 months). None of the other regionsrecorded frequencies of higher than fivetrips, with travellers from the far southcrossing the border only twice to shop.How much?The Quarterly National HouseholdSurvey estimates that the total Irish48JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

A Dublin woman loads her car outside a Newry shopping centre.household expenditure on shoppingin Northern Ireland in the year up toApril 2009 was €435 million. Estimatedexpenditure on shopping was based onall trips to Northern Ireland, including€331 million in trips specifically forshopping and €104 million on tripswhere shopping was not the mainpurpose but shopping expenditure wasincurred. The highest total expenditureon shopping was recorded in the Borderregion (€181 million) and in the Dublinregion (€119 million). The lowest totalexpenditure on shopping was in theMid-West (€8 million), South-West(€13 million) and South-East regions(€11 million). Most people (51%) spentbetween €100 and €299 per trip, withonly 4% spending more than €1,000 ontheir most recent trip.Again the regional variations holdstrongly, with people who travelledfurthest (and least number of times)tending to spend more. Thosehouseholds from the far south spentmore than three times on their mostrecent trip than their counterparts in theBorder region (€492 compared to €150,or a ratio of 3.1). This is also reflectedin the expenditure bands, with 88% ofthose from the Border region spendingless than €299 and none above €1,000.For what?The Quarterly National HouseholdSurvey goes on to provide some detailson what Irish households bought inNorthern Ireland. On their most recenttrip, 79% of households boughtgroceries, 44% bought alcohol, 42%bought clothing and durables, 26%cosmetics and 19% ‘other’.However, the idea that cheaper alcoholis the key reason for cross-bordershopping is not supported by the figuresJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 49

for what people spent on differentcategories. Those questioned said thaton their most recent trip, groceriesaccounted for 40% of expenditure,clothing and durables for 27%, ‘other’for 18%, alcohol for 11% and cosmeticsfor 4%.Again, there are regional and householdvariations in what people bought ontheir most recent cross-border shoppingtrips. The exception to this rule is thealcohol category, with all regions aroundthe 11% average. Significant variationsinclude households in the Border regionspending almost two thirds on groceries,while those from Dublin and the farsouth spent significantly above theaverage on clothing and durables.Table 1 uses the overall figure of €435million in expenditure in the year up toApril 2009 to give figures for each of thecategories.In terms of seasonality, or the important‘Christmas effect’ on retail, this overallexpenditure estimate is based on the 12month period from the second quarterof 2008 on and thus includes the 2008Christmas period.Some conclusionsThe first point about the QuarterlyNational Household Survey is it showsthat cross-border shopping hasincreased but remains a minority pursuit.Of all households in the South, 84% didnot shop in the North in the 12 monthsbefore the second quarter of 2009. Ofthose that did, one in three either did thesame amount of shopping or less thanin previous years. In the 12 months afterthe second quarter of 2009 only 7% ofhouseholds said they intended to crossthe border regularly to shop.Secondly, geography matters, with theattraction of cross-border shoppinglessening with distance from the border.Curiosity may take some shoppersfrom Munster to Northern Ireland, butthis appears to be outweighed by theTable 1: Total cross-border shopping expenditures by categoryType of goods % of average expenditure Total amount ofpurchased on most recent shopping expenditure intripprevious 12 months(€m)Groceries* 39.8 173.1Clothing & Durables** 26.8 116.6Other 18.5 80.5Alcohol 11.2 48.7Cosmetics 3.7 16.1Source: Calculations based on QNHS (December 2009)Notes: *Includes tobacco **Includes TVs, furniture etc50JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

transport costs and time involved. 5Indeed, the slightly higher proportionsof cross-border shoppers in easterncounties may reflect the better road andpublic transport infrastructure servingthat corridor into Northern Ireland. Also,given the amounts spent and on whatby shoppers from the far south, it is hardto escape the conclusion that peopletravelled longer distances for ‘once-off’purchases rather than for savings onfood and drink. This ‘mental distance’is also reflected in tourism patterns,where people from Munster rarely travelto the border counties, let alone toNorthern Ireland. There is, of course,the more rational cost-benefit issue: tocompensate for the time and cost oftravelling to the North from Munster,the expenditure must be high. This iscomparable to the unusually high levelof shopping expenditure evident fromtourists travelling to New York inrecent years.Thirdly, the Southern Border countiesare critical to cross-border shopping,though even in this region a majority(59%) are ‘domestic in-shoppers’. Morethan one in ten shoppers from thisregion travel across the border morethan once a month, making a crossbordertrip a normal part of shoppingpatterns. However this may have beenthe case long before the current trend.In the Southern Border region thereis almost an equal split among crossbordershoppers between those whohave shopped more across the borderin the previous 12 months and thosewho have done the same or less. Inevery other region, the split is more liketwo to one between those who haveshopped more and those who havedone the same or less. This supportsthe idea that the Border counties havea more established pattern of shoppingand to some degree act as a functionalshopping unit. 6Fourthly, despite the anecdotal evidenceand claims of interest groups, alcoholis not the primary expenditure categoryfor Southern shoppers. Although almosthalf of households bought some alcoholon their most recent shopping trip, itis only the fourth (out of five) largestspending categories with only 11% ofexpenditure.Interestingly, the close alignment ofcross-border shopping patterns withthe private consumption basket used tocompile the Republic’s Consumer PriceIndex (CPI) suggests that the bulk ofcross-border shopping is straightforwardsubstitute shopping, with people buyingcheaper cross-border items in the sameproportion as they normally buy them athome. Comparing the Quarterly NationalHousehold Survey spending patternswith the CPI basket is necessarily crude,as the CPI provides detailed expenditurebreakdowns whereas QNHSrespondents are asked to classify theirexpenditure into five broad categories 7 .Nevertheless, when the CPI basketis adjusted and rescaled to excludeservices, motor fuels and consumptionof alcohol on licensed premises, thesimilarity between the two baskets isstriking (see Table 2 on next page).This comparison, crude as it is,suggests a number of things. Firstly,it dispels the myth that purchases ofalcohol are the primary motivation forcross-border shopping. It also suggestsJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 51

can be traded across the border bothlegally and illegally. The tax differenceshere have benefited Southern retailersfor most of the past decade, with anestimate in 2005 (by the Northern IrelandAffairs Committee at Westminster) thatup to £20 million per year in UK exciseduty was being lost to fuel purchasesin the South, a figure that is not farremoved from the excise currently beinglost to the Irish Exchequer from crossbordershopping.Longer-term benefitsThe level of and interest in cross-bordershopping indicates a new level oftransparency that will ultimately benefitthe sector. Increased availability ofinformation and the removal of barriers(which the improved cross-borderroad infrastructure has contributed to)stimulate market competition whichultimately leads to cost and pricereductions. We have already seen somesupermarket giants taking steps toreduce prices on the southern side ofthe border.The inclusion by the Central StatisticsOffice of a module on cross-bordershopping in the Quarterly NationalHousehold Survey has brought a senseof perspective to the sometimes emotivesubject of cross-border shopping.This will allow for a more informed andreasoned debate on the issue, whichcan only help cross-border cooperationand policy development to furthermutual benefit..Eoin Magennis is Policy ResearchManager with InterTradeIreland,where he is responsible fordeveloping and implementingbusiness and economic research onthe island economy.Steve MacFeely is Director ofBusiness Statistics at the CentralStatistics Office, where he isresponsible for the productionand dissemination of agriculture,building and construction, industrialservices, foreign affiliate, energy,innovation and R&D, prices,transport and tourism statistics.Aidan Gough is Director of Strategyand Policy with InterTradeIreland,where he is responsible fordeveloping its strategic directionas it seeks to deliver its legislativemandate.REFERENCES1. ‘Tills ring out in Enniskillen as crossbordertrade soars’, Belfast News-Letter,16 December 2008.2. This was widely reported at the timeand resulted in some sharp responses:see ‘Apology sought from Lenihan over“unpatriotic” shopping in Newry’, IrishTimes, 9 December 2008. The chargewas laid again last year by the Tánaiste,Mary Coughlan: see ‘Minister urgespeople to shop locally’, Irish Times, 16November 2009.3. See ‘One job lost for every 150 tripsacross the Border’, Irish Independent,30 November 2009; ‘British shops’war on Irish’, Irish Mail, 12 November2009; and ‘Shoppers going Northare not traitors’, Irish Independent,JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 55

26 November 2009. These headlinescapture something of the tone of mediacoverage. However there has been morenuanced analysis from the economistJim O’Leary, ‘Going North to shop mayprevent economy going south’, IrishTimes, 12 December 2008, and in arecent discussion on Irish Economyblog: see http://www.irisheconomy.ie/index.php/2009/12/11/cso-on-crossborder-shopping/#comments4. For full results see http://www.cso.ie/releasespublications/documents/labour_market/current/qnhs_xborder.pdf5. One interesting point is that 15% ofshoppers from the South-West usedthe plane to travel to Northern Ireland(i.e from Cork to Belfast). The ‘timeinvolved’ point comes from a survey of500 cross-border shoppers carried outin June 2009 which found that 87% ofthese shoppers would only travel for upto one hour to ‘save a quarter on theirgrocery bill’. See Mintel, The Impact ofCross-border Shopping (Irish Series,August 2009).6. A topic for further research is thedegree to which a cross-bordershopping hinterland on the island ofIreland may be different from otherEuropean regions. The ‘Reviving theBorder Region Economy in a new eraof peace and devolved government’research project, being carried out forthe Centre for Cross Border Studies bya team led by Professors John Bradleyand Michael Best, has a shoppingmodule that will compare the Irishborder with the German/Polish one. Thiswill build on previous research: JohnFitzgerald, Brendan Whelan and JamesWilliams, An analysis of cross-bordershopping, ESRI General ResearchPapers 137 (1988), and Tanja Dmitrovicand Irena Vida, ‘An examination ofcross-border shopping behaviour inSouth-East Europe’, European Journalof Marketing, 41/3 (2007), 382-395.7. Alcohol, cosmetics, groceries(including tobacco), clothing anddurables, and other.8. The estimated losses of theselatter two, apparently to cross-bordershopping, were complicated by lostbusiness to the overall economicdownturn. Therefore, comparisons weremade in relative performance betweenstores in border regions against thosefurther south.9. This figure is taken from Fitzgerald,Whelan and Williams, An analysis ofcross-border shopping.10. Calculation based on the authors’estimate – using 2007 figures for retailconsumption and the Retail Sales Indexsince that year.56JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

Dissolving Boundariesin North-South educationRoger AustinIn 1998 the then Irish Taoiseach, Bertie Ahern, and theformer British Prime Minister, Tony Blair, took part in ahistoric video-conference link between two schools,one in Northern Ireland and the other in the Republicof Ireland. It was the first time that political leaders hadused this technology in schools. This ‘virtual’ meetingbetween the two heads of state with two classes ofstudents and their teachers led to a programme whichhas steadily expanded every year and has now reached370 schools, 740 teachers and 26,600 students.The leaders’ meeting was the start of the DissolvingBoundaries project, managed by the Schools ofEducation at the University of Ulster and NationalUniversity of Ireland Maynooth.Roger AustinAfter more than a decade of work, itseems like a good time to ask:• What exactly has the programmeachieved?• What lessons for the future, if any,might be drawn from DissolvingBoundaries’ experience?In considering lessons learned, wewould like to consider both the island ofIreland and elsewhere. We have usedthree illustrative case studies of partnerschools to consider these questions.The first case study is from two primaryschools.1. Changing community attitudesthrough primary school linksAnyone who has tried to open dialogueacross the border in Ireland knowsthat it is often extremely difficult topersuade the Protestant community inNorthern Ireland to get involved. In spiteof the achievements of the 1998 GoodFriday Agreement, there remain largepockets of suspicion on the northernside of the border about a possibleunited Ireland and whether an organisedNorth-South school link would besupported by parents and governors.Here is the principal of a rural, controlled(i.e. predominantly Protestant) primaryschool reflecting on how his schoolbecame involved in the DissolvingBoundaries programme four years ago:The parents had sort of indicatedthat it was ok to do it, but comingfrom a very difficult area here weneeded to tread carefully. ThisJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.557

is a loyalist stronghold. We havepeople here whose relations,whose husbands or whatever havebeen shot and murdered. So it’s aparticularly entrenched area, andwith so much accountability inschools now coming from parents’views, we feel a wee bit vulnerablesometimes in terms of taking onnew projects.The class teacher directly involvedin the programme commented onhow little contact the pupils had withchildren from ‘down South’, and howthe school had involved parents fromthe very beginning, including them inthe face to face visit that was beingplanned. In all their contact with parents,it was similarities between the twoschools that were stressed - ‘similarage group, farming background’ – tocreate what the teacher described as‘non-threatening contact with children inanother place’. He added:Had we been paired with a school inDublin, it wouldn’t have worked. Notat all. And the parents would havebeen asking a lot more questions. Ithink once they were from the samesort of area it encouraged them andgave them a little comfort zone.This is a significant observation in thecontext of the theoretical frameworkthe Dissolving Boundaries team haveused to influence the roll out of theprogramme. Allport’s contact hypothesissuggests that for contact betweendifferent groups to be successful, certainconditions have to be met. One of theseconditions is that the participants shouldbe of ‘equal status’. We have interpretedthis to mean that there should besufficient similarity in terms of age, abilityand aspiration for there to be enoughcommon ground for dialogue totake place.But to suggest that cross-bordereducational links are only a problem forschools in Northern Ireland would be amistake. The principal of the Republicof Ireland school linked to the onedescribed above painted a picture ofher rural school that was in its own wayisolated and somewhat drawn inupon itself.We are a very small rural community.We’re in a bog and you only comehere to come here. You don’t gothrough here to get anywhere else.And that in itself has ensured thatthere’s very a much of sense ofwe’re here and we’re us. It’s almostlike an island in its own.While noting the value of the locallinks her children had with others for‘tag rugby, Gaelic football, hurlingand meeting them at sacraments’,she stressed that ‘the outside thingis wonderful’. This level of supportfrom this principal was echoed by herpartner colleague in Northern Ireland,who spoke of the potential she sawfor ‘the engagement, the opening ofminds, for making a difference’. Thiskind of leadership, based on a vision ofusing technology to open minds andperspectives, is a critical element in thesuccess of Dissolving Boundaries.In their different ways, these two primaryschool principals also remind us of thegeographical, political and historical58JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

factors that in the past have causedmisunderstandings, suspicion andfear. As the two schools began to thinkabout the possibility of working together,the principals and their designatedteachers met face to face for a planningsession to decide what the focus of thecurricular work should be. The principalof the school in the Republic ofIreland said;We have the canal here and theyhave Lough Neagh. So the first yearwe talked a lot about that kind ofthing. We have a lot in common.We have wáter, and water had abig impact on the community - itgrew up around the building of thecanal. There was no communitybefore that. Their community grewup around the necessity of the workin the mill. So they learn a lot aboutwhat people can have in common.For many schools in the programme,particularly in the early stages of apartnership, the fundamental goal isabout trust-building. This often meansstarting work on issues which are notcontentious. It led one of the Southernteachers to comment on her pupils’perceptions of the children inNorthern Ireland:They have no concept of interestin those children’s lives in terms oftheir religious backgrounds, theirhistorical background. They want toknow: What do they eat? What dothey watch on tv? What team doyou follow? What music do you like?And when they get together, thefriendships form on the basis of “ohhe likes such and such a team soI’m fine with him”.She went on, however, to observe that‘every time we do Irish history, whichis historically quite complicated, withpartition and everything else, somebodyin the class mentions – “Aren’t ourfriends in Northern Ireland…?” Sheadded that this ‘reality’ meant that it’sreal history, living history that they needfor now.’We can see in these comments boththe importance of building links aroundpupils’ interests, ensuring that the focusof work is age appropriate, but alsothe beginnings of changed perceptionsabout controversial issues in thecurriculum.The place of ICT in sustainingcontactAt the start of the Dissolving Boundariesprogramme we knew that face to facemeetings between schools could beimportant, but in order to make therelationship sustainable and long term,we needed to harness ICT to fostereveryday contact. Schools now usethree ICT applications to achieve this.Two of the applications use softwarecalled Moodle which enables teachersand pupils to engage in on-line groupdiscussion. We wanted to drawon another aspect of the contacthypothesis by getting away from theindividual electronic pen-pal conceptto foster group-to-group discussion,enabling children to interact with othersin a way that naturally accommodateddiversity. As the pupils soon discovered,JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 59

not all the children in a linked group werethe same: some were white skinned andothers not; some were passionate aboutsoccer and others about Gaelic games.At the annual planning conference, theteachers are shown the importance ofsplitting their classes into smaller teamsin such a way that each team has amatching group in the other school.When they exchange group profilesthey write as a group, describing theirappearance, their likes and dislikes; sothe on-line ‘forum’ is the place whereregular messages are exchanged in aprivate and secure area. Traditionalists,worried at what might look like childrenspending time on the exchange ofpersonal data about their lives, wouldbe impressed by the improvement inwriting skills that occur when there isa real audience. But beyond this, weconcur with Wenger and others whoargue that effective learning is oftentriggered by social interaction and, inthis case, by having a real purpose forcommunicating. Once you have peopleyou call ‘friends’ across the border, itstarts a process of thinking about theirperception of the world and how toexpress things sensitively.We have a good example of this fromthe curricular work that these twoschools carried out. After their initialstudy of the place of water in their twocommunities, the schools chose tostudy animals in China and Fair Trade.As each team researched an agreedaspect of the topic, they posted theirfindings into another part of Moodle,called a ‘wiki’, a shared on-line ‘space’for building a sort of website. Oftenthe pupils in one school will chooseone colour for their contributions, sothat they can be distinguished from thework of the team members in the otherschool. One of the teachers describedhow his pupils reacted to this process:“ I love your picture on so and so”,and then they send them one. Youknow that kind of thing. And whenit comes to the next stage of theproject, doing this animal stuff, it willbe very much creating wiki pagesand then maybe sending an email:“I’ve put in such a thing, will you addin what you think about it and sendme an email if you think I shouldchange – what do you think?”You know the way kids are witheach other.We see this as an excellent exampleof collaborative learning, with childreneffectively constructing knowledge ata distance,and doing this at the age ofnine or ten. It’s worth underlining thepoint that the software is not ‘prepackagedcontent’; it allows the learnerto adapt it, to personalize it and then toshow it off to the rest of the class. Thekey in this is that the two teams on eachside of the border are working towards acommon goal, namely the presentationof research on a topic that is part of thecurriculum.For this collaboration to happen,teachers use imagination and flexibilityto see how work spanning a wholeschool year can ‘fit in’ with whatthey have to do anyway. The annualevaluation reports that the programmeteam produce (available at www.dissolvingboundaries.org) make clearhow this process takes time; there60JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

are no quick fixes here, just a steadyaccretion of experience. That is whywhen schools are invited to take partin Dissolving Boundaries, they aregiven extra help in the first year, butencouraged from Year Two to remainpart of the programme ‘family’. Theyget a reduced level of funding, butenough to attend an annual reflectionand planning conference in Septemberwhere they hear of the work that otherschools have carried out and have timeto plan their own activities for the year. Ineffect, we have a ‘learning community’,a steadily expanding network, with 30new schools on each side of the borderjoining every year.The two ICT applications described sofar are both asynchronous: i.e. they donot require schools to be on-line at thesame time. This has the very decidedbenefit of giving teachers the scope tofit Dissolving Boundaries work in aroundother commitments. It also means thatthe pupils have time to think and todiscuss in their own groups what theyshould communicate to their partnerteam in the other school. Later in thisarticle we will see how schools are usingthe third application, real-time videoconferencing,as a further means ofsustaining contact.To conclude this case study of the twoprimary schools, we focus on a nontechnologyprogramme component - theface to face visit - which many regard asthe high point of the year.Meeting face to faceThe schools are given a small grant tocontribute to a face to face meeting andthis often takes place at a venue halfway between the two schools: popularvenues include Dublin or Belfast Zoo, orone of the many outdoor or adventurecentres. In some cases the venue isdirectly linked to the curricular workbeing done, but in others, such as thiscase study, the focus was more on teambuilding through outdoor pursuits. Themeeting was ‘a huge motivation’, ‘theicing on the cake’. As one principal putit, it is the relationships built around theuse of ICT that makes the face to facemeeting successful:Through the technology they havebuilt up a good trusting relationship.And when they meet each other,they at least have a starting point toengage in conversation, group workand activities.The partnering principal described howthe two teams were brought together:So the deal is the A team fromour school and the A team fromtheir school have to spend the daytogether and everything they do as ateam. And you know it really makesa difference.There’s a climbing wall and the firstthing they do is go round the bottomof it. Then they work with their ownpartner which is their email partneressentially. And that’s all great. Thenthey are on archery teams, there’san assault course. And everything isteam. And they are always – the As,Bs, Cs, Ds, Es and Fs.For the children there is both excitementand a little anxiety about taking theJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 61

step from virtual contact at a distanceto being in direct contact. One of theteachers in the Republic of Irelanddescribed an incident involving one ofher pupils;A little girl in the class was typing toher friend saying, see you tomorrowand looking forward to it and all that,when she stopped dead. And thisis the third year of the project. Arethey Catholic or Protestant? Wouldshe know what confirmation is?Because she’d had a confirmationthe previous Monday and I said,“Oh yes, they probably do that”.That was it, nothing else. The littleone was into horses and so wasshe. She just didn’t want to be tellingher something that she mightn’tknow. That was it. That was the onlytime a child has mentioned religion inall the years of doing the project.This growing sensitivity to culturaldifference, which we see as one ofthe most important outcomes of theprogramme, also extends to the widercommunities that the children belongto. In this case study there was directparental involvement, with some of thenorthern parents and school governorsaccompanying the children on the visit,and southern parents actively backingthe programme through the Parents’Association, and on one occasionproviding a barbeque at the end of thevisit. The whole process led the principalof the northern school to say that as aresult of this sustained link, ‘we’ve nowgot an extended family’.OutcomesOne of the most interesting outcomesin this link is the way that the schoolin Northern Ireland was able togradually win the parents over to a newperspective on school policy towardsdifference and diversity. At first, theattraction of a link ‘far away’ in theRepublic of Ireland was partly that itwasn’t too close to home. Researchliterature (e.g. Sundberg) confirms thatgeographical distance lessens anxietyabout contact with an ‘out group’, butin this case the positive experienceof working with parents on the crossborderlink opened up new possibilities.The principal put it as follows:Dissolving Boundaries was my firsttoe in the water with this communityI have been blessed to work withhere. And as a result of that it hasenabled other activities: we havea scheme going with P3s everyyear with our closest neighbouringmaintained (Roman Catholic) schoolwhere they meet for 12 weeks. Theyhave two hours a week and theyput on a fabulous show in the localcommunity hall for parents, teachersand children. To do this we wereable to call upon the experiences,the trust, the integrity of ourDissolving Boundaries project.We should not underestimate thesignificance of this kind of developmentin terms of transforming the place ofschool in the community and doing thisthrough the imaginative use of ICT. It’san excellent example of what has beenreferred to as ‘E-schooling’ (Austinand Anderson) where ICT accelerateschange in the nature of learning62JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

Children from Portmarnock National School, Co Dublin and St Mary’s School, Limavady,Co Londonderry during a Dissolving Boundaries face to face meeting.both inside the school and withinthe community it serves; to use AlanNovember’s language, it ‘transforms’learning.In concluding this case study, we mightreflect on the ways that this link hasdeveloped what we call ‘citizenship’qualities in the pupils, not through astudy of citizenship content as such,but through a process of workingwithin a cross-border team and startingto understand diversity and respectdifference. It is one indicator of successthat in the year 2008-9 almost half of theNorthern Irish primary schools involvedwere from the Protestant side of thecommunity and just over half were fromthe Catholic side.In the next case study, a link betweentwo Special Schools, we ask aboutother meanings of the word ‘boundaries’and how video-conferencing is openingup unexpected horizons for teachersand young people.2. Special School partnershipAt the very start of the programme,we wanted the communicationtechnologies to be open to all, and inthis spirit of inclusiveness we invitedSpecial Schools to join in. Since 1998over 30 have taken part, enablingyoung people with a very wide rangeof learning needs to work together,often making exceptionally good use ofvideo-conferencing. Technically, we havemoved from using the rather expensiveISDN system to one that is now internetbasedand therefore free once theschool is connected to the internet, acritically important development in termsof extending access to schools whilekeeping within a tight budget.In the case study chosen to illuminateJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 63

this part of Dissolving Boundaries, thelink was between a Special School inBelfast and a Special School across theborder. The northern pupils taking partwere described as follows:There’s eleven of them. Some ofthem have Downs Syndrome. Thereare children with autism and thereare children with general globaldelay. So the top ability children inthe class would have quite low mild,moderate learning difficulties, andthe lowest ability children wouldhave severe learning difficulties.The southern partner school had ninestudents who were a year older butwere ‘at similar levels in terms of ability’.The principal in this school, asked aboutwhy he got involved, talked about theneed to open up his school to the widerworld:We used to be in the past sort ofhidden away and very few knewabout us. But we’re trying toencourage more people to comein. The whole stigma with a SpecialSchool in the past was childrenweren’t thought of, whereaswe’ve tried to open our doors andencourage people to come and visit;to see that it’s just kids that need alittle bit of extra help.So just as the primary school link brokedown the geographical isolation of tworural schools, in this case study thetechnology broke through the formerlyclosed, forgotten world of childrenwho ‘just need a little bit of extra help’.Interestingly, one of these schools hadalso had a previous link with childrenin a mainstream primary school, anexperience that would have beenunsustainable without the use of videoconferencing.Video-conferencingAlthough all schools in the programmenow have software called Marratechto make ‘real time’ live visual contactwith their partner school, this bit oftechnology, using a simple webcamattached to a PC, has made a hugedifference in both Special and primaryschools. The fact that the children arein the same classroom all day, generallywith the same teacher, makes thescheduling of live video-conferencingsessions much easier than in secondaryschools.And as one of the teachers reflected onhow different technologies had beenused in their work, it was clear thatvideo-conferencing had a very specialplace:We would have emailed and wewould have exchanged pictures,videos too. We would have madePower Points. There’s all that inDissolving Boundaries. We’ve gota Power Point underway followingthrough our work here. We’ve gotthe pictures of exchange meetingsand all that. But on top of all thatyou have the video-conferencing,which on the one hand seems likea small enough thing, the cherryon the icing. But it seems to me it’srather more than that because it iskind of so special.For the children there was the motivation64JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

of a medium that didn’t require highlydeveloped literacy skills:From the word go, when theyrealised that they could seethemselves and others on video andsee them responding on the screen,I don’t think there’s too much doubtthat that in itself was exciting andthey wanted to be involved in that.As many other studies have shown,however, (for example, Martin) it’snot enough to assume that once thetechnology is in place it will be usedeffectively. In this case study we can seea number of reasons why the video-linkshad such an impact. First, the teachersthemselves had to become proficientusers of what was a completely newICT application, and they began withreservations about whether it wouldwork and be reliable. One said:I didn’t know what videoconferencingwas. So it was abit scary…. there are few thingsworse than the business of tryingto use the technology and it lettingyou down.His partner teacher, interviewed thefollowing day, said:The video conferencing was brilliant.I had a lot of reservations about it,I’d never done it before. But actuallyit went quite smoothly.It took several attempts to get bothgood quality sound and image, testingthe best place to put the microphoneand to position the camera. It wouldhave been understandable for teacherswith a modest level of ICT competenceto give up, but the reality of anotherschool counting on the link beingmade elicited a level of persistencethat we have observed right acrossthe programme. The presence of adistant audience, and the fact thatthe teachers had met and planned aseries of activities, contributed to thedetermination of teachers to find ways tosolve the inevitable technical problems.The fact that there was a real purposebehind using ICT meant that teachersacquired and consolidated high levels ofskill, adapting the technology to suit theirspecific classroom needs.In this partnership the teachers alsorealised that the students needed tobe carefully prepared for the videoconferencesafter initial experiments withthe technology:We quickly realised that it would behelpful for them to make their ownnotes and to have them in front ofthem. To be comfortable about thethings they were planning to say,and remembering to say them, andnot just be tongue tied with oneanother.In effect, the pupils were learning notjust about the communication skillsof turn-taking, listening to differentaccents and articulating ideas, but alsopicking up literacy skills in the process,a considerable achievement for theseparticular students.There were two final factors in explainingthe success of video-conferencingin this partnership: one was the waythat this medium was integrated intoJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 65

other elements of the programme. Inthis case, a face to face meeting hadtaken place early on in the school yearin the northern school and, as one ofthe teachers commented, this provideda strong focus for the use of videoconferencing:The video-conferencing is a greatway to get it started becausethey can talk to these people, andthe meeting that we had at thebeginning of the year was fabulous.That really led to a big motivationand the children then knew the kidsby the time they came to videoconference.Once this Pandora’s box ofcommunication technology was opened,the pupils wanted to use it every day:It brought in the world around us inthe sense that the children talkedabout all the different activities thatthey’d done. So when they went onthe bus tour of Belfast, they relayedthat and they talked about what theyhad done. They talked about whatthey had seen. So really anything wedid in school kind of a wee bit out ofthe ordinary, they brought it up andwere like ‘we want to tell our partnerschool about it’.The second reason why the videoconferencingworked was that it wasstrongly tied into the curriculum projectthe schools were working on. Thisfocussed partly on the developmentof gardens, with the southern schooldeveloping a sensory garden and thenorthern school developing thinkingskills through the cultivation of herbs forcookery. This proved to be a good focusfor real time discussion:In one of our video-conferences wewere just exchanging notes abouthow the plants were getting on…we saw in the background in oneof their pictures that they had awee mini greenhouse where theyput their plants when they weretransferring them to outside. So wewere keeping tabs on each other’ssuccesses.In both schools teachers commentedon how the use of technology and thelink with the other school had raised theself-esteem of the pupils and improvedcommunication skills. In some casesit gave pupils a sense of ownershipof their learning and the confidenceto be ‘leaders’ in the school. Theseare important outcomes, and a usefulreminder that when we evaluate theimpact of ICT, we need to look at morethan just improvements in academicperformance. What this case studyshows is the power of ICT to help youngpeople feel part of wider society, notjust locally but on a wider stage. Socialcohesion should be at least one of thestrategic goals for the use of ICT.3. French without tears: anenterprising secondaryschool linkIn our final case study we examine thehighly unlikely notion of a French linkacross the border in Ireland, and thesurprising effects this has had on pupils’language acquisition. Unexpectedpartnerships are formed at planningconferences when teachers often meet66JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

for the first time: in this case a teacherof French from County Dublin met aScience teacher from Northern Irelandwho had one French class. In spite oftheir initial concerns about whether amodern language link would work,they soon realised that both sets ofstudents were at the same level oflearning the language, both had a similarcurriculum and needed to communicateorally and in writing. The Frenchspecialist, who had previous experienceof links to France, had found that thedifferences in pupils’ proficiency levelsin English and French in such links hadpresented problems.In the Dissolving Boundaries link, theevenness of language proficiency meantthat both sets of pupils, regarded inone of the schools as fairly challenging,wanted to impress their partners,checking written work to make sureit was free of mistakes. The teacherswere astonished at the readiness ofthe pupils, particularly the boys, towant to write. They also noted greatercollaboration within their respectiveclassrooms and, as one principal said,‘it improved their self-confidence andhas certainly broadened their horizons’.The class teacher noted improvementsin speaking, listening and written work,and to their sense of enjoyment. It isJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 67

charged with policy implementation.What is still needed is a more explicitpolicy statement from government inboth jurisdictions about the role of ICTin promoting both social cohesion andinter-cultural education.SustainabilityOne of the biggest problems facingany programme that starts life as aninnovative pilot is how to expand anddisseminate good practice in costeffectiveways. As the number ofschools has expanded year on yearfrom 52 initially to 180 in 2008-9, theteam have had to devise an increasinglysophisticated way of supporting andmonitoring each partnership. A databaseof all participating schools is used toadd weekly notes on the use of Moodleand video-conferencing, so that wherethere has been a lack of activity, theprogramme team can intervene. Inour view, this external support is oneof the reasons why so many schoolshave stayed with the programme, andit underlines the point that sustaininglinks has to be actively managed by anexternal agency.An inclusive, whole schoolperspectiveThese case studies show that just aboutany child, of any age, studying any areaof the curriculum, can benefit from theuse of communication technologies forthis kind of inter-cultural learning. TheICT applications chosen have the greatadvantage of being so flexible that theycan be adapted for use with SpecialNeeds students just as easily as theycan for nine year olds or those aged16-18. Our emphasis on the process oflearning, whatever the subject matter,has meant that the programme hashelped teachers embed ICT skills intheir own teaching and transfer thisexperience to other parts of their work.This is particularly significant giventhe reservations expressed by bothacademics (e.g. Cuban) and schoolinspectors in both jurisdictions on theimpact of ICT. The cumulative effectof this has been that the DissolvingBoundaries programme is not stuck ina ghetto in schools. It reaches out andconnects, especially when principalsgive it their wholehearted backing. Theirleadership is a critical component.Future challengesWith the transfer of policyimplementation from the Department ofEducation to the Education and SkillsAuthority (ESA) in Northern Ireland,and in a climate of cutting back onpublic expenditure on both sides ofthe border, the Dissolving Boundariesprogramme is vulnerable, in spite of itshigh impact and low costs. The recentlyformed partnership between DissolvingBoundaries and the Joint BusinessCouncil of the Confederation of BritishIndustry (CBI) in Northern Ireland andthe Irish Business and Employers’Confederation (IBEC) in the Republicto develop an ‘enterprise’ focus for 20schools in the programme from 2009is a significant step in winning privatesector support for the work being done.The continuing community tensionsin Northern Ireland and difficulties inaccepting new immigrants suggest that,far from cutting back on the programme,its lessons need to be applied both interms of broader North-South links andJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 69

within Northern Ireland. The impressivework being done in the Middle Eastlinking different Arab and Jewish teachertrainees shows that there is nowinternational recognition that this modelworks. What is needed is the continuedpolitical will to sustain it.Dr Roger Austin, Senior Lecturer inthe School of Education at Universityof Ulster, is co-director of theDissolving Boundaries programme.N.B. I would like to acknowledge thecontribution made to the programmeand its research by my colleaguesin the School of Education at theUniversity of Ulster, Jane Smyth,Marie Mallon and Hazel Bailie, andto the other members of the team inNUI Maynooth, Angela Rickard andNigel Metcalfe.REFERENCESSchools’, http://www.deni.gov.uk/circular_2007.pdfDepartment of Education and Science,Dublin, Inspection report on the impactof ICT, 2008.http://www.education.ie/servlet/blobservlet/ICT_in_schools_insp_report.pdfDissolving Boundaries research reports,2002-8, www.dissolvingboundaries.orgHoter.E, Shonfeld.M and Ganayim.A, Information and CommunicationTechnology (ICT) in the Service ofMulticulturalism, The InternationalReview of Research in Open andDistance Learning, Vol.10, No.2 , 2009Martin.M, Video-conferencing forschools: Pedagogy and Practice,Guildhall Press, Derry, NorthernIreland, 2008Allport.G.W, The nature of prejudice,Cambridge, Mass. Addison-Wesley,1954.Austin.R and Anderson.J, E-schooling:global messages from a small island.Routledge, London, 2008.Cuban, L., Oversold and underused:Computers in the classroom.Cambridge, Mass: Harvard UniversityPress, 2001.Department of Education, NorthernIreland,‘Use of Information andCommunications Technology inNovember,A, http://novemberlearning.com/Sundberg, P.A, Building positiveattitudes among geographically-diversestudents: The Project I-57 experience.Paper presented at the NationalEducating Computing Conference,NECC 2001, Building on the Future,Chicago, Ill.Wenger. E, Communities of practice:learning, meaning, and identity.Cambridge University Press, 199870JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

e-emergence of ‘political economy’,and the partial and uneven recollectivisationof the economy: witness,for example, the recent socialisation offinancial risk in state bail-outs for thebanking sector. Compared to previousand similar responses to economiccrises of the past – most notably theRoosevelt New Deal in the US in the1930s depression and the evolutionof the welfare state in Europe after theSecond World War – this one has somenew and extremely significant additionalfactors. These include the issue of‘peak oil’, finally acknowledged by theInternational Energy Agency (IEA)’s2008 World Energy Outlook; relatedconcerns around resource scarcityand competition; energy security; thedecarbonisation of our energy systemand the better known interlocking set ofissues around climate change.Despite the failure of the Copenhagenclimate change conference in December2009, it is clear that one cannotseparate tackling climate changefrom the emergence of a new energyeconomy: the search for paths towardsa decarbonised economy is the onlygame in town. As Fatih Birol, chiefeconomist of the IEA put it: “We need toleave oil before oil leaves us.” 1This new economic model has beengiven a number of names: including the‘new industrial revolution’ (UK GreenParty, 2009), the ‘smart economy’(Department of the Taoiseach, 2008)and ‘ecological civilisation’ (ChineseCommunist Party, 2007). The GreenNew Deal, originated by the groupof the same name in the UK, will beused in this article. Paraphrasing ColinHines, one of the main authors of theoriginal 2008 Green New Deal report,our dominant economic model basedon ‘buildings, banks and boutiques’ (i.e.property speculation, financial servicesand consumerism) has spectacularlyimploded. In short, business as usual isnot an option; we need to find anothereconomic model.What is the Green New Deal?Drawing our inspiration from FranklinD. Roosevelt’s courageous programmelaunched in the wake of the Great Crashof 1929, we believe that a positivecourse of action can pull the worldback from economic and environmentalmeltdown. The Green New Deal thatwe are proposing consists of two mainstrands: first, it outlines a structuraltransformation of the regulation ofnational and international financialsystems, and major changes to taxationsystems; second, it calls for a sustainedprogramme to invest in and deployenergy conservation and renewableenergies, coupled with effective demandmanagement. 2In the context of the present crisis thereis a palpable sense of the need for newthinking, and therefore talk of a GreenNew Deal has gained considerableground. Since the publication of the UKGreen New Deal Group’s original NewEconomics Foundation report in May2008, there have been numerous furtherstudies and reports ranging from theUN Environment Programme 3 to studiesby major financial institutions such asHSBC 4 .72JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

An increasingly common sight in the Irish landscape: windmills putting renewable wind energy intothe increasingly all-island electricity gridThe Green New Deal contract betweengovernment, markets and citizens is onewhere the market (especially finance)is much more tightly and transparentlyregulated and there is a significantrole for the state in ‘steering,’ if not‘rowing’ the economy. Around the worldgovernments are putting together billiondollar Keynesian stimulus packages toprotect their national economies andkick-start the global one. Some, suchas South Korea, China, Germany and ofcourse the Obama administration in theUS, are devoting a significant proportionof this major government spending toinvestments in renewable energy, cleantechnology and the environmental goodsand services sector.President Obama’s $900 billionstimulus package, recently agreed byCongress, is in part motivated by theaim of reducing America’s dependenceon unstable foreign fossil fuel energysupplies by investing massively in greenenergy infrastructure and in the processcreating an estimated two million ‘greencollar’ jobs. These countries havegrasped the opportunity of the currentdownturn to move in the direction of aGreen New Deal, at the centre of whichis decarbonisation of the economy, thepromotion of ‘green collar’ jobs andinvestment in the green technologysector. This Green New Deal tackles the‘triple crunch’: the economic recessionand job losses, energy insecurity andprice/supply instability, and tacklingclimate change.Some of the main tenets of the GreenNew Deal include a return to Keynesiandemand-side management, tighter reregulationof finance, and governmentJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 73

counter-cyclical investment to boostjob creation. This very much followsRoosevelt’s New Deal of the 1930s: firstimpose strict regulations on the causeof the problem – a greedy, feckless andinadequately regulated finance sector;second, get people back to work andgenerate new business opportunities;third, fund this in part by an increase intaxes on big business and the rich – ameasure which also has the positiveeffect of decreasing inequality.The specifically ‘green’ element relatesto the opportunities to, in the wordsof the Nobel-prize winning economist,Joseph Stiglitz, “not let a good crisis goto waste” by doing things in response tothe current crisis that were not possiblebeforehand. Specifically, the GreenNew Deal proposes that governmentsshould shift to a low-carbon energyeconomy through massive investment inrenewable energy. In Ireland this wouldinclude the upgrading of the all-islandelectricity grid to enable this to happen;and creating a ‘carbon army’ to retrofitinsulation to our energy-leaky housingstock, thus creating thousands of jobsand business opportunities, as well astackling fuel poverty.Measures to reduce dependenceon fossil fuels, stimulate alternativetechnologies and save energy cancreate a substantial number of jobsduring the years it will take to tacklethe current economic downturn. Thepotential increase in the demand forlabour reflects not only the labourintensity of many of the tasks that needto be undertaken in the short run, butalso the backlog of tasks to be donewhen a new policy framework is broughtin (e.g. retrofitting the existing housingstock with insulation or a comprehensiveprogramme to replace domesticboilers). The labour-intensive nature ofthe greening of the energy economyrepresents a golden opportunity forthose losing their jobs. This is particularlythe case when one thinks of theconstruction sector, badly damaged inthe recession, which could gain greatlyfrom any Green New Deal economicstrategy.As a Green New Deal would require‘buy in’ from all major stakeholders –government, business, trade unionsand wider civil society – it is much morethan an economic innovation strategy,though understandably that is how it isbeing portrayed and discussed in mediaand policy circles. Such is the scale ofthe ‘triple crunch’ – economic, climateand energy – we are facing, I believe thatsuch a coalition could be created if thereis the right leadership from governmentand the social partners. In Ireland, Northand South, a Green New Deal couldoffer a way to harness the abundantrenewable energy sources we have; linkuniversities and energy companies, andprovide skills and training for the growing‘green collar’ job sector.To reduce carbon dramatically willrequire skills ranging from energyanalysis, design and production of hitechrenewable alternatives; large-scaleengineering projects such as combinedheat and power plants and offshorewind farms; through to work in makingevery building ‘energy tight’; and fittingmore efficient energy systems in homes,offices and factories. To fulfill this labourdemand would require a targeted and74JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

structured skills and training strategy,which itself would provide more jobs.The scale of the challenges we facecannot be underestimated, but thenneither can the potential benefits. Themost timely and targeted measureswould include those that promote smartenergy-efficient public buildings andhomes, and switching to cleaner typesof transport, such as extending lightrail systems within Dublin and to citiessuch as Belfast. The number of jobs thatcould be created in Northern Ireland andthe Republic to upgrade the all-islandelectricity grid so that it is ready forrenewable connection could run intothousands, according to the All IslandGrid Study. 5It is important that fiscal measures thatare not explicitly ‘green’ do not makeachieving climate change goals moredifficult by subsidising greenhouse gasemissions or ‘locking in’ high-carboninfrastructure for decades to come.Hence a Green New Deal should alsoinclude removing subsidies and otherfiscal or financial incentives from formsof near-term infrastructural investment ortechnological innovation which maintainthe unsustainable, and thereforeultimately uneconomic, ‘business asusual’ high-carbon energy economy.Lest such a Green New Deal be viewedsimply as an unreconstructed Keynesian‘tax, borrow and spend’ strategy, it isimportant to stress that the removal ofgovernment subsidies, and therefore thecutting of state spending, is a key anddefining element of a Green New Dealwhich seeks to move the economy ontoa low-carbon, sustainable path.For example, removing the marketdistortingeffects of fossil fuel subsidies –estimated to be in the tens of billions ofdollars – would reduce CO2 emissionsin the OECD by over 20%. The creationof a level playing field by transferringthe subsidies to large, centralised,capital intensive carbon energy andtransportation investments wouldprovide a re-balancing of the market formore renewable, labour intensive energyand transportation activities. As theOECD’s Ministerial Environment PolicyCommittee noted: ‘Removing subsidiesto carbon-intensive technologies, pricingpollution and creating a “level playingfield” is also important to enable lowcarbonalternatives to compete fairly inthe market, and to find ways of helpingthese technologies to move quickly intothe market-place’. 6 Removing theseperverse subsidies could provide thenecessary funding, along with otheroptions – such as taxing ‘windfall’oil profits, adopting carbon taxes,and auctioning pollution and carbonallowances, as well as innovativefinancial mechanisms such as raisinggreen bonds – to provide the necessaryinvestment for this Green New Dealstrategy.Island of Ireland uniquely placedThe Green New Deal proposes thatsome of the stimulus packages thatare now being developed should betargeted away from maintaining theold 20th century economy towardsinvesting in the new economy of the21st century. The island of Ireland isuniquely placed, not least in terms of itsabundant renewable wind and marineenergy resources and its small scale,so that with the right political, business,JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 75

union and environmental leadership andpartnership it could become a ‘greeneconomy’ world leader. For example, inthe Republic of Ireland, the Green PartyMinister for Communications, Energyand Natural Resources, Eamon Ryan,has announced a f100 million insulationpackage that will create an estimated4,000 jobs in the hard-pressedconstruction industry and benefit over50,000 homes 7 . Or consider the 80,000jobs that the High Level Action Group onGreen Enterprise noted could be createdin the Irish green economy 8 . Jobs,reducing fuel poverty and reducingcarbon emissions – this is the type of‘triple win’ policy that is the hallmarkof a Green New Deal and adecarbonising economy.In Northern Ireland, given its largeenergy-inefficient social housing stock,high levels of fuel poverty and the factthat housing accounts for roughly25-30% of CO2 emissions, a similarprogramme would address multiplepolicy objectives at the same time. Itwould reduce our CO2 emissions andmake a significant contribution to theNorthern Ireland element of the UKClimate Change Bill targets; createthousands of jobs and opportunities forretraining; reduce fuel poverty and thusunnecessary illness and deaths; and, ifgiven the leadership this would require,overnight create a secure, sustainablemarket for retrofitting insulation to thepublicly owned housing stock. One ofthe other great advantages of creatingthis ‘green collar carbon army’ is thatthese jobs are not ‘offshorable’: thiswork cannot be outsourced to India orChina and would therefore provide localjobs for local people.According to a UK Department ofTrade and Industry/Department ofEnvironment, Food and Rural Affairsreport, world markets for environmentalgoods and services sector are set tobe worth $688 billion by 2010, justunder $800 billion by 2015 and willreach a trillion dollars by 2020 9 . Justas the Stern report called climatechange the ‘greatest market failurein history’ 10 , so combating climatechange and decarbonising the economycould be seen as a unique commercialopportunity for wealth and job creation.In a speech outlining his view of a GreenNew Deal in March 2009, Gordon Brownsaid a total of 1.3 million people wouldbe employed in the environmental sectorby 2017 - representing an annual growthrate of 5% and about 400,000 new jobs.UK Business Secretary John Huttonnoted: “By the end of the decade, globalgreen industries will be worth as muchas the global aerospace industry – in theorder of £350 billion a year – and withthe potential to create thousands of newgreen collar jobs in Britain. So there isa clear business case for maximisingthe opportunities presented by climatechange and making sure that Britainunlocks these business opportunities” 11 .Are the administrations in bothjurisdictions on the island of Irelandready to unlock those opportunities?Are ministers ambitious and innovativeenough to set in place the policies andprovide the political leadership andcooperatively develop and implement aGreen New Deal for the island?If nothing else, a Green New Dealrepresents perhaps the best optionwe have at the moment, since theold business model of fossil-fuelled,76JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

globalised and deregulated capitalismhas so spectacularly come off thewheels. A Green New Deal would bringthe economy ‘back down to earth’,reminding us that unlike governments,nature does not do bail-outs, and thereis an urgent need for new thinking andaction to re-embed the human economywithin the wider ecological system uponwhich it depends.The Northern Ireland Green NewDeal InitiativeIn early 2008 Friends of the EarthNorthern Ireland together with otherorganisations such as the Confederationof British Industry, the NorthernIreland Council for Voluntary Action,the Northern Ireland SustainableDevelopment Commission, the UlsterFarmers Union, individual entrepreneurs,policy-makers and academics fromthe two universities came together toproduce their version of a Green NewDeal for Northern Ireland. This waspublished in summer 2009.The Northern Ireland Green New Dealstrategy is based on the realisationthat ‘around 10% of Northern Ireland’sincome is spent on importing fossil fuelson which we are 99% dependent for ourenergy. Facing a future of rising energyprices we risk serious economic andsocial failure unless we act swiftly toreduce that dependence’. 12 Its vision ofa Green New Deal for Northern Irelandincludes: the refurbishment of tens ofthousands of existing homes each yearwith full insulation and renewable energy,thus making significant inroads intofuel poverty; transforming the energyperformance of public andcommercial buildings through energyefficiency measures and making ‘everybuilding a power station’; regionalisingand localising the supplies of bothelectricity and heat through large-scalerenewables, micro-generation andusing fossil fuels more efficiently; andemploying a ‘carbon army’ of highlower-skilledworkers to implement thissystematic reconstruction programme;transforming our transport system to befit for purpose in the coming era of highoil and carbon prices by providing a realpublic transport choice for everyone;creating thousands of ‘green collar’ jobsin the £3,000 billion world market forlow carbon environmental goods andservices; and developing a package offinancial innovations and incentives toleverage the very large sums needed toimplement such a programme, based onpartnership between the public sector,the private sector, and the public.The Green New Deal in the Republicof IrelandSome of the thinking in official policymakingcircles around the GreenNew Deal idea in the South can befound in the work of Forfás, the IrishGovernment’s advisory body forenterprise and science, and Comhar,JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 77

the national grid and building anew green infrastructure, includingmassive investment in renewableenergy. 19However more orthodox economistsrejected the report, including influentialfigures such as Colm McCarthy whochaired An Bord Snip Nua’ 20 , whofocussed on the dangers of overinvestmentin either wind generation orgrid capacity; ‘mission creep’ in relationto Comhar’s recommendation that theNational Treasury Management Agency(already tasked with running the NationalAssets Management Agency ‘bad bank’)should administer the revenue fromcarbon tax; and the uncosted characterof Comhar’s recommendations. Thisled to a rebuttal from Professor FrankConvery, chair of Comhar. He stressedthat a carbon tax is necessary butnot sufficient for reducing Ireland’sCO2 emissions, so the other policiesrecommended by the Comhar reportare required; that upgrading the gridis about decentralising electricityproduction; that other researchunderlines the need for more not lesswind energy production for the islandof Ireland; and he strongly rejectedMcCarthy’s criticism that the reportignored the state of public finances 21 .There has also been a lively debate onthe topic online, for example on theTASC (Taskforce and Action on SocialChange) ‘Progressive Economy’ blog.It is clear that while a debate has(belatedly) begun on the policiesunderlying a transition to a low-carbon,green, sustainable economy in theRepublic (sadly this debate is lessadvanced in Northern Ireland), there isa long way to go in terms of creating acommon vision based on the ecological,‘peak oil’, and climate change realitiesdriving that transition. The tensionsbetween those wedded to a moreorthodox economic vision and a desireto return to business as usual (whichcreated the Celtic Tiger economy) asquickly as possible, and those proposinga new green economic model, havebeen revealed, and these divisionswill become starker in 2010 when thisauthor predicts the economic recessionwill deepen.As climate change and energy securityissues come to shape the political andeconomic imperatives of the state, civilsociety and business (not to mentionbiodiversity, water, waste, food andtransport issues), we may expect newcoalitions of social and economicforces to coalesce around acceptance,modification or resistance to theinevitable transition to a low-carboneconomy. Which side will the tradeunions take? Or anti-poverty groups andother civil society organisations? Theseare the new and emerging political faultlines which need to be considered in theyears ahead as we begin the transitionto a new economy, devising new policiesin the context of a climate-changed andcarbon-constrained world.Towards a ‘sustainability wareconomy’?One possible version of a GreenNew Deal is what one may term a‘sustainability war economy’, whereunlike the planned transition outlined bythe Green New Deal, governments areforced to move quickly and belatedly80JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

to deal with and adapt to peak oil,insecurity of energy supply and climatechange impacts. Over the last coupleof years the argument has beenmade that the transition away fromunsustainable development towardsa more sustainable future may haveto be based on a difficult political andcultural experience similar to the onemany counties went through during andafter the Second World War. Considerthe following statement from AndrewSimms, head of research at the wellrespectedLondon-based green thinktank, the New Economics Foundation:The situation in the globalenvironmental war economy is notso different from the dilemma thatfaced individuals in Britain’s wareconomy. As Hugh Dalton, Presidentof the Board of Trade, put it in1943: ‘There can be no equality ofsacrifice in this war. Some must losetheir lives and limbs, others only theturn-ups on their trousers.’ Impactsmay differ, in other words, but theacknowledgement of a shared needremains and unifies. Faced with acrisis in which individuals are askedto subordinate personal goals to acommon good, they can, and do,respond. This is the lesson of theBritish and other war economies andit may also prove the rallying cry of anew environmental war economy. 22The same argument can be heard in theEuropean Commission. Stavros Dimas,Commissioner for the Environment, saidin a speech in January 2007:Damaged economies, refugees,political instability, and the loss oflife are typically the results of war.But they will also be the results ofunchecked climate change. It is likea war because to reduce emissionssomething very like a war economyis needed. All sectors – transport,energy, agriculture and foreign policy– must work closely together tomeet a common objective. And it isa world war because every countryin the world will be affected by theresults of climate change – althoughit will be the poorest who are hithardest. 23The UK Green New Deal report alsoechoes this “war economy” themein pointing out: ‘There is a growingconsensus that climate changedemands an economic mobilisationof clean energy technology, and otheranti-greenhouse measures, on a scaleto rival war time’ 24 . The stress onmobilisation and sense of urgency whichpermeates this report echo the wartimecall for citizens to enlist and supportthe war effort within an explicitly ‘greenKeynesianism’ context. According to theGreen New Deal report:In our living memory, the scale ofeconomic re-engineering needed toprevent catastrophic climate changeJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 81

has only been witnessed in a widerange of countries during war time.No other approach looks remotelycapable of delivering the necessaryvolume of emissions reductions inthe time needed. In that light, wecan learn from war-time experiences,positively and negatively. Thebest of those lessons can then betranslated into our contemporarycircumstances. 25Local Responses: The TransitionTowns MovementA more local level instance of an urgentresponse to the need for a Green NewDeal can be found in the rapidly growing‘Transition Towns’ movement in theUK and Ireland. 26 The Transition Townsmovement is an interesting innovationin that while it explicitly begins from thetwin challenges of ‘peak oil’ and climatechange, it is also resolutely practicaland pragmatic in orientation. It cannotbe described as overtly ideologicallyfocused in terms, for example, ofchallenging globalisation or articulatingan oppositional form of green politicalactivism. The UK Green New DealGroup makes an explicit link from theirmacro-level analysis to the local level ofthe Transition Town. Their report states:There is a sense already in Britishsociety that there is a ‘gatheringstorm’. Over one hundred TransitionTown organisations have arisen fromthe grass roots in towns, villagesand cities across Britain. These areessentially self-help organisationsseeking to assist their communitiesto reduce their dependence on fossilfuels and increase their economicresilience. They are preparing inpractical ways for the ‘power down’entailed in the coming energy crunchand the low-carbon living neededto fight climate change. Anyonewho has attended a Transition Townmeeting can report on the spiritthat exists to face up to the triplecrunch. 27Kinsale, Co. Cork set up the firstTransition Town group in Ireland andthere are now around 20 (mainly small)Transition Town groups in NorthernIreland and the Republic 28 (as well as arecently established all island TransitionInitiative Network). 29 In some respectsthe Transition Towns perspective makesa virtue of necessity (not just that ‘smallis beautiful’, but ‘small is inevitable’) aslocal communities prepare for ‘powerdown’ in a post-oil, low-carbon energyfuture. Other centres of green discourseand practice in Ireland include the GreenParty (in and outside government),green economic think tanks such asFeasta and sustainability organisationslike Cultivate, and environmental NGOssuch as Friends of the Earth in bothjurisdictions, as well as institutes ofsustainability and sustainable living in theuniversities.The positive post-oil future promotedby the Transition Town movement ischaracterised as ‘an abundant future,energy lean, time rich, less stressful,healthier and happier.’ 30 The TransitionTown movement seeks to inspireand empower local communities toreskill and educate themselves so thatcommunity resilience is enhanced todeal with the shocks of declining oil andclimate change. Transition Town is first82JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

and foremost about enhancing personal,family and community resilience bychanging individual and group social,ecological and economic behaviour andrelationships in relation to a particularplace. Also significant is the TransitionTown movement’s stress on communityself-reliance and resilience, its (relative)independence from the state andbusiness, its awareness of the land (andby extension wider ecological relations)and, most importantly, the strong senseof community solidarity and sharedwork towards providing the materialand energy wherewithal to sustain thatcommunity in a low-carbon future.ConclusionThere are also good reasons to viewthe inevitable transition towards a green,sustainable economy as desirablefrom an all-island perspective. Facingthe challenges and opportunities offinding a new way of ‘making our wayin the world’ in the 21st century could(I stress ‘could’ lest I be accused ofnaivety) become an important elementof a new post-conflict political narrativefor the island. With the creation of apower-sharing Executive within NorthernIreland and the slow but steady growthof pragmatic North-South cooperation,especially on infrastructure, publicservices and economic issues – notleast the creation of an all-islandwholesale electricity market in 2007 –there is the potential for a Green NewDeal to become part of an all-islandpost-conflict dispensation. As the 2008Smart Economy report in the Republic ofIreland put it:Uniquely in history, and by contrastwith previous periods of economicdifficulties since independence,Ireland faces the current economicsituation as an island at peace.The institutions established bythe Good Friday Agreement andthe transformation in relationshipsbetween the two traditions onon the island, between North andSouth, and between Britain andIreland, provide an entirely newand positive basis for tacklingthe current economic challengestogether. There is now an importantall-island dimension to all aspectsof Government policy. To theextent that it is appropriate, andby agreement with the NorthernIreland Executive, all of the policies,programmes and initiatives in thisAction Plan will take full account ofthe mutual benefits available throughNorth/South co-operation. 31Given the necessary connection (notfully explored in this article) betweenthe transition to a sustainable economyand issues of greater democratisation,citizen empowerment, human rights,good governance and lowering socioeconomicinequalities 32 , an all-islandGreen New Deal could provide apragmatic yet inspired approach toJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 83

integrating economic and social aswell as sustainability and post-conflictobjectives in Ireland. Such a GreenNew Deal could, with the right political,economic and cultural leadership(the latter cannot be discountedgiven the scale and magnitude of thetransition envisaged), together withmore grassroots initiatives such asTransition Towns, become a way forthe jurisdictions on the island to dealwith the problems and legacies of thepast while at the same time facingthe problems and opportunities of asustainable future together.John Barry is Associate Director ofthe Institute for a Sustainable Worldand Reader in the School of Politics,International Studies and Philosophyat Queen’s University Belfast. Hisbooks include Environment andSocial Theory (2nd edition, 2007) andthe co-edited volume, The Nation-State and the Global EcologicalCrisis (2005). He is co-editor of thejournal Environmental Politics. Heis currently writing two books, oneentitled Green Politics in Ireland andthe other Sustainability, Vulnerabilityand Green Politics. He is former cochairof the Green Party in NorthernIreland.REFERENCES1. Schneider, A., ‘Fatih Birol interview:‘Leave oil before it leaves us’, EnergyBulletin, available at: http://www.energybulletin.net/node/43604 (2008)2. Green New Deal group, A GreenNew Deal (London: New EconomicsFoundation), 2008.3. United Nations EnvironmentProgramme, Green Jobs: TowardsDecent Jobs in a Sustainable, LowCarbon World, available at:http://www.unep.org/publications/search/title_search.asp?search=Green+Jobs&image.x=6&image.y=9 (2008)4. HSBC Global Research, A Climatefor Recovery, available at: http://globaldashboard.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/HSBC_Green_New_Deal.pdf (2009)5. Department of Communications,Energy and Natural Resources, All IslandGrid Study, available at: http://www.dcenr.gov.ie/NR/rdonlyres/1B7ED484-456E-4718-A728-97B82D15A92F/0/AllIslandGridStudyStudyOverviewJan08.pdf (2008)6. OECD, Environment PolicyCommittee at Ministerial Levelmeeting on ‘Environment and GlobalCompetitiveness’, available at: http://www.oecd.org/document/29/0,3343,en_2649_201185_40541853_1_1_1_1,00.html (2008)7. Dept of Communications, Energyand Natural Resources, ‘Governmentannounces national insulationprogramme for economic recovery’,available at: http://www.dcenr.gov.ie/Press+Releases/Government+announces+national+insulation+programme+for+economic+recovery.htm (2008)8. High Level Action Group on GreenEnterprise, Developing the GreenEconomy in Ireland, available at:http://www.entemp.ie/publications/84JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

trade/2009/developing_the_green_economy_in_ireland_01.12.09.pdf(2009)9. Department of Trade and Industry/Department of Environment, Food andRural Affairs, Study of Emerging Marketsin the Environmental Industries Sector,available at: http://www.ukceed.org/files/downloads/emergingmarkets_summary.pdf .(2006)10. HM Treasury, Stern Review of theEconomics of Climate Change, availableat http://www.hm-treasury.gov.uk/stern_review_report.htm (2008)11. Hutton, J., ‘Environmentaltalent key to economic recovery’,available at: http://www.defra.gov.uk/news/2008/080501b.htm = (2009)12. Northern Ireland Green New Dealgroup, Green New Deal for NorthernIreland, available at: http://www.foe.co.uk/resource/briefings/ni_green_new_deal.pdf (2009)13. Forfás, A Baseline Assessment ofIreland’s Oil Dependence – key policyconsideration, Dublin, Forfás, 2006.14. ibid.15. Forfás, Environmental Goodsand Services Sector on the Islandof Ireland, available at: http://www.forfas.ie/publication/search.jsp?ft=/publications/2008/title,1930,en.php(2008)16. Department of the Taoiseach,Building Ireland’s Smart Economy: AFramework for Sustainable EconomicRenewal, (2008).17. ibid.18. Comhar SDC Report andRecommendations (2009), Towards aGreen New Deal for Ireland, available at:http://www.comharsdc.ie/_files/2009_TowardsAGreenNewDealComhar_rpt.pdf (2009)19. Gibbon, J., ‘Green New Dealpoints way out of economic trough’,Irish Times, 1/10/2009, available at:http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/opinion/2009/1001/1224255612654.html20. McCarthy, C. , ‘Green plana recipe for fudge and confusionin economic policy’, Irish Times,9/10/2009, available at: http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/opinion/2009/1009/1224256257436.html21. Convery, F. , ‘No point waiting untilthe 11th hour to adopt Green New Deal’,Irish Times, 15/10/2009, available at:http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/opinion/2009/1015/1224256691485.html22. Simms, A., Towards anEnvironmental War Economy, London:New Economics Foundation, 200123. Dimas, S., ‘Climate Change: Whya Global Response requires Europeanleadership’, available at: http://www.euractiv.com/en/sustainability/eudefends-leadership-world-war-climatechange/article-160848.(2007)24. Green New Deal Group, A GreenNew Deal, 2008JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 85

25. ibid.26. Hopkins, R., The Transition TownHandbook. Totnes, Green Books, 2008.27. Green New Deal Group, A GreenNew Deal, 200828. Ennis, Sandymount (Dublin),Middleton (Co Cork), Blessington,Donard (both Co Wicklow), Wicklow,Laois, Gorey, Wexford, Omagh,Holywood (Co Down), Donabate-Portrane (Co Dublin), Laois, Tramore,Galway, West Cork, Kinsale, Dublin 8,Trim, Donegal, East Clare, Clonmel,Skerries (Co Dublin)29. See http://transitiontownsireland.ning.com30. Green New Deal Group, A GreenNew Deal, 200831. Department of the Taoiseach,Building Ireland’s Smart Economy: AFramework for Sustainable EconomicRenewal, 200832. Barry, J. (2010), ‘Discourses ofTransition to Sustainability in Ireland:Towards a Green Republicanism’in O’Mahony, P et al (eds),Environmentalism in Ireland: TheCommunicative Turn. Manchester,Manchester University Press, 2010.86JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

University of Ulster and Letterkenny IT:a unique opportunity for higher educationcollaboration in the north-westPat McCloughanEnhanced collaboration between Letterkenny Instituteof Technology and the University of Ulster has thepotential to contribute significantly to the socioeconomicdevelopment of the north-west, providedsuch collaboration occurs in a relatively openenvironment in which the differences in the highereducation operating systems between North and Southcurrently constraining cross-border student flows areaddressed. An ambitious approach is warranted giventhe journey the region needs to travel to catch up withthe rest of the island economically and in terms ofhigher education attainment and delivery.Pat McCloughanThe benefits from enhancedcollaboration between the Universityof Ulster and Letterkenny Instituteof Technology should not beunderestimated. Leveraging the skillsand expertise of both institutions andcatering for a larger demographicarea will facilitate greater impactand utilisation of talent over a widergeographical space. In particular, incombination with other developmentsunder the inter-governmental North WestGateway Initiative (including the ProjectKelvin transatlantic broadband link),closer higher education collaboration willensure that enterprise in the region hasgreater access to growth opportunities.Indecon International EconomicConsultants, in association with LondonEconomics, were commissioned in2008 to examine the potential forenhanced strategic cooperationbetween Letterkenny IT and theUniversity of Ulster aimed at furtheringthe delivery of higher education in theNorth West Gateway Strategic AllianceRegion (NWGSA Region), which for thepurposes of this article we will call the‘north-west region’.The north-west region was definedby both institutions to include CountyDonegal and the Northern Ireland localauthority areas corresponding to DerryCity Council, Coleraine Borough Council,Fermanagh District Council, LimavadyJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.587

Students at the Magee (Derry/Londonderry) campus of University of UlsterBorough Council, Omagh DistrictCouncil and Strabane District Council.The region represents a cohesiveregion in socio-economic and culturalterms, notwithstanding the borderand perceptions regarding religiousdifferences. For example, the easternpart of Donegal known as the ‘Laggan’,which includes the corridor betweenLetterkenny and Derry, and the FinnValley area between the border town ofLifford and the twin towns of Stranorlarand Ballybofey further west, is one ofthe main repositories of the Ulster-Scotstradition on the island of Ireland. It wouldnot be unreasonable to suggest that aDonegal person has more in commonculturally, and certainly accent-wise, withhis or her neighbours in west Tyrone orFermanagh than with people from Sligoor Leitrim. At the same time, there isalso a rich diversity among the peopleof the north-west region, reflecting thevariety of its topography.The Indecon report was launched inLetterkenny on 14 May 2009 by theTaoiseach Brian Cowen TD togetherwith senior management from bothinstitutions. The study found a very highlevel of support for greater collaborationbetween Letterkenny IT and theUniversity of Ulster among both externaland internal stakeholders in the northwest,including employers and postprimaryschools, as well as staff andstudents at each institution. 1Despite some gains made in recentyears, the north-west region remainsbehind other parts of the island88JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

of Ireland in terms of economicperformance, and may be at risk ofbecoming more seriously affected by thecurrent recession than elsewhere on theisland. Further, educational attainment inthe region has remained low comparedwith other regions in Ireland, andthe level of higher education courseprovision (on a per capita basis atundergraduate and postgraduate levels)is also relatively low.As an area of low population density, thenorth-west region cannot expect to rivalthe likes of Dublin or Belfast in termsof higher education infrastructure ordelivery. That would not make economicsense. Nevertheless, while the regionis home to the Irish National SpatialStrategy’s only cross-border ‘gateway’(the Letterkenny-Derry corridor), itcontinues to lag behind other parts ofthe island in terms of both the numberof undergraduate and postgraduateplaces on offer and in regard to therange of third- and fourth-level studyopportunities available.What is clear from the new primaryresearch presented in the Indecon reportis that there is a very strong degree ofsupport (on both sides of the border)for expanding the provision of highereducation activities in the north-westregion. The most effective means ofachieving this is through enhancedcollaboration between the University ofUlster and Letterkenny IT as the largestthird-level institutions in the north-west.An ambitious yet realistic approachto enhanced cooperation betweenthe two institutions is required. Withinand between the two institutions, thiswill necessitate innovative thinkingon how best to build on their existingcollaboration in both full-time and parttimeundergraduate and postgraduateprogrammes, in academic research andin technology exchange with businessand industry.At a national and regional policy level, inorder to help realise the potential arisingfrom enhanced collaboration betweenthe University of Ulster and LetterkennyIT, a re-think of higher education policyand practice on both sides of the borderis needed. This will necessarily involvechallenging the traditional demarcationsbetween the institutes of technologyand the universities (in the South), andovercoming the structural differences inthe higher education operating systemsbetween North and South that may bepresently impeding the flow of studentson a cross-border basis.The prize to which enhancedcollaboration between the twoinstitutions can contribute includesgreater retention of graduates and themaintenance of more skills within thenorth-west region. These goals will serveto make the region more attractive forinward investment and help overcomewhat the Taoiseach Brian Cowenreferred to in his launch of the Indeconreport as the ‘tyranny of distance’.Strategic contextThe strategic context for the proposedenhanced collaboration betweenthe two higher education institutionsincludes increasing recognition of theimportance of cross-border cooperation,which may be cast in sharper focus inJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 89

the context of the present economicdownturn afflicting both parts of theisland. Other things being equal, onemight expect cross-border collaborationin areas such as higher education togain more momentum in the comingyears, as institutions like the Universityof Ulster - and particularly its Magee(Derry) and Coleraine campuses – andLetterkenny IT seek to take advantage oftheir geographical proximity to expandgrowth opportunities.Recently published studies highlightthe socio-economic benefits fromgreater cross-border alliances in highereducation, notably the ComprehensiveStudy on the All-Island Economy(2006) 2 and the All-Island Skills Study(2008), 3 itself the fruit of cross-bordercollaboration between the Expert Groupon Future Skills Needs in Ireland and theNorthern Ireland Skills Expert Group.Various employment and enterprisedevelopment initiatives currentlyunderway in the region recognise theimportance of improving educationalattainment and facilitating furthercooperation between the two northwesternhigher education institutions.Examples of two such initiatives arethe NWWDF (North-West WorkplaceDevelopment Forum), aimed atimproving training in the regionon a cross-border basis, and thedevelopment of a technology ‘highway’between Letterkenny and Derry, whichseeks to improve access to high-speedbroadband.An important educational cross-cuttingtheme is the emphasis now placed ondeveloping qualifications in science,technology, engineering and maths(the so-called ‘STEM’ disciplines).Skills acquisition in STEM is assuminggreater relevance in the developmentof activities in science, engineering,technology, business, finance andhealthcare, especially in relation tointernationally-traded and domesticallytradedservices, which are set toaccount for a growing proportion ofeconomic activity and employmentin the island economy in the comingyears. There is great scope for the twoinstitutions to jointly lead the process ofimproving attainment in STEM skills inthe north-west region, making it bothmore attractive and more competitive.Comparative higher educationsystems in the two jurisdictionsCertain differences in the highereducation operating systems betweenNorth and South may limit the potentialfor enhanced collaboration betweenhigher educational institutions based oneach side of the border like LetterkennyIT and the University of Ulster. The mostsignificant differences are the ‘MaSNCap’ in Northern Ireland and differencesin tuition fees between Northern Irelandand the Republic of Ireland.The MaSN (Maximum StudentNumber) Cap is an annual limit set bythe Northern Ireland Department forEmployment and Learning (DEL) inrespect of all home and EU full-timestudents entering undergraduatehigher education courses in NorthernIreland. It therefore applies to alluniversities and higher and furthereducation colleges in Northern Irelandoffering full-time undergraduate highereducation courses. 490JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

armagh city hotelElegance and Style in Ireland’sAncient Cathedral CityThe Armagh City Hotel has so much to offer:-Extensive conference space – FISHER SUITE accommodating up to1200 delegates with facility to break in to smaller rooms10 SYNDICATE ROOMS – for smaller meetings and breakout sessionsBEDROOMS – 82 well-equipped comfortable bedrooms catering for allthe needs of the business and leisure travellerGRILL BAR menu available dailyTHE DELI available daily for snacks and light mealsCARVERY LUNCH available each dayFRIARY RESTAURANT available Weds-Sun nights for dinnerTHE BALCONY – the outdoor dining and refreshment areaExcellent WEDDING PACKAGE - Inclusive of chair covers andseasonal flowers on tablesLIVE MUSIC every Fri & Sat nights, plus traditional music on Mon night2 Friary Road, Armagh BT60 4FRT: +44 (0)28 3751 8888 F: +44 (0)28 3751 2777E: info@armaghcityhotel.com www.armaghcityhotel.comPart of the Mooney Hotel Group

Media students on graduation day at University of Ulster Coleraine campuspostgraduate courses on offer on bothsides of the border in the north-west.These should include general arts andhumanities courses, as well as morevocationally-oriented courses such asengineering and business studies.It appears that the existing jointinitiatives between Letterkenny ITand the University of Ulster havebeen designed to ‘skirt’ around thedifferences in the higher educationoperating systems between Northand South, understandably enough.However, this has limited the natureand extent of cooperation between thetwo institutions. While together the twoinstitutions have been able to designsome innovative new joint ventures(see Existing Collaboration below), thetake-up for which has been consistentlysteady, the situation in which suchcooperation has had to navigate aroundthe differences in the higher educationoperating systems needs to beaddressed as a matter of priority if bothinstitutions and the wider north-westregion are to benefit from enhancedcollaboration (provided any new jointventures are designed to meet identifieddemands).Profile of the University of UlsterThe University of Ulster is the largestprovider of higher education in NorthernIreland – in fact in the island of Ireland– with approximately 25,000 full-timeand part-time students. It is a significantcontributor to the north-west region: in2007-08, the university’s Magee andColeraine campuses together accountedfor over 9,000 full-time and part-timeundergraduate and postgraduatestudents, and together they employapproximately 2,000 staff.Magee and Coleraine together hadover 7,600 undergraduate enrolmentsin 2007-08, making up almost 40% ofJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 93

the university’s overall undergraduatepopulation in that year. The largestfaculties in terms of undergraduatenumbers at Magee and Coleraine areLife and Health Sciences, the UlsterBusiness School, and Arts. Alsoimportant at Magee are the Facultyof Social Sciences and the Faculty ofComputing and Engineering – eachof which accounted for well over 500undergraduate enrolments in 2007-08.Over 2,000 postgraduate studentsare currently enrolled on taught andresearch programmes at Coleraineand Magee. The largest postgraduateenrolments in Coleraine are in theFaculties of Life and Health Sciences,Social Sciences and Arts; the largestsuch enrolments at Magee are in SocialSciences, the Ulster Business School,Arts, and Life and Health Sciences.The University of Ulster has a strongrecord of achievement in research.In the most recent UK ResearchAssessment Exercise (RAE) (December2008), the university achieved strongperformances in nursing and Celticstudies (with 100% of research inthese areas classified as internationalquality). The RAE results also confirmthe University of Ulster’s researchstrengths in biomedical sciences, law,architecture and the built environment,media studies and art and design.Significant improvement in the qualityof research in areas such as computingand nanotechnology were also recordedin the 2008 RAE.The Coleraine and Magee campusesplay an important role in the university’sresearch strengths. Coleraine is hometo the Centre for Molecular Biosciences,which is active in international researchinto molecular and nutritional aspectsof degenerative diseases and microbialand pharmaceutical biotechnology,and comprises approximately 200research staff and doctoral students.The Centre for Functional Genomics,established in October 2003 at theColeraine campus with £2 million infunding from the EU Programme forPeace and Reconciliation, aims todevelop the existing biotechnology andbiomedical facilities there by focussingon functional genomics research withthe potential to have a commercialimpact on biotechnology, biomedicineand high-added-value food production.The Coleraine campus is also thelocation of the Centre for Coastal andMarine Research, which is active inresearch into coastal environmentsand coastal geology, archaeology andmanagement. The presence of the latterresearch centre is noteworthy given thatthe north-west region boasts one of thelongest and geologically most diversecoastlines on the island.As well as Celtic studies, otherresearch strengths at the Universityof Ulster’s Magee campus include ITand electronics, multi-media, design,international business, psychology,nursing, history and social policy.Designated research centres includethe Intelligent Systems Research Centre(ISRC), the Academy for Irish CulturalHeritages, the Institute of Ulster ScotsStudies, the Transitional Justice Instituteand INCORE (International ConflictResearch). New initiatives underway onthe Derry campus include the CreativeTechnologies (Industries) ResearchCentre, the Centre for PostgraduateProfessional Legal Education, the94JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

Letterkenny Institute of TechnologyClinical Translational Research andInnovation Centre (CTRIC) at AltnagelvinHospital, as well as developments infinancial services, construction, quantitysurveying and spatial planning, andpsychology.Knowledge and technology exchangeis promoted by the Office of Innovationat the University of Ulster througha range of initiatives and ongoingcollaboration with business and industry.The university’s participation in suchactivities includes collaboration withlocal enterprises through the FUSIONProgramme (an all-island initiativemanaged by InterTradeIreland) andKnowledge Transfer Partnerships.The Magee Science Park focusses onsoftware development and advancedIT while the Coleraine Science Parkconcentrates on life, health andenvironmental technologies. Bothhave been active in incubating a rangeof entrepreneurial ventures and ingenerating significant new high qualityemployment locally.Profile of Letterkenny Instituteof TechnologyEstablished in 1971, Letterkenny IThas approximately 3,000 students,comprising about 2,500 full-timeand 500 part-time students over twocampuses, the main campus beinglocated in Letterkenny (the largest urbancentre in Donegal) and the tourism andhospitality campus in Killybegs in southwestDonegal.The built environment at Letterkenny IThas undergone significant transformationin recent years. This includes theBusiness Development Centre, launchedin 2000, which provides 1,100 squaremetres of specialist incubation spaceand associated supports for high-techstart-ups. Under the Irish NationalDevelopment Plan, it is planned thatmore then 2,000 square metres ofspace dedicated to specialist researchand enterprise development facilities willbe available at Letterkenny IT.Most courses at Letterkenny IT are atbachelor degree level or higher. Of the66 courses offered in 2007-08, overthree-quarters were at these levels,including 20 bachelor degrees athonours level and six masters degreecourses. The latter include the MSc inInnovation Management in the PublicService, a unique, specialist courseoffered jointly by Letterkenny IT andJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 95

the University of Ulster on a part-timebasis throughout the island of Ireland.This course offers graduates jointaccreditation in both Ireland and the UK(by HETAC and the University ofUlster respectively).Like the University of Ulster,Letterkenny IT has a tradition ofcatering for mature students. Thesestudents account for approximatelyone-fifth of all undergraduates at theinstitute, illustrating its commitment tolifelong learning in the north-westregion. Notwithstanding its relativelysmall size, Letterkenny IT has someclear research strengths. Theseinclude the Centre of Applied MarineBiotechnology (CAMBio) and electronics,production and innovation in theEpiCentre. The latter brings together theUniversity of Ulster, Letterkenny IT andNorth West Regional College in Derry. InDecember 2008 it was announced thatthe EpiCentre project at Letterkenny ITwould benefit from Enterprise Irelandfunding of over €1m (£1.1m) to aid theconstruction of the WiSAR Lab (WirelessSensor Applied Research). This is asignificant development for cross-borderresearch in the north-west.Existing collaborationInitiatives in joint course developmentbetween the two institutions include:• The aforementioned MSc inInnovation Management in thePublic Service – the only course ofits type in the island of Ireland. Thishad 61 students enrolled in 2007-08and produced 25 graduates in 2006:11 from Northern Ireland and 14from the Republic.• The Postgraduate Certificate inHigher Education Practice (PgCHEP)– this course is delivered by theUniversity of Ulster to lecturing staffat Letterkenny IT as a means ofensuring high quality standards inteaching, learning and research. Itoffers graduates the possibility ofproceeding to obtain diploma andmasters qualifications in highereducation practice.The University of Ulster’s Diploma inNursing at Letterkenny IT providedthe foundation for the subsequentdevelopment of the institute’s own suiteof nursing degrees from 2002, namelythe BSc in General Nursing, the BScin Intellectual Disability Nursing andthe BSc in Psychiatric Nursing. Thesehonours level degree courses are fundedby the Irish Department of Healthand Children.The growth of nursing studies hasbeen one of the main developments atLetterkenny IT in recent years. Coupledwith the fact that the University of Ulsterpioneered nursing degree courses atColeraine and Magee, it would appearthat the north-west region may have acomparative advantage in the provisionof nursing education. Also noteworthyin this regard is the presence of twomajor hospitals in the region in Derry(Altnagelvin) and Letterkenny.Joint initiatives between the twoinstitutions in research and technologyexchange include the aforementionedEpiCentre and the North West Scienceand Technology Partnership. Bothinitiatives also involve North WestRegional College in Derry (a largefurther education college that is growing96JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

its provision of higher educationcourses).ConclusionThere is considerable scope and localsupport, and need, to develop theprovision of higher education in thenorth-west region. The most effectiveway of achieving this is throughenhanced collaboration between thetwo largest third-level educationproviders in the region, the University ofUlster and Letterkenny IT. It is importantthat an appropriately ambitiousapproach is taken – one that is notunduly encumbered by differences inthe higher education operating systemsbetween the two jurisdictions.This ambitious approach shouldinclude the requirement that anyfurther collaboration between the twoinstitutions should not be confined topart-time and lifelong learning courses(which are, of course, important), butshould also aim at developing thefollowing aspects of higher educationdelivery, as a means of retaining agreater proportion of the brightestschool-leavers, who otherwise are at riskof leaving the region for most if not all oftheir working lives:• Full-time undergraduate courses(in the arts, humanities and socialsciences as well as in the moretechnical and vocationally-orientedcourses traditionally associated withthe colleges in the region);• Full-time postgraduate programmes(aimed at attracting graduates fromoutside the region as well as buildingon the graduates coming throughfrom the region, including from NorthWest Regional College);• Collaboration with local businessand industry regarding informationand technology transfer, R&Dand innovation, and businessdevelopment.With regard to full-time and part-timeundergraduate and postgraduateinitiatives, there should be a particularfocus on developing STEM subjects vitalfor the economic development of theregion (in science, technology, business,finance and health).Enhanced collaboration should alsoseek to develop PhD qualifications in theregion, including doctoral study amongLetterkenny IT staff. Increasing the stockof PhDs would have the double benefitof helping to enhance the quality of theregion’s teaching and research, and ofacting as a signal of high quality skills forpotential inward investors. Considerationshould also be given to the developmentof professional PhDs in the region, forexample the Doctor of Nursing Studies(DNSc) qualification, aimed at furtherdevelopment of specialised nursingpractice in the region.Fundamental to maximising the potentialof lifelong learning in the region willbe to recognise previous learning (forexample, acquired in the workplace) andprovide flexible delivery modes (includinge-learning). It is important that aconsistent approach to lifelong learningis taken by both institutions in any futurejoint course development.Specific areas of potentialcollaboration in research activityJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 97

etween the two institutions mayinclude (but not necessarily be limitedto) marine, biomedicine, biotechnology,electronics, computing (includinggames), business and creativetechnologies – reflecting existing oremerging research strengths in thetwo institutions. Consideration shouldalso be given to the extension of theCreative Technologies (Industries)Research Centre at Magee to includeLetterkenny IT and North WestRegional College.Finally, there is also potential to furtherdevelop collaboration between the twoinstitutions in the area of knowledge andtechnology exchange with business andindustry. Enhanced cooperation throughpooling of expertise would see greateravailability of experts; wider geographicalcoverage across the region; greateropportunities for student placements,and support for business developmentand innovation. In such initiatives,it would be important to ensureappropriate publicity and signposting ofbusiness support functions available atboth institutions because the provisionof such support may be currentlycharacterised by lack of information.At time of writing, the University ofUlster and Letterkenny IT are finalisinga ‘blueprint’ for closer collaborationwhich will be published later this year.This initiative is understood to have thesupport of both the Northern IrelandDepartment for Employment andLearning and the Irish Department ofEducation and Science.Dr. Pat McCloughan is a DivisionalDirector with Indecon InternationalEconomic Consultants. He is aneconomist with extensive projectexperience in Ireland, NorthernIreland, Great Britain and Europe.He played a leading role in theIndecon report commissioned byLetterkenny Institute of Technologyand the University of Ulster. Anyviews expressed in this paper are theauthor’s personal views.REFERENCES1. North West Gateway StrategicAlliance (NWGSA) Scoping Study,Indecon International EconomicConsultants, May 2009.2. Comprehensive Study on the All-Island Economy, British-Irish Inter-Governmental Conference, 2006.3. All-Island Skills Study, Expert Groupon Future Skills Needs and the NI SkillsExpert Group, 2008.4. Analysis of official figures by Indeconreveals that the further educationcolleges in Northern Ireland are growingtheir provision of higher educationcourses, which is an importantdevelopment in enhancing educationalattainment across NI.5. For example, reflecting initiativesto build on the island’s comparativestrengths in agri-food, despite thecurrent difficulties facing the sector,opportunities are likely to arise in thecoming years in specific niches withinthe sector, including agronomy andfood innovation, as the agri-food valuechain from farm to fork becomes morebusiness-like and market-oriented.98JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

Nationalism in the service of abetter chance for a bigger life:a response to Robin WilsonEoin Ó BroinNationalism, as ideology and political practice, hasbeen blamed for many things. Two world wars, theHolocaust, ethnic cleansing in the former Yugoslavia,and even the collapse of the recent Copenhagenclimate change negotiations have all been laid atnationalism’s door. That the justification for sucharguments is usually without empirical foundation andbased on questionable theoretical foundations matterslittle to its proponents. Increasingly, and particularlyamong liberal and social democratic writers andactivists, nationalism is seen as divisive, dangerousand undemocratic: to be consigned to the ideologicaldustbin of history.Eoin Ó BroinOf course it wasn’t always so. Therewas a long moment in Europeanintellectual history when nationalismwas broadly understood in positiveterms. From its emergence during therevolutions of the 1840s through to decolonisationin the 1960s, nationalismwas viewed as an essential ingredient inthe formation of democratic states.From the end of the 19th century,in theory, if not always in practice,the nation-state became the normfor peoples in search of democracy,equality and self-determination. Cultural,linguistic and historic communitiesformed themselves into politicalsubjects, demarcated territorial claimsdefining the limits of their imagined state,and demanded sovereignty.By the mid point of the 20th centurynationalism and the nation-stateformed the ideological and architecturalunderpinning for democratic regimesacross the globe. Again in theory, if notalways in practice, the sovereign citizenwas the basic unit of the nation-state,the linchpin of its democracy. At theglobal level the nation was the subject ofinternational relations and law.Of course in practice there weredemocratic regimes that failed to projectand promote the rights of either theirJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.599

own citizens and those resident withinthe boundaries of the state. Therewere others which, while normativelydemocratic at a domestic level, paidscant regard to individual or state rightsat the international level. And there werethose which sought to advocate, and inmany cases succeeded in advancing,individual and collective rights at thedomestic and international level.But everyone was a nationalist.Ideological contests were not betweennationalists and anti-nationalists butbetween left and right. Liberalism,capitalism and socialism vied forposition, and each sought to situatetheir claims to political legitimacywithin the language and collectiveexperience of national communities andnation-states.Of course contrary to the claims of manynationalists themselves, these nationalcommunities were always heterogenous,always contested and perpetually inthe process of being constructed andre-constructed. When was the nation?What was the nation? Where was thenation? And crucially, who was thenation? These were the questionsthat framed the ideological space inwhich claims for political, economicand cultural power were fought out.However, rarely if ever was the nationitself, whether political, cultural orgeographical, called into question.But then something happened. Thealmost invisible omnipresence ofnationalism and the nation-state wasbrought into question, and its legitimacy,as the organising unit of modern politicallife, was challenged. For some it wasthe failure of the newly independentpost-colonial states to live up to thesocial and economic promise of theirrespective independence movements.For others it was an increasingunwillingness to take sides in what wereseen as territorial disputes betweencompeting nationalisms.For sections of the left it was the failureof the 1981 Mitterrand government toadequately respond to the collapseof Keynesian social democracy. Forothers it was the apparent triumphof ethno-nationalism emerging fromthe ruins of the USSR, and with itthe spectre of ethnic cleansing inthe former Yugoslavia. Most recentlythe deregulating logic of neo-liberalglobalisation and a post-nationalistcosmopolitan desire to re-regulate atthe level of the global, has broughtinto being a contradictory yetcomplementary constituency that seeksto move beyond the nation state.And yet, in the broad ranging debatethat has followed this problematisingof nationalism and the nation-statesomething seems to have gotten lost;namely the very function of nationalismand the nation-state.The function of nationalismOur modern conversation on nationalismand the nation-state began in 1983with the publication of two books,Ernst Gellner’s Nations and Nationalismand Benedict Anderson’s ImaginedCommunities. 1 Together thesewriters have done much to frame thesubsequent debate.100JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

The date is also important as it marksthe end of the European left-liberalinfatuation with anti-imperial strugglesaround the globe, and the collapseof the post-war European socialdemocratic settlements, which togetherhave provided much of the unconsciousrationale for what was to become thepost-national turn in European liberal-leftpolitical discourse.Gellner and Anderson introducedtwo key questions into academicunderstandings of nationalism andthe nation-state: namely whether thenation was a product of modern orpre-modern historical and sociologicalforces, and whether nations were naturalphenomena or brought into being bypolitical and economic actorsand forces.The debate sparked by Gellner betweenmodernists and perennialists overlappedwith and reinforced that initiated byAnderson between constructivists andnaturalists. After Gellner scholars askedthemselves to what extend nationalismand nation-states were a product ofindustrialisation and modernisation,or rooted further back in pre-modernhistory. After Anderson scholarsdebated the extent to which it was thenationalists themselves who broughtnations and nation-states into being, orwhether nations required nationalism tosecure their rights and place inthe world.A further division in the debate emergedwith the distinction drawn by MiroslavHroch 2 between Western Europeancivic nationalism and Eastern Europeanethnic-nationalism. Mapped ontothis distinction one could also readoppositions including: political versuscultural; French versus German;universal versus parochial; democraticversus undemocratic; peaceful versusviolent; and benign versus belligerent.For this writer, and not withstandingan earlier adherence to the civicversus ethnic opposition, a number ofconclusions can be drawn from thenow rich literature on nationalism andthe nation-state. The first conclusionis that nationalism and nation-states,while built out of older cultural material,are definitively modern phenomena.To consider oneself as a national ofa particular nation-state is somethingdistinct to the modern world,unimaginable before the 17th or 18thcenturies.The second conclusion is that it wasindeed nationalists who brought nationalmovements into being in order tocreate territorially defined nation statesinhabited by culturally and linguisticallydefined national communities. Nationalcommunities are imagined, or moreaccurately constructed, from prenationalcultural and political materialduring periods of democratisation,whether in the 19th or 20th centuries.The third conclusion is that thedistinction between civic andcultural nationalism, no matter howpolitically attractive, is a nonsense.All nationalisms are, in part or whole,cultural phenomena. The nationalismof the French revolution, despite itsgrounding in Enlightenment values ofuniversal rights, was culturally specificto a French nation then in the processJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 101

of construction. It mobilised oppositionto the allegedly parochial, backwardregional cultural and linguistic identitiesof the Basques and Bretons, amongothers, as part of its construction of amodern, centralised, civic yet cruciallyFrench nation-state. This third pointis important, as it reveals a confusionthat lies at the heart of so much of thecontemporary debate on nationalism:namely what it is that is distinct aboutnationalism as an ideology and thenation-state as an organising principle ofmodern politics.By way of explanation, it may be usefulto think of modern political ideologiesas providing three distinct sets of logics:constitutive, procedural and substantive.Nationalism is a constitutive ideology.Its function is to constitute a politicalsubject, namely The People, out of anexisting but reconfigured articulation ofcultural and linguistic identities. Theseidentities are authentic, in the sense ofhaving real lived material presence, andinvented, in the sense of having beenmaterially produced and reproduced byhuman beings in specific sets of socialand economic circumstances.An example of a procedural ideology,on the other hand, would berepublicanism, which has little to sayabout how to constitute its politicalsubject and everything to say abouthow that subject, The People, shouldgovern itself, once constituted.Republicanism is an ideology that, byproviding rules for decision-making,enables an already constituted politicalsubject to make decisions about itsown affairs.Of course, neither constitutive norprocedural ideologies can, in and ofthemselves, direct a political subjecttowards the outcome of its proceduraldeliberations. For this, The People,however defined, and utilising whateverset of rules, must decide on the kind ofsociety they want to live in. They needa set of substantive norms to determinehow best to produce and distributeeconomic, political, cultural and spiritualrights, responsibility and resources.Capitalism, socialism and liberalism areall substantive ideologies in this sense.Although this distinction is neither rigidnor without elements of overlap andbleed, it does help explain why, forexample, nationalism can never, in andof itself, be civic. For that it requiresrepublicanism. Equally it helps explainwhy, and not withstanding the claims ofliberals or socialists, subjectivities basedon social class or individual rights mustalways be anchored in national culturaltraditions, British liberalism and Frenchcommunism being cases in point.Herein lies the power of nationalism andthe nation-state, explaining its almostuniversal purchase and persistence inthe modern world – namely its unrivalledstrength as a subject-constitutingideology.The limits of nationalismIf the strength of nationalism andthe nation-state lies in their ability toconstitute and situate the politicalsubject of the nation as a people andgeographic and historic place, it isalso here that nationalism’s limits areto be found, and it is on these limits102JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

that nationalism’s strongest critics havefocused their attentions in recent times.At a theoretical level there are at leastthree obvious limits to nationalism inthis regard. The first limit is that nationalpolitical subjectivities, like all identities,are constructed through the interplayof essence and difference. Nationalists,working with already existing culturalmaterial, articulate a sense of identitythat is simultaneously essential toitself and distinct from its other. Whilelanguage, and linguistic difference, is themost obvious material to achieve thisobjective, it is not always available, andbroader cultural or historical elementsmay be brought into play.Nationalism’s critics argue that thismanoeuvre is inherently divisive, as itdemands that the identity of the nationis defined in opposition to, and thereforein conflict with, its other. A conflationof in-opposition-to and in-conflict-withallows critics to locate what they believeto be the belligerent logic of nationalism,which provides a powerful though whollyinadequate explanatory framework forconflicts in the North of Ireland, theformer Yugoslavia and Rwanda.The second limit is that in addition todefining itself against external others,nationalism seeks to homogenise itsinterior, categorising its own citizensagainst a continuum of nationalauthenticity. That this homogenisingdrive is a function of the will to powerof specific groups within the nationrather than nationalism itself does notweaken the attraction of the argumentfor nationalism’s critics. The Catholicexclusivism of the early years of the IrishFree State or the anti-communist witchhunts in McCarthy’s United States ofAmerica are cases in point.The third limit, and determined directlyby the first two, is that rights andresources in any given nation-state aredistributed to citizens and non-citizenresidents according to the exclusionarylogic of nationalism’s own sense ofself. This logic determines who canenter the state, on what terms andwith what rights; and within the statewho is accorded what rights, and whatpunishments are due when normativeresponsibilities are infringed. Unlikethe first two limits, the third presentsnationalism with a serious challenge thatit ignores at its own peril.Put simply, these three limits,argue nationalism’s critics, producexenophobia, discrimination andinequality. And the critics are partiallyright. But crucially these limits are notinherent to the successful functioningof nationalism as a subject-constitutingideology. Nor must we abandon thepositive strengths of nationalism in orderto resolve them.Indeed throughout nationalism’s history,and within any given national movement,there have been counter-nationalisms,struggling to resolve and resistattempts by dominant-nationalisms toconstitute the nation according to thesexenophobic, discriminatory andunequal logics.In an Irish context, there is a longtradition of counter-nationalisms to thedominant nationalist/unionist discoursethat became hegemonic across theJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 103

island in the immediate aftermath of theCivil War and Anglo-Irish settlement.These alternative traditions have soughtto articulate an infusion of culturalnationalism, civic republicanism,democratic socialism and radicalfeminism. Intuitively, if not consciously,they have sought to construct anationalism and a nation-state that iscosmopolitan, heterodox and egalitarian.One can think of James Connolly, HannaSheehy-Skeffington, Sean O’Faolain,Peadar O’Donnell and George Gilmoreas just some of the figures whosepolitical and literary practice intuitivelyand self-consciously sought toconstitute a national subject that wasoutward looking, plural and inclusive.Nationalism’s critics can only concludethat nationalism and the nation-stateis unable to escape its xenephobic,discriminatory and inegalitarian limits byblinding themselves to those nationalistswho have or are continuing to seekeffective solutions to these problems.For this writer, the issue is not whethernationalism continues to have a future,but what kind of nationalism best suitsthe future we want to build? And inanswering this question, those of uswho believe that we need nationalismnow more than ever must demonstratethat our intellectual and organisationalproject has found an effective responseto its own limits and to the challenges ofnationalism’s critics.Misreading nationalismWriting in the 2009 edition of Journal ofCross Border Studies in Ireland, RobinWilson argued that Irish nationalistparties, in commemorating Wolfe Tone,betray a belief that “however unsettlinglyIreland may have changed over thecenturies, ‘Irishness’ remains a rockof certainty to which to cling.” 3 Wilsonwent on to mobilise a series of criticsof nationalism, and cultural or ethnonationalismin particular, to support hisprinciple conclusion that ‘republicanismis running out of steam’ and should bereplaced by a cosmopolitan politics.I will return to the issue ofcosmopolitanism below, but firstly I wantto engage with Wilson’s initial claim: thatIrish nationalism is exclusive, isolationistand unable to respond effectively todifference and the demands of an everglobalising world. While Wilson doesnot name any nationalist political party,I’m sure he would apply his critique ofnationalism to Sinn Féin, and so I willuse Sinn Féin’s nationalism to testhis case.At a theoretical level Wilson, like manyIrish writers, conflates republicanism andnationalism. He ignores the fact that Irishrepublicanism predates Irish nationalismby almost half a century; that theirideological and organisational functionsand forms are distinct; and that neithercan be viewed as a single homogenousentity. In his essay, republicanismappears at times as a civic alternative tocultural nationalism, while at others asa form of cultural nationalism disguisedas Enlightenment universalism. As aconsequence, Wilson’s theoreticalunderstanding of what constitutes Irishrepublicanism or nationalism at anyspecific moment in almost 200 hundredyears of history is collapsed into acrude caricature.104JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

James Connolly Hannah Sheehy- Sean O Faolain Peadar O’DonnellSkeffingtonIn turn, he misreads the interrelationshipbetween civic republicanism and theconservative cultural nationalism thatunderwrote the early decades of theSouthern State, and erases from historythe counter-nationalisms that challengedthe exclusions and inequalities thatlay at the heart of the post-partitionsettlements North and South.Theconsequence is that he refuses both theexistence of and the difference betweenthe conservative Catholic nationalism ofDe Valera, for example, and the radicalsocialist-feminist nationalism ofSheehy-Skeffington.Nationalism, for Wilson, is at all timesculturally exclusive and politicallyisolationist. Indeed it is only whennationalism calls on itself to abandonthat which makes it national – in thewriting of Conor Cruise O’Brien orpolitics of Garret FitzGerald – thatWilson appears to concede thepossibility of ‘reconstruction’. Howeverin reality these figures are simply theprogenitors of Wilson’s own postnationalism,rather than sources of anycounter-nationalism.Moreover his claim that their politicswere ‘more conducive...to fosteringreconciliation across the island as awhole’ is hard to square with the impacton Northern Unionists of FitzGerald’snegotiation of the 1985 Anglo-IrishAgreement or the impact on NorthernNationalists of Cruise O’Brien’sintroduction of Section 31 of theBroadcasting Act.In support of his argument, and inaddition to his theoretical confusion,Wilson attempts to impose his ownreadings onto events such as the annualWolfe Tone commemorations and theoutcome of EU referenda, contrary tothe available empirical evidence.Republican commemorations,particularly those celebrating thefounding moment of our politicaltradition, are not about constructinga sense of cultural continuity tocompensate for the reality of socialand cultural change. Rather they aremobilisations aimed at re-legitimisinga civic republican political project,while similtaneously rearticulating therepublican principles of liberty, equalityand solidarity in new and everchanging contexts.Speaking at the 2009 Wolfe ToneJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 105

Commemoration in Bodenstown, SinnFein’s Martin McGuinness concludedby saying:Sinn Fein will continue to stand upfor ordinary people and to speakout for those who this governmentwould seek to ignore – not thebankers and property speculatorsbeing bailed out with the people’smoney but those who Wolfe Tonereferred to as ‘the people of noproperty’. Our work in continuingto build national reconciliation, inseeking to bring about harmonybetween Catholic, Protestant andDissenter on this island, will alsocontinue. And we will continue topursue the unity and freedom ofour country. These were the aims ofWolfe Tone. They are our aims.With these words, McGuinness wasdrawing on three important strands ofrepublican discourse, the aim of which isnot to construct continuity with the past,but to motivate and mobilize for changein the present and future. The first ofthese strands is a politics of social andeconomic equality; the second a politicsof cultural and religious pluralism; andthe third national political and territorialreunification. Wilson does a disserviceboth to republicans and to the qualityof his own argument by crudelymisrepresenting such commemorativepolitical mobilisations in this way.His arguments with regard to the LisbonTreaty operate similarly. His assertionthat the rejection of the Lisbon Treaty in2008 represented a ‘dip into isolationistdiscourse’ is directly contradictednot only by the political discourse ofMartin McGuinness speaking at the Wolfe ToneCommemoration in Bodenstown, Co Kildarethe principle ‘No’ campaigns, but bydetailed opinion polls conducted both byMillward Brown IMS for the Departmentof Foreign Affairs and the EuropeanCommission’s Eurobarometer poll.In both opinion polls a clear majority of‘No’ voters believed that Ireland shouldremain in the European Union and thatits interests were best served by thatmembership. Both opinion polls also lista detailed series of reasons why peoplerejected the Treaty, including insufficientknowledge of the Treaty; opposition tothe policy direction of the EU in relationto workers rights and defence policy;and opposition to the perceived negativeconsequences for smaller memberstates of the proposed redistribution ofpower contained in the Treaty.106JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

that the British government’s 2005community relations policy for the Northof Ireland, A Shared Future, embodies a‘political philosophy of cosmopolitanism’and laments Sinn Féin’s shelving ofthe proposals post 2007. For SinnFéin, however, A Shared Future, ratherthan embodying some egalitariancosmopolitan ideal, avoids key issues ofinequality at a structural and collectivelevel, which Wilson’s ‘individualisedconcept of society’ is simply unable tounderstand or address. Discriminationand exclusion more often than notoccur at a collective or community levelon grounds of class, gender, religion,ethnicity, nationality, sexual orientationand so on.Creating a shared future, in Ireland orelsewhere, will require the dismantlingof structural architectures of inequalityand exclusion, and the protectionof both individual and collectiverights, something which the Britishgovernment’s community relationspolicy is neither intended for nor capableof doing.It is important to stress that Sinn Féin’sargument is not the opposite of Wilson’s,as the party is strongly in favour of a Billof Rights that provides for the social,economic, political and cultural rights ofthe individual. Rather the party believesthat a more profoundly egalitarian rightsbasedapproach to policy-making mustinclude collective and community rights,including national rights alongside moretraditional claims to individual rights.Indeed, rather than see Wilson’scosmopolitan individualism as a moreegalitarian and tolerant approach topolitical life, it could be argued thatits privileging of the individual, andintolerance to any form of collectiveidentity, replicates the exclusionsand discriminations which he findsso abhorrent in those ‘collectivised“imagined communities”. It alsoignores the extent to which individualidentities are as imagined and asproblematic as collectivised identities,and contain within them the samepotential for xenophobia, discriminationand exclusion as their communitycounterparts.More fundamentally, Wilson’scosmopolitan liberalism ignores thefact that any ideology that seeks toconstitute its subjectivity exclusivelythrough the individual, cannot hope tobe sustainable and/or durable. Identitiesare unavoidably collective, requiringimagined communities of one sort oranother to give them meaning andsubstance.To put it another way, Wilson’scosmopolitan individualism is simplya retreat into an unreconstructedliberalism. Like other former leftintellectuals of his generation, thedisappointments and challengesof earlier political alignments andassociations have led him to abandonthe collective foundations of politicalidentity and action, and substitutefor them a bland individualism, whichseeks to situate the liberal intellectualabove the competing claims of so manycollectivities.The irony is that, understood in thisway, Wilson’s cosmopolitanism, ratherthan offering some new ideological108JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

and organisational project toconfront the challenges of our times,actually represents the final retreatof an embattled and defeated socialdemocracy into the embrace of socialliberalism. In doing so, Wilson, likeother social democratic supportersof the current right-wing direction ofthe European Union, provides politicalcover to the neo-liberal impulses ofcorporate-led globalisation as enshrined,for example, in the EU’s Lisbon Strategyand the Lisbon Treaty’s agenda forinternational trade.Nationalism now more than everSo where does this leave nationalism aswe enter the second decade of the 21stcentury? Has the era of the nation-statecome to and end? Has nationalismexhausted its political repertoire?This writer thinks not. The fact thatthere are more national movementsand more nation-states than at anyother time in history should give pausefor thought. Today, more than ever, weneed nationalism, but a nationalism thatcan overcome its own limits, and avoidthe xenophobias, discriminations andexclusions that have been a feature ofmany of its conservative, liberal andsocialist variants since the 19th century.Rather than abandon nationalism andthe nation-state, this writer believesthat the best form of democracy can beachieved in Ireland today through theending of partition, the withdrawal of theBritish state from the North of Irelandand the building of a political systemin which all the people who inhabitthe island of Ireland are sovereign. Myconception of sovereignty is neitherinsular nor anachronistic, but a genuinelyradical democratic one, in which selfdeterminationis vested in people in aplurality of ways - individual, communal,local, national, international - whilerecognising the complexity of life intoday’s internationalised world.The challenge today is to articulateforms of sovereignty and selfdeterminationand to build institutions ofgovernance that are open, democratic,plural and just, in meaningful andmaterially effective ways. Central to thisarticulation has to be a socio-politicaland economic critique of contemporarysociety that recognises the structuralinequalities embedded in the very fabricof our lives. These structural inequalities– along lines of class, gender, race,religion and sexual orientation to namea few – form the architecture in whichwe live our lives and which prevent usfrom realising the meaning of equality.From such a critique we can buildstrategies for removing these inequalitiesand continue the long and unchartedprocess of building new architectures– social, political, economic – basednot on inequality and discrimination,but on empowerment and solidarity.This process of critique, strategy andstruggle is what I understand to besocialism, albeit heavily indebted to theparallel movements of feminism, antiimperialism,anti-racism and ecologismwhich have motivated progressivemovements across the globe throughoutthe 20th century.This articulation is left republicanism:a commitment to radical participatorydemocracy, popular pluralist sovereignty,110JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

social and economic justice, andpolitical and cultural equality, coupledwith a commitment to confrontingand challenging the loci of powerand inequality which constitute thearchitecture of modern society. In theprocess we will radically alter the wayin which we as human beings organiseour lives.In what must be the most potent andpowerful call to action in recent times,the Brazilian politician and social theoristRoberto Mangabeira Unger, in his2009 manifesto, The Left Alternative, 4called on progressives across theglobe to ‘build a world of democraciesin which the individual is empoweredto participate and dissent.’ He arguesthat ‘nationalism was one of the mostunexpected and powerful transformingforces in modern history.’ And thoughrecognising that today nationalism ‘hasbecome a dangerous diversion’, Ungerdoes not call for its abandonment, butrather for it to be ‘reinterpreted andredirected’ in order to ‘become anopportunity for the advancement ofprogressive alternatives.’Unger advocates a programme of‘revolutionary reform’ that seeks to ‘turndemocratic politics, market economiesand free civil societies into machinesfor developing distinct and novel formsof life.’ As part of this process he callsfor ‘successful national heresy withinthe global economy, democratisingmarkets, deepening democracies andempowering individuals’. For Unger, asfor this writer, the nation and nationaldifference is not privileged aboveother subjectivities, whether individualor collective, but an element, and anintegral element, of a broader, deeperradicalism mobilised ‘in the service ofan attempt to give ordinary men andwomen a better chance for a bigger life.’2016 marks the centenary of the 1916rising. This event was not an isolatedIrish affair, but part of a much greaterglobal process of modernisation anddemocratisation, of which the Mexicanrevolution of 1910, the World War of1914-1918 and the Russian revolutionof 1917 were a part.As we approach the centenary ofthis foundational moment of modernIrish republicanism, those of us whoremain committed to the emancipatorypromise of nationalism, republicanism,socialism and feminism need to criticallyassess our century of struggle in orderto learn the mistakes made by ourpredecessors, to strengthen our politicalcapacity in the present and future. Indoing so, those of us who believe thata better Ireland, Europe and worldis possible must continue to build aprogressive politics, with ambitiousstrategies aimed at implementing moreradical policies in order to achieve ourobjectives, namely an independentdemocratic socialist Ireland, playing acentral part in the ongoing struggles fora more democratic Europe and a moresocially and economically just world.Eoin Ó Broin is a policy analyst,political activist and writer basedin Dublin. He is the chairperson ofDublin Sinn Féin and a member ofits Ard Comhairle. His first book,Matxinada - Basque Nationalismand Radical Basque Movements,was published in 2003. His secondJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 111

ook, Sinn Féin and the Politics ofLeft Republicanism, was publishedby Pluto Press in 2009. His nextbook, A Better Ireland? - NewPolicies, Strategies and Alliances,will be published by Pluto Press laterthis year. He writes a weekly columnfor An Phoblacht and is a regularcontributor to www.politico.ie.REFERENCES1. Ernest Gellner, Nations andNationalism. Oxford: Blackwell (secondedition, 2006); Benedict Anderson,Imagined Communities: reflections onthe origin and spread of nationalism.London: Verso (1991, revised)2. Miroslav Hroch, Social Conditions ofNational Revival in Europe. CambridgeUniversity Press (1985)3. Robin Wilson, ‘Towardscosmopolitanism? Renewing Irishness inthe 21st century, in The Journal of CrossBorder Studies in Ireland. No 4 (Spring2009) Armagh: Centre for Cross BorderStudies4. Roberto Mangabeira Unger, The LeftAlternative (2009) London: Verso112JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

President McAleese with board members, staff and friends of the Centre for Cross Border Studiesat a reception to mark the Centre’s 10th birthday in Áras an Uachtaráin on 14 September 2009.THE CENTRE FOR CROSS BORDER STUDIESMarch 2010The Centre for Cross BorderStudies, founded in September1999 and based in Armagh andDublin, researches and developscooperation across the Irishborder in education, training,health, ICT, the economy, publicadministration, agriculture, planning,the environment and other practicalareas. It also provides management,training and ICT support servicesto North-South and cross-borderorganisations and networks, anddevelops and manages cross-borderinformation websites.The Centre is an independent companylimited by guarantee (UK charity no.XR 31047) and is owned jointly byQueen’s University Belfast, Dublin CityUniversity and the Workers’ EducationalAssociation (Northern Ireland). Itsprincipal financial contributors in the pastyear have been the EU INTERREG IVAprogramme and the Irish Department ofEducation and Science. The Centre hasalso raised a significant proportion of itsincome through sponsorship and sellingits research and consultancy services togovernment and other agencies.Controversy about constitutionalrelations between Northern Irelandand the Republic of Ireland nowobscures less than ever before thebroad consensus that exists in bothjurisdictions about the value of crossbordercooperation on practical issues.This holds that a low level of contact andcommunication across the Irish borderdamages the well-being of both partsof the island, and there is a clear needto identify and overcome the presentbarriers to cooperation and mutualunderstanding.JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 113

PURPOSEThe pragmatic view, that cooperationshould take place where it brings realbenefits to both parts of the island, isweakened by an additional factor: therehas been too little research to date onhow this practical cooperation is to beachieved, and how the outcomes ofsuch research should be developed.The Centre for Cross Border Studies– itself a unique expression of crossbordercooperation – provides anobjective, university-based setting forpolicy research into and development ofsuch cooperation.which have a strong education,research and developmentdimension;• Provide training programmes forpublic officials and others in North-South cooperation in Ireland;• Provide sources of comprehensiveand accurate information aboutNorth-South and cross-bordercooperation in Ireland.WEBSITESCCBS HOUSE WEBSITEwww.crossborder.ieThe Centre is a policy researchand development institute, whosepurpose is to:• Identify gaps in cross-borderinformation, research and mutuallearning in Ireland;• Commission and publish researchon issues related to opportunitiesfor and obstacles to cross-bordercooperation in all fields of societyand the economy;• Host events at which researchfindings can be discussed anddisseminated, and at which policyformation in the area of cross-bordercooperation can be developed;• Present the findings of suchresearch and development projectsto the European Commission, thetwo governments, the NorthernIreland Executive, employer, tradeunion and social partnership bodies,and the wider public;• Provide management support forNorth-South and cross-borderorganisations and programmesThe number of page views and hits onthe Centre’s home website continuedto rise (although the number of peopleaccessing it decreased slightly) in2009. On the other hand the numberof people visiting one of the Centre’sother two major websites, to accessBorder Ireland’s (www.borderireland.info) Media Centre, which carries pressarticles about cross-border matters ona weekly basis, rose sharply to the pointwhere it now has more users than www.crossborder.ie (see table onnext page).114JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

www.crossborder.ieYear Unique Visits Page Hits(monthly average) visitors views2003 1619 2161 4802 143732004 1453 2084 9178 189812005 2566 3603 8127 247472006 3481 4915 10149 305342007 3969 5432 12041 322072008 4340 6060 15930 370452009 3621 5156 19338 43007Border Ireland Media Centre (www.borderireland.ie)2009 3801 7043 24840 82984BORDER IRELANDwww.borderireland.infoBorder Ireland is the first everonline searchable databaseto provide access to the fullrange of information on North-South and cross-border issuesin Ireland, covering education,health, agriculture, transport, theenvironment, tourism, culture,mobility issues, business andcommunity development.Formally launching it in March 2006,the then Irish Minister for Finance, MrBrian Cowen TD, said: “This websitewill be the keystone for informationprovision that will enable us all to meetfuture challenges, be they economic,social or educational. I would encourageeveryone who wishes to benefit from across-border approach to their activitiesto make use of this invaluable website.”By February 2010 Border Ireland haddocumented (online) the details of 3,782North-South and cross-border activities,1,790 organisations, 2,048 publications,1,812 newspaper articles and 2,343individual contacts (people).With funding from the EU Peace IIprogramme, the Centre developedBorder Ireland to centralise the verylarge amount of uncoordinatedand fragmented information aboutNorth-South cooperation and theIrish border region. This has involvedJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 115

the creation of an informationcapture strategy and strong workingrelationships with a network of over200 information providers from allgovernment departments, North andSouth; the managing authorities for allEU programmes; relevant charitablefoundations on the island; researchcoordinators in all higher educationinstitutions, and key community andvoluntary, and business leaders.Border Ireland is available online atwww.borderireland.info where peoplecan search through the information byyear, sector and location, and view anorganisation’s history of involvement incross-border cooperation.A second 2006-2008 phase of theproject was implemented throughsupport provided under the EU Peace IIExtension Programme. The key objectivefor this second phase was to developBorder Ireland as the recognised portalfor information on and communicationabout cross-border cooperation on theisland of Ireland.collecting data for and maintaining thisvery large database. The Border IrelandBriefings now on the site are: a guide tocross-border cooperation in the healthservices; cooperation between publiclibraries; a guide to the geographicallocation of cross-border cooperationactivities; an overview of North-South and cross-border cooperationin the Common Chapter of the twojurisdictions’ development plans; ‘Who’sWho’ in North-South and cross-bordercooperation; and overviews of North-South and cross-border cooperationin agriculture, economic development,tourism and transport.During 2009 Border Ireland reached alimit on its current platform and we arenow in the process of moving it ontoa dedicated webserver with almostunlimited space to expand in the future.BORDER PEOPLEwww.borderpeople.infoIn 2008 Border Ireland received afacelift, modifying its presentation toplace the Media Centre, featuringregularly updated media reports onNorth-South and cross-border issues,at the centre of the information provided.The Media Centre is now the mostpopular and visited page on the site.Also during this phase, an interactivediscussion forum was developed todisseminate Border Ireland Briefings,to provide responses to ‘A Note fromthe Next Door Neighbours’ (see below),and to communicate progress inThe Border People online informationportal, providing useful citizens’information for people crossing theborder to live, work, study or retire, isnow three years old.116JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

It was developed in response to acommission from the North/SouthMinisterial Council Joint Secretariat inearly 2007 with technical assistancefrom DID, the web and design teamof the Northern Ireland Department ofFinance and Personnel, and fundedby the EU Peace Two programme. Itssecond 2009-2011 phase is funded bythe EU INTERREG IVA programme.Usage in 2009 Pages HitsJanuary 61,526 191,443February 29,829 167,379March 15,184 123,112April 40,459 394,800May 68,905 418,682June 38,796 318,614July 38,114 335,098August 36,551 340,695September 37,157 364,987October 43,713 384,903November 45,902 390,429December 33,385 275,599The prototype website was officiallylaunched (initially aswww.crossbordermobility.info) inOctober 2007 at a meeting of theNorth/South Ministerial Council inBallymascanlon, Co. Louth by theFirst Minister of Northern Ireland, DrIan Paisley MP MLA, the Deputy FirstMinister, Mr Martin McGuinness MPMLA and the Irish Minister for ForeignAffairs, Mr Dermot Ahern TD. Workcontinued on the site, and it waslaunched to the public aswww.borderpeople.info in Dublin inApril 2008 (by television presenter ClareByrne) and in Derry/Londonderry inMay 2008 (by Northern Ireland DeputyFirst Minister Martin McGuinness MPMLA). It received widespread publicitythroughout Northern Ireland and theSouthern border region, including a fullpage in the Belfast Telegraph.An all-Ireland and international marketingcompany, Weber Shandwick, wasretained to publicise the initiative. Inthe summer-autumn of 2008 and2009 there were poster campaigns onbillboards, adshels, buses and collegeand university notice boards in Newry,Armagh, Enniskillen, Coleraine, Derry/Londonderry, Dundalk, Letterkenny,Bundoran and Monaghan, and leafletsand pens were distributed attargeted events.The Border People public informationwebsite – the first of its kind onthe island of Ireland – is structuredaround the four themes of Commute,Work, Live, Study. It includes indepthinformation on a range ofsubjects in both Irish jurisdictions,including taxation, social security,job seeking, qualifications, health,education, housing, banking andtelecommunications. The websitecontent has been continuously updatedin consultation with Borderwise, thecross-border advice and informationservice provided by Citizens AdviceNorthern Ireland and the CitizensInformation Board in the Republic ofIreland. At time of writing there areno staff employed in Borderwise, butCitizens Advice NI have submitted anapplication to the EU INTERREG IVAprogramme for funding to continuethis service.There appears to be an untappedmarket for information and adviceJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 117

on cross-border mobility issues. Thenumber of ‘hits’ on the Border Peoplewebsite rose sharply to nearly 420,000in May 2009 and achieved a continuinghigh level of 275,000-390,000 permonth thereafter. Pages accessedalso reached a peak in May 2009 atnearly 69,000 and settled to a level of33,000-46,000 after that. This sharpincrease in the website’s usage can belargely explained by the offline marketingcampaign outlined above. Thismarketing campaign will be continuedup to the end of 2011.The second phase of the Border Peoplewebsite (2009-2011) is currently beingdeveloped by the Centre in partnershipwith the North/South Ministerial CouncilJoint Secretariat and funded by the EU’sINTERREG IVA programme as part ofthe INICCO group of projects (see pages120-121). New features allow a muchhigher level of public feedback, and forthe systematic analysis of that feedback.A User Group of cross-bordermobility information providers andusers – including citizens advicebureaux, government agencies, healthorganisations, cross-border localauthority networks, the EURES crossborderemployment service, communitygroups, business groups and individualfirms – met twice in 2009. The first ofthese, on 2 June in Armagh discussedthe accuracy and usability of crossborderstatistics, and was addressed bySteve McFeely of the Central StatisticsOffice (RoI) and Fiona Johnston of theNorthern Ireland Statistics and ResearchAgency (NISRA). The feedback reportcommented:We still do not have any better statisticson the exact numbers of people movingacross the Irish border. The currentlycited statistics of approximately 18,000workers (9,000 in each direction),5,200 students and 4,000 migrantscrossing the border to work or studyeach year are estimates developed in2001 during the preparation of the NorthSouth Ministerial Council ‘Obstacles toMobility’ Study. This lack of an accurate,in-depth understanding of cross-bordermobility within the island is consideredby the User Group to be the ‘majormissing element in the overall picture’.The second User Group meeting on14 December in Dundalk discussedcross-border consumer issues. Thespeakers were the Chief Executive ofthe NI Consumer Council, AntoinetteMcKeown, the PR and MarketingManager of the European ConsumerCentre (Dublin), Caroline Curneen, andDundalk Town Centre CommercialManager, Andrew Mawhinney.Among the issues raised were the unfairdeal border region users are getting inpublic service provision, notably in healthservices and public transport (includingthe lack of integrated ticketing); thepoor service cross-border workersget from banks (particularly the lack ofmortgage packages) and the exorbitantfees frequently charged for simplecross-border transactions; the risingtrend of cross-border online shoppingand the lack of awareness of consumerrights in this area; and the hold large UKshops have on local shopping centresand the particular stranglehold of UKwholesalers.The Border People website and itsuser groups are a clear example of118JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

cross-border cooperation at its mostpragmatic and sensible: a means ofmaking government departments,information and advice providers andthe general public in both jurisdictionsmore knowledgeable about and thuseffective in dealing with practicalobstacles to cross-border mobility.Common difficulties faced by peoplemoving across the border to live, work,study or retire include knowing whereto start when inquiring about specificcross-border issues; the absence ofadvisors in public offices who knowthe two jurisdictions well; the need forinformation leaflets in ‘plain English’ forcross-border workers; the unfamiliarrequirements of having to completeself-assessment tax forms in the otherjurisdiction; a lack of knowledge abouthow educational qualifications translateacross the border; the absence ofportable pensions, and the difficultiesof accessing information about socialwelfare and health care entitlements.A NOTE FROM THE NEXT DOORNEIGHBOURSSince September 2006 the Centre hasbeen sending an opinionated monthlye-column, A Note from the Next DoorNeighbours, to a growing audience ofsubscribers: nearly 7,000 at the lastcount. These Notes have provokedenthusiastic feedback and debate.The 41 ‘Notes’ so far have covered thefollowing issues: whether North-Southcooperation actually works to bringabout reconciliation between peoplein the two jurisdictions; the inaccuratereporting of North-South cooperation inthe media; the possible re-opening ofthe Ulster Canal; the importance of EUfunding to cross-border cooperation inIreland; the need for Northern Irelandto attract back its highly educated andskilled emigrants; how Ireland, Northand South, could play a distinctive rolein combating world hunger; hopesafter the March 2007 Northern Irelandelection; the cross-border role ofteacher education; Rev Ian Paisley as achampion of North-South cooperation;the contribution of Norwegian humanrights lawyer, Torkel Opsahl, to thepeace process; the need for civil societygroups in both Irish jurisdictions to talkto one another; a possible high-speedrail bridge between Northern Irelandand Scotland; the row over familiesin Donegal sending their children toDerry schools; why higher educationstudents don’t cross the border tostudy any more; more about barriersto cross-border higher education; theresurrection of Clones; whether theIrish border region could become thebest border region in Europe; how theCentre for Cross Border Studies isbecoming involved in work in Africa;an upbeat message from the chairmanof the Centre; reconciliation initiativesin Monaghan and Armagh; anti-racismand anti-sectarianism work in primaryschools in County Antrim and theSouthern border region; cross-bordercooperators saying ‘Yes’ to the LisbonTreaty; cross-community gaelic games;the value of having both a united Irelandand a United Kingdom at the same time;JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 119

statistics which show the commonalitiesbetween North and South; North-Southcooperation during the recession; whythe concept of an ‘island of Ireland’economy is still a valid one; the‘patriotism’ of cross-border shopping;the work of a Monaghan priest incross-border reconciliation; crossborderphone, insurance and bankingservices; the Belfast-Dublin Enterprisetrain (twice); the cross-border activitiesof an East Belfast Protestant communityworker; an appeal for an idealisticperson to become the Centre’s deputydirector; the Centre’s work in knittingthe island’s relationships back together;the Orange marching season; the needfor less emphasis on Irish unity andmore on cross-border cooperation; theFermanagh man with the cross-borderknowledge in his head; the role of civilservants and EU officials in cross-borderpeacebuilding; some unsung heroes ofcross-border cooperation in 2009, andthe Armagh Rhymers group.These columns have been reportedin the Irish Times, Irish News, DerryJournal, Northern Standard (Monaghan),Scotsman, Glasgow Herald, SundayPost (Scotland) and on RTE, BBCScotland, Border Television and localradio stations in Ireland, NorthernIreland, Scotland and northern England.They also appear on the celebratedwebsite of British-Irish and Northern Irishissues Slugger O’Toole(http://sluggerotoole.com)The columns can also be accessed atwww.crossborder.ie/home/ndn/index.phpTHE INICCO PROJECTSBetween 2009 and the end of 2011the Centre is undertaking five majornew research projects funded bythe EU cross-border programmeINTERREG IVA and managed bythe Special EU Programmes Body.These have been packaged underthe collective title: the Ireland/Northern Ireland Cross-BorderCooperation Observatory (INICCO).The five constituent projects areas follows:Speakers at the June 2009 Border PeopleUser Group. From left to right: Pat Donaghy(North South Ministerial Council JointSecretariat), Fiona Johnston (NISRA), SteveMacFeely (CSO), Joe Shiels (CCBS).1. BORDER PEOPLE CROSS-BORDER MOBILITYINFORMATION WEBSITE(PHASE TWO)This is the second phase of the BorderPeople (www.borderpeople.info)information website, being developedin a continuing partnership with the120JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

North South Ministerial Council JointSecretariat. This project is led by theCentre for Cross Border Studies’ ITmanager, Joe Shiels, assisted by a newinformation officer, Annmarie O’Kane,who started work in February 2009. (Formore information see the longer item onBorder People on pages 116-119.)Phase Two will allow for a much moresystematic dissemination and marketingof information and public feedback oncross-border mobility issues, assistedby an active and enlarged User Groupdrawn from a wide range of citizensadvice, employment advice, localauthority, business and communityorganisations. Performance will bereviewed against agreed targets forinformation content, along with regularstatistical website reports to evaluatedemand and usage. An annual surveywill test whether the interests of usersare being matched and how well thevarious website features are working.The Steering Group for this project isdrawn from the North South MinisterialCouncil Joint Secretariat, the Centre forCross Border Studies, the Departmentof Finance and Personnel (NI), theDepartment of Social and Family Affairs(RoI), Citizens Advice Northern Ireland,Citizens Information Board (RoI), and theEURES Cross-border Partnership.2. THE CROSS-BORDER SPATIALPLANNING AND TRAININGNETWORK (CroSPlaN)This network was formally launchedat the Blackwater Learning Centre atKnockconan in north Monaghan on 25September 2009. Led by the Centre’ssister organisation, the InternationalCentre for Local and RegionalDevelopment (ICLRD), it brings togetheran alliance of planners, economicdevelopment officers, local authorityofficials, councillors, and communityand business interests on both sides ofthe border to promote more systematiclearning and exchange in planning. (Formore information on CroSPlaN andICLRD see pages137-144.)CroSPlaN’s three year programmeconsists of the following:• Two applied research projects peryear• One training programme per year forcross-border region local councillors,council officials and business leaders(the first course, in Dundalk andNewry, runs from November 2009 toMay 2010).• One technical workshop per year• One annual conference (in 2010 heldon 21-22 January in Enniskillen, CoFermanagh, with the title ‘Preparingfor Economic Recovery: PlanningIreland, North and South, out ofRecession.’)The two 2009-10 research projects are:• The Implications of the NorthernIreland Review of PublicAdministration and new planninglegislation in the Republic ofIreland for inter-jurisdictional spatialplanning;• Best practices in cross-border andinter-jurisdictional spatial planningand regional development in the EUand USA.JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 121

The 2010-11 CroSPlaN researchprojects will address the cross-borderenvironmental implications of EUdirectives (on Habitat, Water Frameworkand Groundwater) for cross-borderplanning in Northern Ireland and the Irishborder region. It is intended that futuretraining programmes will also coverthese topics and their implications forlocal and regional planning.The Steering Group for this projectbrings together planners, planningacademics, cross-border cooperationspecialists and cross-border localauthority network representatives fromthe Planning Service (NI), the BorderRegion Authority (RoI), Leitrim CountyCouncil, the National Institute ofRegional and Spatial Analysis (NIRSA)at NUI Maynooth, University of Ulster,the Irish Central Border Area Network(ICBAN), the Centre for Cross BorderStudies and the ICLRD.3. EXPLORING THE POTENTIALFOR CROSS-BORDER HOSPITALSERVICES IN THE BORDERREGIONThe overall aim of this project is to‘identify how cross-border hospitalservices can provide mutual benefitsfor the people of the border region’.Building on two recent CCBS reports –Removing the Barriers: an Initial Reporton the Potential for Cross-Border Cooperationin Hospital Services in Ireland(2007) and Surveying the Sickbeds:initial steps towards modelling all-islandhospital accessibility (2008) – this morein-depth study concentrates specificallyon the Irish border region, but is alsodrawing on comparable practiceelsewhere in the EU and trying to identifypossible new areas for developingall-island health co-operation with aparticular focus on hospital planning.There are many complex political andpolicy barriers– such as payment fortreatment and the contrasting role ofhealth insurance in the two jurisdictions– that the report will also take intoaccount.The project has two complementarystrands:• Development of a prototypemodelling tool for hospitalplanning on a border region andall-island basis (the ModellingStrand)• The role of communityinvolvement in planning hospitalservices in the border region (theParticipation Strand).The primary output of this study, whichwill be completed in mid 2011, will bea robust prototype modelling tool forhospital planning based on patientneed, and disregarding, for researchpurposes, the jurisdictional boundaries.This tool will take into account a rangeof variables such as clinical factors inselected specialisms; the distributionof patients (potential need anddemand); the configuration of hospitalsin the cross-border region (potentialsupply based on bed numbers andspecialisms), and the transport network(modelling of accessibility based ontravel time).After a tendering process in autumn2009, the Centre selected the Londonand Dublin-based consultancy firm122JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

Speakers at the January 2010 ICLRD/CroSPlaN conference: from left to right: (back) HubertKearns, Professor Rob Kitchin, Wesley Shannon, Professor John FitzGerald; (front) Holly St Clair,Charlotte Kahn and John Driscoll.Horwath Bastow Charleton (HBC),which has extensive experience of healthservice policy and planning, to carryout the Modelling Strand of this project.HBC will identify a series of optionsto look at the core ingredients for themodelling tool, and how it might beapplied in practice in a selected numberof clinical areas. The draft modellingtool will be tested with real data fromthe Northern Ireland and Republic ofIreland hospital systems. Specifically,the research will examine the number,size, composition and possible locationsof the hospitals that would be requiredin the future if the planning of acuteservices in the border region was onthe basis of population needs ratherthan jurisdictional frontiers. The intentionwould not be to present a prescriptivemodel or one which covers every servicearea, but rather to provide an indicationof how the pilot methodology developedmight be applied to selected services.The Participation Strand of the projectwill be undertaken ‘in house’ by CCBSdeputy director (research), Ruth Taillon,who carried out a series of focus groupsand interviews with hospital serviceusers and health service professionalsin winter-early spring 2010. Focusgroups of local stakeholders were heldin Enniskillen, Omagh, Dundalk, Derry/Londonderry, Letterkenny, Cavan,Monaghan, Castleblayney, Newry andDungannon. This study, which will becompleted in May 2010, will explore therole (of lack of it) of local communitiesin the planning of hospital services inJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 123

the Irish border region and factor thesefindings into recommendations fordeveloping a more patient-centredfocus to this planning. It will alsoconsider how local communitiesmight have an input into cross-borderhealth planning in the future. Recentcampaigns in Monaghan and Omaghagainst the removal or relocation ofhospital services have brought theseissues into particular focus.The Steering Group for this projectbrings health and cross-bordercooperation specialists together fromthe Institute of Public Health in Ireland,the Health Research Board (RoI), theHealth Service Executive (RoI)(observer),Cooperation and Working Together(CAWT), the Irish Patients Association,the Patient Client Council (NI), thePharmaceutical Society of Ireland,the Irish Department of Foreign Affairs(observer), the Centre for Cross BorderStudies and the University of Warwick.4. REVIVING THE BORDER REGIONECONOMY IN A NEW ERAOF PEACE AND DEVOLVEDGOVERNMENTThe aim of this package of four closelyinter-related research projects is to findways of understanding and increasingthe accessibility, size, transparency,competitiveness and profitabilityof Irish border region markets in acontext where peace and normalityhave finally arrived in Northern Irelandand the Southern Border Region, buthave been followed by an internationaleconomic recession. This overall project– in which the Centre is partnered byInterTradeIreland – is being carriedout by a high-level team comprisingDr John Bradley, formerly of theEconomic and Social Research Institutein Dublin; Professor Michael Best ofthe Universities of Cambridge andMassachusetts; Ms Joanne McLaughlin;and two economists from the WroclawRegional Development Agency inPoland (the research is ‘twinned’ forcomparative purposes with the LowerSilesia region of Poland and its commonborder with the German länder ofSaxony and Brandenburg). This projectwas initiated in December 2009 and willbe formally launched in spring 2010.The four constituent elements of thisresearch project are:a. The specific challenges theregion faces due to its peripherallocation, with an explorationof how it might become lessperipheral through new businesscommunication technologies,optimal use of supporting institutions(including higher educationinstitutions) and the experienceof more advanced border regionselsewhere in Europe. This is the‘framing’ piece of research for theoverall research project.b. How border region retail andwholesale markets might bemade more efficient drivers ofregional growth (and more robustin the face of currency changes)after the present temporaryimbalance caused by currencydistortions.c. How the micro-enterprises (withunder 10 employees) whichare the mainstay of so mucheconomic activity in the region124JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

might be enabled to expandby exploiting increased access tolarger cross-border markets ontheir doorstep (and to learn fromthe experience of successful ‘niche’producers in other parts of Irelandand Europe).d. How the region’s tourismproduct (including ‘green’tourism) might dovetail withstrategic plans for tourism inIreland as a whole and how bordertowns might learn from ‘goodperformers’ elsewhere on the islandto bring more visitors to the region.The Steering Group for this projectbrings together economists, industrialpromotion practitioners and crossbordercooperation specialists fromInterTradeIreland, the Department ofEnterprise,Trade and Investment (NI),Invest Northern Ireland, Forfás (RoI),Centre for Cross Border Studies and theUniversity of Ulster.5. PILOT IMPACT ASSESSMENTTOOLKIT FOR CROSS-BORDERCOOPERATION IN IRELANDAs part of the integrative work of across-border observatory, the Centrewill research the development of apilot Impact Assessment Toolkit forpractical, mutually beneficial crossbordercooperation in Ireland. Impactassessment is a continuous process tohelp the policy-maker fully think throughand understand the consequences ofpossible and actual interventions.It hasbeen used particularly in the health andenvironmental sectors in Ireland, Northand South, but not until now in crossbordercooperation.The Centre will develop this ‘toolkit’to guide policy-makers through theprocess of planning and implementing amajor cross-border project. This wouldconsist of a number of stages: theearly stages of identifying and definingthe policy challenge; the identificationof options; the consultation stage; thefinal proposal, focussing on costs andbenefits; the implementation stage; andthe review stage, when actual costs andbenefits indicate whether the project isachieving its desired aims. This projectwill start in May 2010, and will beassisted, on a consultancy basis, by DrJoachim Beck, director of the Euro-Institut in Kehl, Germany, and a leadingEuropean expert on cross-bordercooperation and impact assessment.CURRENT EXCHANGE PROJECTSNorth-South Student TeacherExchange Project (Year Six)In March 2010 the North-South StudentTeacher Exchange project will enterits sixth year with the latest exchangeof 19 students to do a key part oftheir assessed teaching practice inschools in the other Irish jurisdiction.The partners with the Centre in thisproject are the seven colleges ofprimary education on the island:Stranmillis University College and StMary’s University College in Belfast; StPatrick’s College Drumcondra, MarinoInstitute of Education, Froebel Collegeof Education and Church of IrelandCollege of Education in Dublin (MaryImmaculate College in Limerick is nottaking part in the 2010 exchange). 142JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 125

student teachers have taken part in thisexchange project since it was initiatedin 2003. The first four exchanges werefunded by the EU Peace Programme,while the 2009 and 2010 exchangeswere funded by the StandingConference on Teacher Education Northand South (SCoTENS)(see also pages135-137).In October 2008 a study by Dr MaeveMartin of NUI Maynooth on the impactof the exchange on the personalattitudes and professional practice ofthe student teachers who had takenpart in it between 2003 and 2007 wascompleted. Dr Martin concluded:This project has been a great successin terms of the enduring positivedispositions it has helped to developamong the beneficiaries, the youngteachers. These have included: greaterinterest in peace and reconciliationissues; greater consciousness of thedemands of multicultural classrooms;greater knowledge of the otherjurisdiction’s education system andcurriculum; the invaluable experiencegained from learning from skilledteachers in the other jurisdiction; anda greatly increased sense of personalworth and confidence gained throughparticipation in the exchange.She called the project ‘a courageous,inclusive and groundbreaking exchange’and “an experience that has beentransformational” for the studentteachers involved.Student teachers at the North-South Student Teacher Exchange Project’s Orientation Day inChurch of Ireland College, Rathmines, Dublin on 27 January 2010.126JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

Winners of the 2009-2010 Universities Ireland-IBEC/CBI Joint Business Council postgraduatescholarships at the awards ceremony in Belfast on 7 December 2009. From left to right (front):Bryan Mukandi, Deirdre McKenna, Anna Magee and Mairead Cantwell. From left to right(back): Reg McCabe, Chief Executive IBEC-CBI Joint Business Council; Professor RichardBarnett, Chairman, Universities Ireland; Andrew Hamilton, Deputy Secretary, NI Department forEmployment and Learning; Brian Ambrose, Chairman, CBI Northern Ireland.CURRENT ADMINISTRATIONPROJECTSThe Centre has filled an important nicheby providing administrative supportto North-South and cross-borderinitiatives, particularly in the field ofeducation. Many cross-border projectsare sustained largely through EU fundingand the commitment of enthusiasticindividuals, and when the money andenthusiasm runs out their absenceof a proper administrative structureoften dooms them to early closure.The Centre offers this cross-borderadministrative structure, and a detailedknowledge of support mechanisms inboth Irish jurisdictions, which can ensuresuch projects’ longer-term sustainability.UNIVERSITIES IRELANDThe Centre acts as the secretariatfor Universities Ireland (UI), set upin 2003 to promote co-operationand collaboration between the twouniversities in Northern Irelandand the seven universities in theRepublic of Ireland. Its chairman forthe 2008-2010 period is ProfessorRichard Barnett, Vice-Chancellorof the University of Ulster. Themembers of the governing CouncilJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 127

of UniversitiesIreland are the nineuniversity presidentsand vice-chancellorsplus representativesof the three externalfunders: Departmentof Education andScience (RoI),Department forEmployment andLearning (NI) andInterTradeIreland.The North/South PostgraduateScholarship Scheme and the Irish-African Partnership for ResearchCapacity Building, launched byUniversities Ireland in 2006 and2007 respectively, have seen furtherprogress this year. The Departmentfor Employment and Learning DeputySecretary, Andrew Hamilton (standingin for the Minister, Sir Reg Empey)presented four masters and PhD fundingawards to students – two from the Northand two from the South – at a ceremonyin Belfast in December 2009.The Irish-African Partnership forResearch Capacity Building (now calledIAP for short) held successful workshopsat Maputo in Mozambique (May 2009)and Dublin City University (October2009), and is planning a summer schooldevoted to research training at Zombain Malawi at the end of March 2010 forsenior academics and research officepersonnel from the 13 IAP partneruniversities in Ireland, North and South,Uganda, Tanzania, Mozambiqueand Malawi. Other UI activities haveincluded becoming the Ireland Sectionof the international Scholars at Risknetwork, meetings with Universities UKand addresses by international highereducation specialists.NORTH/SOUTH POSTGRADUATESCHOLARSHIPSIn the academicyear 2009-2010four scholarshipswere awardedunder thisscheme, whichis a collaborationbetweenUniversitiesIreland and theJoint BusinessCouncil of the Irish Business andEmployers Confederation (IBEC) andthe Confederation of British Industry(Northern Ireland). The scholarshipswent to Mairead Cantwell, a graduateof Trinity College Dublin doing an MScin Spatial Regeneration at Queen’sUniversity Belfast; Anna Magee, agraduate of University of Ulster doing anMSc in Energy Management at DublinInstitute of Technology; Bryan Mukandi,a graduate of University of Zimbabweand NUI Galway, doing a Masters inPolitical Philosophy at Queen’s UniversityBelfast; and Deirdre McKenna, agraduate of Queen’s University Belfastdoing a PhD in Architecture at UniversityCollege Dublin. The first two of thesescholarships were funded by RPS Groupand Dublin Port respectively, while thelatter two were funded by UniversitiesIreland alone.The fundamental requirement foreligibility for this scheme is a willingnessby students to relocate to the other Irish128JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

Participants at the third Irish-African Partnership workshop in Maputo, Mozambique,11-14 May 2009.jurisdiction for a whole year or the majorpart of a year in order to undertake acourse of postgraduate study.Last year the smaller number of North/South scholarships on offer reflectedthe sharp reduction in private sectorsponsorship caused by the economicrecession. In 2010 Universities Irelandand the Joint Business Council arehoping to make up to six awards, whichwill again be worth €15,000 (approx.£13,500) each. Up to four of thesewill be in areas of interest to business(mainly the sciences – includingenvironmental sciences – engineering,ICT and business administration) andwill be co-sponsored by individual firms.Two will be in the humanities and thesocial sciences and will be funded byUniversities Ireland alone. The deadlinefor applications is 17 May 2010.A new element this year will be theincorporation of a three-month jobplacement opportunity in sponsoringcompanies, to be taken at the end ofthe funded postgraduate year. Thiswill be coordinated by IBEC’s ExportOrientation Programme (EOP), theRepublic of Ireland’s longest-running andmost successful graduate placementprogramme.THE IRISH-AFRICAN PARTNERSHIPFOR RESEARCH CAPACITYBUILDING (IAP)The Irish-African Partnership forResearch Capacity Building (2008-2011)was put together by a small group ofJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 129

people working out of the Centre forCross Border Studies, Trinity CollegeDublin and Dublin City University in2007. It is largely funded by the IrishGovernment under the Programme ofStrategic Cooperation between Irish Aidand Higher Education and ResearchInstitutes (2007-2011) – which hasprovided €1.5 million – with €110,000in matching funding from UniversitiesIreland. The Irish Aid funding is managedby the Higher Education Authorityin Dublin.The Irish-African Partnership forResearch Capacity Building (IAP) bringstogether the nine universities on theisland of Ireland along with MakerereUniversity in Uganda, University ofDar es Salaam in Tanzania, EduardoMondlane University in Maputo,Mozambique, and the Universityof Malawi in a unique, high-levelpartnership to develop a coordinatedapproach to Research Capacity Buildingin higher education institutions in orderto make an effective contribution to thereduction of poverty in those countries.The IAP’s aims are:• to build the capacity fordevelopment research in Irish andNorthern Irish universities;• to build capacity in health andeducation research – with genderand ICT as cross-cutting themes– in the four participating Africanuniversities;• in the longer term, to develop anIrish-African network of excellence indevelopment research.The co-chairs of the IAP’s steeringcommittee are Professor Ronnie Munckof Dublin City University, ProfessorSean Farren of University of Ulster andProfessor Eli Katunguka-Rwakishayaof Makerere University. The projectmanager, Peter McEvoy (replacing DrNiamh Gaynor, who resigned to takeup an academic position in September2009) is based at Dublin City University.Other IAP staff are Dr Eimear Barrrett,a postdoctoral fellow in health basedat Queen’s University Belfast; Dr MaryGoretti Nakabugo, a postdoctoral fellowin education based at Mary ImmaculateCollege, University of Limerick;Yaoxue Lin, a web portal managerbased at TCD; and Caitriona Fitzgerald,a part-time administrative officer basedat DCU.The Irish-African Partnership waslaunched by President Mary McAleeseon the opening day of the first IAPworkshop at Dublin City University on8-11 April 2008. The keynote speakerwas Professor Akilalagpa Sawyerrfrom Ghana, Secretary General of theAssociation of African Universities, andan international authority on ResearchCapacity Building in African highereducation institutions. Among thosewho also addressed the workshop werethe President of Dublin City University,Professor Ferdinand von Prondzynski;the Vice-Chancellor of MakerereUniversity, Professor Livingston Luboobi;the Vice-Chancellor of the Universityof Dar es Salaam, Professor RwekazaMukandala; the Vice Chancellor ofUniversity of Malawi, Professor ZimaniKadzamira, and the Vice-Rector ofEduardo Mondlane University, ProfessorOrlando Quilambo.A second four-day workshop was130JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

held in Entebbein Uganda on10-13 November2008. Once againmore than 70senior academicsparticipated fromthe participatinguniversities. Itwas addressedby, among others, the Vice-Chancellorof Makerere University, ProfessorLivingston Luboobi; the Director ofResearch of the University of Dares Salaam, Professor Saida Yahya-Othman; the Dean of Medicine ofEduardo Mondlane University, ProfessorMamudo Ismail; the Dean of Science atChancellor College, University of Malawi,Professor John Saka; the Provost ofTrinity College Dublin, Professor JohnHegarty; and the former Tánaiste andMinister for Foreign Affairs, Mr DickSpring, chair of the IAP’s internationaladvisory board.A third four-day workshop was heldin Maputo in Mozambique on 11-14May 2009, again with more than 70participants. It was addressed by,among others, the Rector of EduardoMondlane University in Maputo, Dr FilipeJosé Couto; the President of UniversityCollege Cork, Dr Michael Murphy; andthe Irish ambassador and British HighCommissioner to Mozambique, FrankSheridan and Andrew Soper.An extra, fourth workshop washeld in Dublin City University on 8-9October 2009 for Vice Presidents andDirectors of Research in IAP partneruniversities. The main purpose of thisevent was to generate themes for asummer school to focus on researchtraining which will be held on 22-25March 2010 in Chancellor College ofthe University of Malawi in Zomba,Malawi. This will concentrate on sixareas: research management, researchtraining, research infrastructure, researchfunding, human resources and researchbid writing.The final, fifth IAP workshop will takeplace in Queen’s University Belfaston 29 September-1 October 2010.Reports on the IAP’s five work packages– stakeholder consultation, foresight,metrics, web portal and conclusions andrecommendations – will be presentedat this culminating workshop. The finalreport of the whole IAP project will bepublished in early 2011.The project’s revised objectives are:• to promote research within thepartner universities in Ireland andAfrica;• To develop understanding of thecomplex issues involved in ResearchCapacity Building within the partneruniversities;• To identify priority research needsin the two core thematic areas ofhealth and education, highlightingthose which the IAP partners havethe capacity to meet;• To make recommendations forpractical strategies within theuniversities to tackle these issues;• To develop a set of metrics by whichresearch capacity building may bemeasured;• To develop a web portal which linksIrish and African partners in a virtualcommunity and which provides aJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 131

vehicle for showcasing developmentresearch and information through adigital repository.The project’s activities and outputsare as follows:1. A stakeholder consultationamong the 13 participatinginstitutions (and external agenciessuch as relevant governmentministries and donor organisations)using workshops, focus groups,structured interviews ande-consultation. The first phase ofthis exercise took place in summerautumn2008 and involved over 300academics and researchers in theinstitutions. This was the first everjoint baseline study of developmentresearch capacity in the Irish andparticipating African universities.Further research was carried out,involving interviews with educationand health specialists beyond theuniversities, and aid agencies andregional health and higher educationbodies, between November2008 and May 2009. In the lattermonth, health and educationresearch priorities identified by theconsultation were discussed at theMaputo workshop, and formedthe basis for two inter-university‘clusters’ of researchers in educationand health. The final report of thestakeholder consultation is due to becompleted by March 2010.2. Five workshops (in Dublin,Entebbe, Maputo, Dublin andBelfast) to develop the networkand specific partnerships, to planthe Malawi summer school andto identify priority areas in health,The President of University College Cork, Dr Michael Murphy (centre), Professor Frank Kee ofQueen’s University Belfast and Patricia McAllister of CCBS outside the Hotel Cardoso in Maputo,where the third workshop took place.132JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

education, gender and ICT researchthrough a ‘foresight’ exercise.3. Foresight report identifyingthe priority themes in health andeducation research, with gender andICT as cross-cutting themes, overthe next 10 years. The final draftreport – Looking to the Future: theIrish-African Partnership ForesightReport - is available on the IAP webportal (see below).4. Summer School, to take place inZomba, Malawi in March 2010 toprovide training in selected areas ofResearch Capacity Building identifiedthrough the stakeholder consultation,the fourth workshop and theforesight exercise.5. Network development throughonline discussion forums, monthlymeetings of the ExecutiveCommittee (on which representativesof the 13 universities and the Centrefor Cross Border Studies/UniversitiesIreland sit), annual meetings of theInternational Advisory Board (chairedby former Tánaiste and Minister ofForeign Affairs, Dick Spring) andpresentations at conferences andseminars by staff and SteeringCommittee members.6. Metrics: developing a set ofmetrics to measure the building ofresearch capacity against a baselineassessment of research capacity inthe 13 partner universities.7. Web Portal. There are two partsto the IAP web portal (www.irishafricanpartnership.ie); the‘front end’ which is the projectwebsite, which is managed by theCentre for Cross Border Studiesand the ‘back end’ which is theportal’s major element, and is theresponsibility of Trinity CollegeDublin. This consists of: 1. AResearch Register to enableindividual researchers in theparticipating Irish and Africanuniversities to post their own details,interests and publications; 2. An‘open access’ Digital Repository forpublications, reports, grey literature,data and theses.The Centre for Cross Border Studies/Universities Ireland provides a numberof services to the IAP. Director AndyPollak is the reporting officer to theHigher Education Authority and IrishAid. Events Manager Patricia McAllisteris the workshop organiser, and FinanceManager Mairead Hughes handles theIAP’s finances.OTHER INITIATIVESScholars at Risk: Ireland Section.The Ireland Section of the NewYork University-based Scholars at Riskinternational network, which defendsand provides refuge and support foruniversity scholars and academicsunder threat of persecution in their owncountries, was launched at a crowdedmeeting in Trinity College Dublin on 22September 2009. Universities Irelandmanages the Ireland Section of SAR.The meeting’s keynote speaker was theIranian lawyer, academic, human rightsactivist and 2003 Nobel Peace laureate,Dr Shirin Ebadi. Taking advantage oftwo €10,000 bursaries provided forthis purpose by Universities Ireland, attime of writing University of Limerickwas finalising arrangements to host aprofessor of psychology from Iran,while Trinity College Dublin andJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 133

University College Dublin were jointlyapplying to host another academicat risk.A series of meetings withUniversities UK, the representativebody of British universities, was initiatedin September 2004 in Dublin, with afollow-up meeting in London in January2006, and a third meeting in Dublinin March 2008. At this latter meetingthe presidents and vice-chancellorsdiscussed matters of mutual interestin the areas of business-universitycollaboration, university funding andresearch, and European developments.A fourth meeting is planned for autumn2010.Addresses by key internationalhigher education specialists. Atthe autumn 2009 UI Council meeting,the presidents decided to invite topinternational specialists on highereducation to address their meeingson a regular basis. The first of thesewas at the spring UI Council meetingon 12 February 2010 in Dublin, whichwas addressed by the President of theUniversity of Virginia and former chair ofthe Association of American Universities,Professor John T. Casteen III.Universities Ireland is funded by anannual levy paid by the nine universities,and by grants from the Departmentof Education and Science in Dublin,the Department for Employment andLearning in Belfast and InterTradeIrelandin Newry.Website: www.universitiesireland.ieSpeakers at the 2009 SCoTENS conference – ‘Reflective Practice: Challenges for TeacherEducation’. From left to right: Dr Tom Hesketh, Minister of State for Lifelong Learning,Sean Haughey TD, Professor Andrew Pollard and Professor Teresa O’Doherty.134JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

STANDING CONFERENCE ONTEACHER EDUCATION, NORTHAND SOUTH (SCoTENS)The Centre also acts as thesecretariat for the StandingConference on Teacher Education,North and South (SCoTENS). Thiswas set up in 2003 by a groupof senior teacher educationspecialists from universities,colleges of education and otherteacher education providers in bothjurisdictions. The 2009-2010 jointchairs of SCoTENS are ProfessorTeresa O’Doherty, Dean of Educationat Mary Immaculate College,University of Limerick, and Dr TomHesketh, Director of the RegionalTraining Unit in Belfast.SCoTENS now has 38 institutionalmembers including all the Colleges ofEducation and university educationdepartments on the island; the TeachingCouncils and curriculum councils (CCEAand NCAA) in both jurisdictions; fourteacher trade unions; nine educationcentres in the Republic; the RegionalTraining Unit (Belfast); the OpenUniversity and the National College ofArt and Design.SCoTENS’ seventhannual conference,on ‘ReflectivePractice: Challengesfor TeacherEducation’, washeld in October2008 in Malahide,Co Dublin. It wasopened by theMinister of State for Lifelong Learning,Mr Sean Haughey TD. The speaker onthe first evening was the NI Ministerfor Education, Ms Caitriona RuaneMLA. The keynote speakers wereProfessor Andrew Pollard, Director ofthe Economic and Social ResearchCouncil’s Teacher and LearningResearch Programme at the Institute ofEducation in London (the UK’s largestever research investment in education,involving over 700 researchers);Professor Jean Murray, Professor ofEducation at University of East London;and Professor Juhani Hytönen, Head ofthe Department of Applied Sciences ofEducation, University of Helsinki.Three reports were launched at theconference: School Leadership Policyand Practice, North and South, the2008 SCoTENS conference and annualreport; Becoming a Teacher: PrimaryStudent Teachers as Learners andTeachers of History, Geography andScience: an all-Ireland study, by ateam of researchers from St Patrick’sCollege Drumcondra, StranmillisUniversity College and other collegesof education (led by Fionnuala Waldron,Susan Pike, Richard Greenwood,Cliona M. Murphy, Geraldine O’Connor,Anne Dolan and Karen Kerr); andProfessional Development for Post-Primary SEN Teachers in NorthernIreland and the Republic of Ireland,by a team of researchers from UniversityCollege Dublin and Queen’s UniversityBelfast (led by Elizabeth O’Gorman,Sheelagh Drudy, Eileen Winter, RonSmith and Mairin Barry).Previous SCoTENS annual conferenceswere on ‘School Leadership Policy andPractice, North and South’ in 2008;JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 135

‘Teaching in the Knowledge Society’ in2007; ‘Teacher Education and Schools:Together Towards Improvement’in 2006; ‘Teacher Education forCitizenship in Diverse Societies’ in2005; ‘The Changing Contexts ofTeacher Education, North and South’(with a particular emphasis on TeachingCouncils) in 2004; and ‘Challenges toTeacher Education and Research, Northand South’ in 2003.SCoTENS hasalso provided seedfunding for North-South and all-islandconferences onsocial, scientificand environmentaleducation (six); initialteacher education,citizenship anddiversity education(two); educational research; specialeducational needs (two); social justiceeducation in initial teacher education(two); language teacher education;doctoral research in education (two);autism; dyslexia, literacy and inclusion;and the competences approach toteacher professional development.It has also providedseed fundingfor North-Southresearch projectson the social/national identity ofyoung children inthe border region;ICT in teachereducation; childrenwith profound andmultiple learning difficulties; studentteacher exchanges; student perceptionsof history, geography and science;school-based work in colleges ofeducation; the professional developmentof teachers working with students withspecial educational needs; examiningassessment procedures for traineeteachers; universities’ role in continuingteacher professional development;work-placed learning models inpost-compulsory teacher education;measuring the value of educationtechnologies; primary student teachers’mathematical identities; consulting pupilson remediation of their specific literacydifficulties; student teachers and theneeds of pupils with autism spectrumdisorder; English as an additionallanguage in undergraduate teachereducation; inclusion and diversity inpost-primary education; the experiencesof primary teachers in teaching healthyeating guidelines; building North-Southlinks in global justice education; primaryschool physical education; arts-basededucational research; the digitisation ofIrish historical education documents;sixth year religion; peer mentoring inteacher education; spoken Irish in Irishmediumschools; the ‘lift off’ literacyprogramme for Irish medium schools;and good practice in the teaching ofpupils from ethnic minorities.A total of 51 North-South research,conference andexchange projectshave receivedfinancial supportfrom SCoTENS inthe period 2003-2009. In February2010 another 11136JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

were seed funded: a conference onpost-primary religious education; aninvestigation into bullying of children withlearning disabilities; mentoring in PEteacher education; realistic mathematicseducation (RME) in primary schools;an expanded conference on doctoralresearch in education; collaborative artand design in citizenship education;a Colleges of Education directorsof teaching practice CPD network;exploring Japanese research lessonsfor peer-to-peer profesional learning; acomparative study of further educationteaching North and South; a baselinestudy of research capacity building ininitial teacher education, North andSouth; and helping student teachersunderstand the problems of childrensubject to domestic abuse.SCoTENS also sponsors the groundbreakingNorth-South Student TeacherExchange, now in its sixth year, whichbrings student teachers from the island’sseven colleges of primary education todo a key part of their assessed teacherpractice in the other jurisdiction (also seepages 125-126).The SCoTENS website (http://scotens.org) has been updated over the past18 months and highlights, in particular,resources on special education,citizenship education and teaching andlearning with digital video. Assistancewith inputting content on special needseducation has been provided by Dr NoelPurdy (Stranmillis University College).SCoTENS is funded by annual grantsfrom the Irish Department of Educationand Science, and the Department forEmployment and Learning and theDepartment of Education (NorthernIreland). A significant proportion ofits funding comes from institutionalsubscriptions from its memberuniversities, colleges of education, otherhigher education institutions, teachingcouncils, education trade unions,education centres, curriculum councilsand other bodies involved with teachereducation. In 2006-2008 it also receivedgrant aid from the Nuffield Foundation.INTERNATIONAL CENTREFOR LOCAL AND REGIONALDEVELOPMENTThe Centre administers the InternationalCentre for Local and RegionalDevelopment (ICLRD). The ICLRD isa North-South-US partnership whichset up offices in Armagh in 2006 (aftera founding conference in Athlonein 2004) to explore and expand thecontribution that planning and thedevelopment of physical, social andeconomic infrastructures can make toimprove the lives of people on the islandof Ireland and elsewhere. The partnerinstitutions are: the National Institutefor Regional and Spatial Analysis(NIRSA) at the National University ofIreland, Maynooth; the School of theBuilt Environment at the University ofUlster; the Institute for InternationalUrban Development in Cambridge,Massachusetts; Athlone Institute ofTechnology; and the Centre for CrossJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 137

Border Studies. Each partner bringscomplementary expertise and networkson both a North-South and East-Westbasis – creating a unique, all-island andinternational centre.The ICLRD continues to expand itscollaboration with other institutions andhas built close working relationshipswith individual faculty and researchersfrom Harvard University, Queen’sUniversity Belfast and Mary ImmaculateCollege, University of Limerick. It isopen to involving other academic andresearch institutions in its activities.The director of the ICLRD is JohnDriscoll, who is also a vice-presidentof the Institute for International UrbanDevelopment; its assistant directors areCaroline Creamer of NUI Maynooth andDr Neale Blair of University of Ulster.The ICLRD• Provides independent joined-upresearch and policy advice on crossborderand all-island spatial planningand local and regional developmentissues;• Offers training and capacity buildingprogrammes for communitiesand local, regional and nationalgovernment representatives andofficials;• Assists local authorities andcommunities in translating policy into‘on the ground’ action;• Acts as a catalyst to bring relevantpublic and private actors, North andSouth, together to work on commongoals;• Promotes international cooperationand exchanges.Each year the ICLRD undertakes appliedresearch projects which contribute to anunderstanding of the complex all-islandand cross-border dynamics and driversof change in cities, towns and ruralareas in Ireland. Since its inception, theICLRD has organised its work aroundthree spatial scales: EU and all-island;regional and cross-border; and local.Much of the ICLRD’s work over thepast year has been undertaken aspart of the Cross-Border SpatialPlanning and Training Network(CroSPlaN), an EU INTERREG IVAfundedprogramme administered bythe Special EU Programmes Body.Operated in association with the Centrefor Cross Border Studies as part of theIreland/Northern Ireland Cross-borderCooperation Observatory (INICCO),CroSPlaN is a three-year programmeof research, training and workshopsin Northern Ireland and the Southernborder counties (see pages 121-122and below for further details).Other key funders and supporters ofthe ICLRD’s programme of activitiesare the Irish Government through theHigher Education Authority (HEA),the Northern Ireland Administration,and the International Fund for Ireland.In addition, InterTradeIreland worksclosely with the ICLRD in linking spatialplanning to the process of strengtheningeconomic competitiveness in crossbordercooperation.ICLRD conferences and workshopsOn 21-22 January 2010 the ICLRD/CroSPlaN held a fifth annual conferencein Enniskillen, County Fermanaghunder the title ‘Preparing for Economic138JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

Recovery: PlanningIreland, Northand South, outof Recession’.Over 130 peopleattended this twodayevent whichwas sponsoredas part of theCroSPlaN initiativeby the EU INTERREG IVA programmethrough the Special EU ProgrammesBody. The conference was opened bySEUPB Chief Executive Pat Colgan,with the keynote addresses being givenby Professor John FitzGerald of theEconomic and Social Research Instituteand Declan Kelly, the US EconomicEnvoy to Northern Ireland. Conferencepresentations are available for downloadat http://iclrd.org/web/2010-conference/Other speakers included Charlotte Kahn,Director of the Boston Indicators Projectat the Boston Foundation; Holly St. Clair,Director of Data Services at the BostonregionMetropolitan Area PlanningCouncil; Pat McArdle, former UlsterBank Chief Economist and Irish Timeseconomic commentator; Conor Skehan,Head of Environment and Planning atDublin Institute of Technology; WesleyShannon, Director, Local GovernmentPolicy Division, Department of theEnvironment (NI); Hubert Kearns,Sligo County Manager; Denis RooneyCBE, Chair of the International Fundfor Ireland; Patricia Potter, Director ofthe Dublin Regional Authority; CelineMcHugh, Senior Policy Advisor withForfás; Martin Spollen, Strategic Advisorwith the Strategic Investment Board(NI); Brian Murray, Chief Executiveof the Workspace Group; ProfessorGreg Lloyd, head of the Faculty of theBuilt Environment at the University ofUlster; Professor Rob Kitchin, head ofthe National Institute for Regional andSpatial Analysis at NUI Maynooth, andProfessor Francois Vigier, Presidentof the Institute for InternationalUrban Development in Cambridge,Massachusetts.In association with this conference,the ICLRD hosted a half-day technicalworkshop on the theme ‘Evidence-Informed Planning: Making InformationAccessible to build Inter-JurisdictionalCooperation’. Attended by 40 peoplefrom both the public and privatesectors in both jurisdictions with aninterest in evidence-based policy andpractice, this event was also organisedunder the auspices of CroSPlaN. Bestpractices from Boston, Massachusettswere presented to demonstratehow the Boston Foundation and theMetropolitan Area Planning Counciluse data and outreach events todrive regional change. The workshopconsidered the role of spatial data andof various technologies in (a) broadeningparticipation in planning and publicpolicy, and (b) improving understandingof the impacts and trade-offs ofdevelopment decisions.Rural RestructuringOn 8 May 2009 the ICLRD organiseda one-day conference on ruralrestructuring and development inthe Blackwater Learning Centre inKnockconan, Emyvale, Co. Monaghan.This event was organised as partof an ICLRD research project onJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 139

ural restructuring, North and South.The conference brought together115 participants and speakers fromgovernment departments, localdevelopment agencies, local authorities,businesses and business networks,community development groups, highereducation institutions, and planners.The keynote speakers included RogerTurner of the Commission for RuralCommunities (UK); Geoff Brown ofthe Carnegie UK Trust; Peter Quinn ofPeter Quinn Consultancy Services; Dr.Kevin Heanue of Teagasc; and MauraWalsh of IRD Duhallow, Co Cork.Conference presentations are availablefor download at http://iclrd.org/web/2009/04/11/rural-restructuringlocal-sustainable-solutions-to-arural-challenge/The following month, on 19 June 2009,the ICLRD report Rural Restructuring:Local Sustainable Solutions to theRural Challenge, was launched inDraperstown, Co. Derry/Londonderryby NI Minister for Agriculture and RuralDevelopment, Michelle Gildernew MPMLA. This research project exploredthe role of rural restructuring andeconomic diversification in both Irishjurisdictions, together with the growingimportance of the urban-rural interface,in the achievement of balanced spatialdevelopment. The programme ofresearch focused on three rural areas:the Draperstown-Magherafelt district inCounty Derry/Londonderry; Emyvale-Truagh-Aughnacloy on the Monaghan-Tyrone border; and Duhallow on theCork-Kerry border. Both Draperstownand Duhallow have been engaged inthe process of rural restructuring for thepast 25 years. The challenges facingthe rural communities of Emyvale-Truagh-Aughnacloy have been furtherexacerbated by its cross-borderlocation, 30 years of the Northern Ireland‘Troubles’, and the impact of decadesof back-to-back policy developmentacross both administrations (Northand South).Following the launch of the report, theresearch team was invited to present thestudy’s findings and recommendationsto the North South Ministerial Council(NSMC) Sectoral Meeting on Agricultureand Rural Development at GreenmountCollege, Antrim, in July 2009. FourMinisters were in attendance: from theNorth, Michelle Gildernew MP MLAand the Minister for the Environment,Edwin Poots MLA; and from the South,Minister for Agriculture, Brendan SmythTD and Minister for Community, Ruraland Gaeltacht Affairs, Eamon O Cuiv TD.The research team comprised CarolineCreamer, NIRSA, National University ofIreland, Maynooth; Dr Karen Keaveney,Queens University Belfast; Dr NealeBlair, University of Ulster; Dr BrendanO’Keeffe, Mary Immaculate College,University of Limerick; and John Driscoll,ICLRD and Institute for InternationalUrban Development.Sustainable CommunitiesThis research project, which at time ofwriting is coming close to completionwith the final drafting of the case studiesand a synthesis paper, investigatesinitiatives in Northern Ireland andthe Republic of Ireland to build andimprove subsidised housing in mixedcommunities through six case studies:140JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

Speakers and researchers at the launch of ‘Rural Restructuring: Local Sustainable Solutions to theRural Challenge’. From left to right (back): Dr Neale Blair, Caroline Creamer, John Driscoll, AndyPollak; (front) Dr Karen Keaveney, NI Minister for Agriculture and Rural Development, MichelleGildernew MP MLA, Dr Brendan O’Keefe.Springfarm (Antrim), the Irish Streetand Gobnascale interface (Derry/Londonderry) and Carran Crescent(Enniskillen) in Northern Ireland; andCranmore (Sligo), Mahon (Cork) andAdamstown (County Dublin) in theRepublic of Ireland. Together, theyprovide a cross section of the challengesfaced by communities working toprovide mixed housing, and thestrategies that have helped planners,housing providers and the communitiesthemselves to create and maintainhousing that is safe, prosperous andopen to all. The study will be publishedin spring 2010, with the case studiesand associated papers being availableto download at www.iclrd.org. TheNorthern Ireland Housing Executive willpublish the three Northern case studiesin association with ICLRD.The research team comprises PaddyGray, School of the Built Environment,University of Ulster; Brendan Bartley,NIRSA, NUI Maynooth; Erick Guerra,Institute for International UrbanDevelopment (IIUD), Cambridge,Massachusetts; and John Driscoll,ICLRD and IIUD.Delineating Functional TerritoriesIn July 2009 the ICLRD, in cooperationwith the All-Island Research Observatory(AIRO) at NUI Maynooth, producedan interim report on the Delineation ofFunctional Territories on the island ofIreland. Those implementing both theNational Spatial Strategy for Ireland andthe Regional Development Strategy forNorthern Ireland are keenly aware of theneed to better understand the patternsJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 141

of urban functional specialisation andurban functional regions. This study ishelping policy-makers and practitionersinvolved in cross-border spatial planningto access compatible and high qualitydata and thus better understandboth all-island economic trends anddemand for cross-border services. Aspart of this initiative, innovative mapswere developed to illustrate catchmentareas for travel to work, delivery ofservices, and access to infrastructure.In an era of scarce public resources,an understanding of such functionalinter-jurisdictional relationships can helptarget public investment in infrastructureand services.In July 2009 ICLRD held a ‘map feast’with policy-makers and academics fromboth jurisdictions, while in Decemberthe pioneering mapping generatedthrough this work was presented toWalter Radermacher, Director-Generalof EUROSTAT, the statistical officeof the EU. In late 2009 the researchteam turned their attention to mappingpopulation accessibility, house pricesand cross-border travel patterns. Phasetwo of this project, whereby functionalterritories will be considered on anall-island basis, is commencing in early2010, with the research team alreadyin consultation with policy-makers andpractitioners in Northern Ireland todiscuss the datasets available and thepotential use of any maps generated.The research team comprisesJustin Gleeson, All-Ireland ResearchObservatory; Dr Declan Curran,Professor Rob Kitchin, Brendan Bartleyand Proinnsias Breathnach, all NIRSA,NUI Maynooth; Des McCafferty, MaryImmaculate College, University ofLimerick; Professor Francois Vigier,Institute for International UrbanDevelopment (IIUD); and John Driscoll,ICLRD and IIUD.Briefing paper seriesIn November 2009 the ICLRD launchedits series of online briefing papers ofshort timely articles that explore howvarious forms of planning, enacted atdifferent spatial scales, can contributeto better collaboration on the pressingissues facing both the Republic ofIreland and Northern Ireland. Articlesavailable to date include:• Good Planning: Key to FutureSuccess by Professor Rob Kitchin,NUI Maynooth and Professor AlastairAdair, University of Ulster (November2009);• Linking Spatial Planning with PublicInvestment: Perspectives from theisland of Ireland by David Counsell,planner and Professor Greg Lloyd,University of Ulster (December2009).Future papers will consider the roleof smaller ‘gateways’ in economicdevelopment, spatial indicators, and themapping of strategic infrastructure andkey services on the island.CroSPlaNUnder the auspices of the CrossborderSpatial Planning and trainingNetwork (CroSPlaN), funded by the EUINTERREG IVA programme, the ICLRDis currently engaged in:142JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

• Applied research on theimplications of the Review of PublicAdministration (NI) and new planninglegislation in the Republic ofIreland on inter-jurisdictional spatialplanning;• Applied research on best practicesin cross-border and interjurisdictionalspatial planning andregional development within the EUand the USA that can inform crossbordercooperation in Ireland;• A training programme for localcouncillors, officials and businessleaders in the Newry-Dundalk TwinCity Region.The CroSPlaN network is also valuablein providing a regular link betweenplanning policy-makers and practitionersin Northern Ireland and the Irish borderregion, as well as raising awareness inIreland of the good practice of othersuccessful European networkingorganisations in the spatial planningfield, such as Mission OpérationelleTransfrontalière in France.The implications of the NorthernIreland Review of PublicAdministration (RPA) and newplanning legislation in theRepublic of Ireland on interjurisdictionalspatial planningThis applied research project considersthe implications of governance reformin both jurisdictions on practicalcross-border cooperation in spatialplanning and regional development.Key questions being addressed includethe priority planning issues for the new‘super councils’ in Northern Ireland; theimplications, if any, of the RPA on crossbordercooperation at both departmentaland council level; and the issue ofvertical and horizontal policy integrationon the island given the revised powersof the councils in delivering centrallydesignedpolicies. Interviews and focusgroups with key stakeholders in theRPA process, together with desk-basedresearch, including a review of relevantdocuments covering the history of theRPA process, were undertaken duringthe latter half of 2009. The resultingreport is being finalised at time ofwriting. This project is being carried outby Caroline Creamer, Dr Neale Blair andJohn Driscoll of ICLRD with Dr KarenKeaveney of Queen’s University Belfast.Best practices in crossborderand inter-jurisdictionalspatial planning and regionaldevelopment in the EU and USAAn ICLRD research team has reviewedthe considerable volume of recentstudies on EU projects with a particularfocus on non-statutory mechanismsfor cross-border spatial planning, andmaterial on inter-jurisdictional planningwithin the United States that is directlyrelevant to North-South cooperation andcooperation between councils withinNorthern Ireland and Ireland. The teamis exploring effective local developmentprocesses at the level of the ‘microregion’in Spain (particularly in ruralareas); and good practices in sharedservices and non-statutory planning inurban agglomerations such as the Lille-Kortrijk-Tournai ‘Eurometropole’ crossborderregion on the French-Belgianborder and the Boston Metropolitanarea in Massachusetts (which includes101 independent cities and towns).JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 143

This research, which will conclude inMay 2010, is being carried out by JohnDriscoll of ICLRD, Professor FrancoisVigier and Jim Kostaras of the Institutefor International Urban Developmentand Dr Brendan O’Keeffe of MaryImmaculate College/ University ofLimerick.Training programme for localcouncillors, officials andbusiness leaders in the Newry-Dundalk regionIn November 2009 the first trainingcourse for local councillors, officialsand business leaders in the Newry-Dundalk Twin City region under theCroSPlaN programme was initiated inRavensdale, County Louth. Buildingon the ICLRD’s research in 2008 intoareas of potential collaboration in theTwin-City Region, this programme takesthe form of five three-hour moduleson development along corridors,evidence-informed planning, crossbordereconomic growth, communityplanning and stakeholder engagement.The programme is led by Dr Neale Blairof the University of Ulster and JohnDriscoll of the ICLRD and the Institutefor International Urban Development. Asecond training course will be deliveredin another cross-border region in late2010-early 2011.The Journal of Spatial Planning onthe island of IrelandAs part of its evolving publicationstrategy, the ICLRD will publish theinaugural edition of The Journal ofSpatial Planning on the island of Ireland(in collaboration with the Centre forCross Border Studies) in autumn2010. The Centre is currently seekinghigh quality research papers onissues of spatial planning and regionaldevelopment to include in this first issueof the new journal. The subject matter ofarticles can cover a range of areas suchas spatial planning policy and practice,balanced regional development, localgovernment reform, planning for energy(including renewables), retail planning,the rural-urban interface, communityplanning, planning for cross-bordercooperation, and evidence-informedplanning.Networks and outreachSince its inception, the ICLRD has beendeveloping linkages, both at home andabroad, with a range of communityand government agencies. The ICLRDis engaging with the European SpatialPlanning Observation Network (ESPON)through NUI Maynooth; the Frenchgovernment’s cross-border cooperationand territorial planning agency, MissionOpérationelle Transfrontalière (MOT),and the Irish-Scottish Forum on SpatialPlanning. It is actively involved onsteering committees for the reviewsof (i) the Regional DevelopmentStrategy (RDS) for Northern Ireland;(ii) the Regional Planning Guidelinesfor the Border Regional Authority inthe Republic; and (iii) Village DesignStatements with the Heritage Councilin the Republic, as well as the advisorygroup for the Newry-DundalkTwin-City Region.NORTH/SOUTH ROUNDTABLEGROUPDirector Andy Pollak represented theCentre for Cross Border Studies and144JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

The final meeting of the North/South Roundtable Group in Áras an Uachtaráin, 23 February 2009:(from left to right) Aidan Gough, Tim O’Connor, Martin Fraser, Professor Roger Downer, FeargalMcCormack, William Poole, Jackie Harrison, Stephen Kingon, Dr Martin McAleese, LaurenceCrowley, John Travers, Liz Gilmartin, Brendan Butler, Liam Nellis, Caroline Moore, Michael D’Arcy,Andy PollakUniversities Ireland on this influential‘think tank’, which ran from 2002 to2009 and drew its members frombusiness leaders and senior civilservants in both Irish jurisdictions.The joint chairs were Stephen Kingon,Chair of Invest Northern Ireland, andLaurence Crowley, former Governor ofthe Bank of Ireland. The joint facilitators,Michael D’Arcy and Liz Gilmartin, weresupported by InterTradeIreland. It heldits final meeting in Áras an Uachtaráin on23 February 2009.EDUCATION FOR RECONCILIATIONThe Centre is a partner with theCity of Dublin Vocational EducationCommittee’s Curriculum DevelopmentUnit in the 2009-2011 phase of thecross-border, cross-communityEducation for Reconciliation project,subtitled ‘Securing the Future throughActive Citizenship.’ The aims of thisEU PEACE III-funded project, which inits successive phases has been workingwith teachers in both jurisdictions since1998, have remained consistent.They are:• To contribute to peace andreconciliation, human rights andjustice through citizenship education• To enable young people to developthe understanding, attitudes andskills to be active citizens in relationto reconciliation, conflict andcontroversial issues within theircommunities and society• To embed reconciliation as a keyelement within citizenship education.The project aims to achieve thisthrough a cross-border programme ofprofessional development for citizenshipeducation teachers in second-levelschools, and through the developmentof teaching and learning resourceson issues of local and global conflict,conflict resolution, human rights andpeace building. The project particularlysupports teachers to develop key skillssuch as critical thinking in relation tocontroversial issues such as conflict,reconciliation and human rights. Over 80schools have participated in EducationJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 145

for Reconciliation since its inception.42 teachers from 25 schools acrossNorthern Ireland and the northernpart of the Republic of Ireland areinvolved in the current phase of theproject. They are drawn from a widerange of school types (grammar andsecondary – Protestant and Catholic– and alternative education centresin the North; community, vocationaland gaelscoileanna in the Republic)from Belfast; Newtownabbey andCrumlin, Co Antrim; Ballynahinch andDromore, Co Down; Keady, Co Armagh;Strabane and Dungannon, Co Tyrone;Enniskillen, Co Fermanagh; Belturbet,Co Cavan; Arranmore Island, Bundoran,Carndonagh, Dungloe and Falcarragh,Co Donegal; Dunleer and Dundalk,Co Louth; Sligo Town, andDrumshambo, Co Leitrim.The current phase was launched inEnniskillen in October 2009 and will runto the end of 2011. Lead teachers fromthe participating schools have so farparticipated in professional developmentat two residential sessions, as well asmeeting in smaller local cluster groups.These sessions combine training inareas of need or interest and provideopportunities to work together ondeveloping new ideas and activities forthe classroom.Workshops on two new projectresources, Policing Matters and Logonto Dialogue, are also being run forcitizenship education teams in bothcurrently and previously participatingschools. Policing Matters, a crossborderresource on policing and the law,has received the support of the PSNIand the Garda Siochána. Both policeservices participated in its launch, whichcoincided with the launch of the newphase of Education for Reconciliation inEnniskillen in October 2009.There is still capacity to includeadditional schools in this project,especially those in Leitrim, Cavan andMonaghan, and controlled schoolsin Northern Ireland. Further detailsfrom Mary Gannon, Education forReconciliation project, CurriculumDevelopment Unit, Captain’s Road,Crumlin, Dublin 12 (Tel. 01-4535487;email: mary.gannon@cdu.cdvec.ie)CURRENT TRAINING PROJECTSNorth/South and Cross-BorderPublic Sector Training ProgrammeBetween May and September 2008the Centre – together with its partners,Co-operation Ireland and the CharteredInstitute of Public Finance andAccountancy (CIPFA), Northern Ireland’sleading provider of training to the publicsector – organised a fifth training coursefor civil and public servants working onNorth-South and cross-border issuesin North/South bodies, governmentdepartments, local authorities andother public agencies in the two Irishjurisdictions. The final course wasover-subscribed: it enrolled 39 officialsinstead of the intended 30 (with sevenstill turned away), and over 50% ofthese were from central governmentdepartments (compared to only 15%central government officials on thefirst two courses in 2005). The intakeincluded senior officials such as the146JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

Chief Executive of NI-CO, the DeputyChief Fire Officer for Northern Ireland,the Director of the Northern IrelandCentre for Trauma and Transformation,the Deputy Secretary to the IrishPresident and senior inspectors in theIrish Department of Agriculture, Fisheriesand Food and Department of Educationand Science.In his foreword to a 2007 compilation ofthe best written assignments carried outby North-South teams of trainees,TheWind across the Border, the thenIrish Minister for Foreign Affairs, MrDermot Ahern TD, said: “What theseyoung public servants are doing istruly pioneering. Here is the pith andsubstance of what good governmentis meant to be about. These essays alloutline fresh new ideas, clearly laid out,about how practical cross-border andall-island cooperation can make a realdifference to improving the lives of thepeople of Ireland and Northern Ireland.”Having generously funded five of thesecourses in 2005-2008, bringing to 145the number of public officials who hadtaken them, the Special EU ProgrammesBody said it was now time to seekfunding from other sources, particularlythe governments in Belfast and Dublinwhose officials were benefitting directlyfrom them. In late 2008-early 2009 theCentre and its partners approached awide range of government departments,public agencies and private trainingfirms looking for support for continuingthis training programme. Among thoseapproached in the Republic werethe Department of Finance’s trainingagency, the Centre for Management andOrganisational Development (CMOD),the Institute for Public Administration,the Department of Foreign Affairs,Public Affairs Ireland and private trainingfirms in Dublin and Dundalk; and in theNorth, the Northern Ireland Office, theOffice of the First Minister and DeputyFirst Minister, the Department forEmployment and Learning, the Centrefor Applied Learning (the NorthernIreland Civil Service’s training agency),Queen’s University Belfast and Universityof Ulster. Unfortunately none of thesedepartments, agencies, institutions orcompanies were interested in partneringand/or funding this very successfulprogramme. Those most favourableto the programme, notably in Irishgovernment departments, had seen theirtraining budgets slashed by governmentcutbacks. We have not yet given up onthis highly innovative programme, andare continuing to seek funding tosustain it.PAST RESEARCH PROJECTSThe Centre has commissionedand published 17 cross-borderresearch projects in the fields oftelecommunications developments,health services, disadvantage ineducation, EU funding programmes,local government links, mental healthpromotion, waste management policies,local history societies, animal health, theeuro, local sustainable development,diversity in early years education,science and citizenship education,public sector training, hospital services,mental health research and governmentservices to minority ethnic groups.These projects involved researchersJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 147

drawn from 13 universities, collegesand independent research centres inIreland and Britain: Queen’s UniversityBelfast, University of Ulster, Dublin CityUniversity, University College Dublin,National University of Ireland Galway,National University of Ireland Maynooth,St Patrick’s College Drumcondra,Stranmillis University College, theInstitute of Public Administration,Belfast City Hospital, Dundalk Instituteof Technology, the London School ofHygiene and Tropical Medicine andthe Centre for Cross Border Studiesitself. The research assignments underthe North/South public sector trainingproject (see above) also involvedcivil and public servants from bothjurisdictions.The Centre has published the followingresearch projects:The Evolutionof TelecomTechnologies:Current Trendsand Near-FutureImplications (2001)A number ofcase studies ofdevelopments in mobile and wirelesstelephony across the Irish border froma research team led by two of Ireland’sleading specialists in informationretrieval, data analysis and image andsignal processing: Professor FionnMurtagh, then of Queen’s UniversityBelfast, and Dr John Keating of NationalUniversity of Ireland Maynooth. Theproject was sponsored by eircom.Cross-Border Co-operation inHealth Services in Ireland (2001)A study of the past,present and potentialfor future co-operationin health servicesacross the Irish borderby a research team ledby Dr Jim Jamison,formerly director of theHealth and Social CareResearch Unit at Queen’s UniversityBelfast, and including Professor MartinMcKee of the London School of Hygieneand Tropical Medicine, Dr Ciaran O’Neillof the University of Ulster, and MsMichelle Butler of the Institute of PublicAdministration in Dublin.Ireland’s LearningPoor: AdultEducationalDisadvantageand Cross-BorderCo-operation (2001)A study of the needsof the more than amillion people on theisland who left schoolwith few or no qualifications by DrMark Morgan of St Patrick’s College,Drumcondra, and Mr Paul McGill,formerly education correspondent of theBelfast Telegraph. They concluded thatcurrent policies in both jurisdictions werefar removed from a vision of lifelonglearning which allows people of all agesand social classes equal access toeducation and training.Creating Living Institutions:EU Cross-Border Co-operation afterthe Good Friday Agreement (2001)A study by Professor Brigid Laffanand Dr Diane Payne of the Institutefor British-Irish Studies at University148JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

College Dublin,which analysed theinteraction betweenthe North-SouthInstitutions set upunder the GoodFriday Agreement –notably the North/South MinisterialCouncil and the Special EU ProgrammesBody - and the EU’s funding programmefor cross-border co-operation,INTERREG.Cross-BorderCo-operation inLocal Government:Models ofManagement,Development andReconciliation(2001)A study by ProfessorDerek Birrell andAmanda Hayes of the University ofUlster of the different kinds of crossborderlinks between local authorities,including one-to-one linkages, localgovernment cross-border networks,and cross-border partnerships involvingother agencies. It also analysed theproject management methods used, theviews of the councillors involved and theinvolvement of the European Union.The Foot-and-Mouth DiseaseCrisis and the IrishBorder (2002)A study of the crossborderdimensionof the 2001 footand-mouthdiseaseoutbreak by theCentre’s research manager, Dr PatriciaClarke, with comments from theDepartments of Agriculture in Belfastand Dublin. Issued exactly a year afterthe original outbreak in England, thereport’s findings were praised by the twoMinisters, Brid Rodgers and Joe Walsh,as “extremely valuable” in helping theDepartments to formulate actions todeal with animal health emergencies.Promoting MentalHealth and SocialWell-being: Cross-Border Opportunitiesand Challenges(2002)This is a two-partstudy by a team fromNational Universityof Ireland Galwayled by Dr Margaret Barry and MsSharon Friel. It examined a number ofcross-border projects in the areas ofpostnatal depression, public awarenessof suicide, cancer support services,the mental health of young men andmental health in rural communities. Thestudy also looked at the comparabilityand compatibility of mental health datasources in the two jurisdictions.The LocalHistory Project:Co-operating Northand South (2003)This study, byDr Jacinta Prunty,Dr Raymond Gillespieand Maeve Mulryan-Moloney of NationalUniversity of IrelandMaynooth, provided the basis for thefirst all-Ireland register of local historyJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 149

societies. They identified 330 societies,but estimated that a complete list wouldexceed 500 societies, North and South,involving an active membership ofperhaps 28,000 persons.Towards a GreenIsle? LocalSustainableDevelopment onthe Island of Ireland(2004)A study of localsustainabledevelopment ascarried out (throughthe Local Agenda 21 process) bylocal authorities and social partnersthroughout Ireland, by a cross-borderteam comprising Geraint Ellis and Dr BillNeill of the Queen’s University Belfast’sSchool of Environmental Planning, andDublin-based researchers Una Handand Brian Motherway. It found that 54%of local authorities on the island hadbegun a process of LA21, but stressedthat the main challenge is to move fromdebate to action.Diversity in EarlyYears EducationNorth and South:Implications forTeacher Education(2004)The aim of this EUfundedstudy was toidentify the difficultiesfacing teachers andchildren in areas of inter-communityconflict and tension on both sides of theIrish border with a view to developing aframework for preparing young teachersworking with children in the early years.It was carried out by researchers atSt Patrick’s College Drumcondra inDublin and Stranmillis University Collegein Belfast, Mairin Kenny and HelenMcLaughlin, under the direction ofPhilomena Donnelly and Louise Quinn.Citizenshipand Science:The ConnectingAxes (2005)The final report of theEU-funded Citizenshipand Science Exchange(CaSE) Schoolsproject looked at howa group of 12-14year old students in 16 schools onboth sides of the border deepenedtheir understanding of the dynamicrelationship between science andcitizenship. The students exploredsubjects such as air and water pollution,waste management, GM and fair tradefoods, renewable energy and energyefficiency. Much of the cross-borderwork centred on a shared Web resource.This project was led by Professor PeterMcKenna and Dr Charlotte Holland ofDublin City University.ImprovingGovernment ServiceDelivery to MinorityEthnic Groups(2006). This study,funded by the Officeof the First Ministerand Deputy First Minister in NorthernIreland (with additional funding fromthe Joseph Rowntree Charitable Trustand the British Council), examinedhow public services such as health,education, policing and employment150JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

support are provided to minority ethnicgroups in Northern Ireland, Republic ofIreland and Scotland. It had a particularfocus on how Northern Ireland’s publicauthorities could learn from their nearestneighbours. The research work wascarried out by a partnership led by theNational Consultative Committee onRacism and Interculturalism (NCCRI),together with Piaras MacEinri fromUniversity College Cork, the Institutefor Conflict Research in Belfast andOrganisation and Social DevelopmentConsultants in Edinburgh.The Wind Acrossthe Border (2007).This report broughttogether six awardwinning researchassignments carriedout by pairs andteams of officialsas part of theNorth/South andCross-Border Public Sector TrainingProgramme. They were on the proposedreopening of the Ulster Canal; anall-island service for the recycling ofwaste fridges and freezers; expandingthe CAWT-sponsored eMed renalinformation system to the whole island;an all-island visitor pass for heritagesites; setting up a cross-border trainingand accreditation system for installersof renewable energy technologies;and cross-border sharing of patientelectronic records.Removing the Barriers: An InitialReport on the Potentialfor Cross-Border Cooperation inHospital Services (2007)This short report compared theplanning of hospitalservicereorganisation,North and South. Itnoted that there aredifferent strategies inthe two jurisdictions,with Northern Irelandplacing greateremphasis on traveltime and the Republic on the sizeof the catchment population. Theauthors,independent Belfast researcherDr Jim Jamison and Dr Michelle Butler,Senior Lecturer in UCD’s School ofNursing Midwifery and Health Systems,point to the clear scope for jointhospital planning and rationalisation inthe border region to benefit the health ofthe population.Mental Health: TheCase for a Cross-JurisdictionalApproach combiningPolicy and ResearchEfforts on the Islandof Ireland (2009)This study by DrPatricia Clarke ofCCBS explored thecontext of and challenges to the reformof mental health services (and relatedresearch) in Northern Ireland andRepublic of Ireland. It compared the twomain mental health documents – theBamford Review in the North and AVision for Change in the South – in orderto identify similarities and differences inpolicy approach in the two jurisdictions,highlighting areas of common concern,priorities for research and the gapswhich exist. This work was carriedin association with the Mental HealthCommission (RoI), Cooperation andJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 151

Working Together (CAWT) and otheragencies in the mental health field.COMMISSIONED STUDIES ANDEVALUATIONSThe Centre has carried out studiesand evaluations for government andother public agencies and socialpartner organisations. These haveincluded:• A study of North-South cooperationin the education sector (preschool,primary, secondary) forthe Department of Education andScience and the Department ofEducation Northern Ireland (2010-2011)• A review of cross-border consumerissues, employment issues andrailway links, as reflected in BorderPeople queries and User Groupmeetings, for the North SouthMinisterial Council Joint Secretariat(December 2009-April 2010)• A study of the numbers of peoplecrossing the border on a daily/weekly basis and what they arecrossing the border to do (towork, study, retire, access medicalservices etc), for the EURES CrossborderPartnership (February 2010)• A review of the 2008 study ofpostgraduate flows from theRepublic of Ireland to NorthernIreland for the Irish Department ofEducation and Science (December2009)• A study of mental health policy andresearch on the island of Ireland,for the Mental Health Commission(RoI) and other agencies, supportedby the Cooperation and WorkingTogether (CAWT) cross-bordernetwork of health authorities(December 2008)• An evaluation of the cross-borderGP out-of-hours service forCooperation and Working Together(July 2008)• A study of postgraduate flows fromthe Republic of Ireland to NorthernIreland higher education institutions,for the Irish Department of Educationand Science (January 2008)• How the trade union movementcan become more involvedand influential in North-Southcooperation, for the Northern Irelandoffice of the Irish Congress of TradeUnions (December 2007).• A review of policy recommendationsfrom the five research projectscommissioned by the HigherEducation Authority under the 2004-2006 Cross-Border Programme forResearch contributing to Peace andReconciliation: Intergenerationaltransmission and ethno-nationalidentity in the border area; Equalityand social inclusion; MappingFrontiers, Plotting Pathways;E-consultation; and Virtual ResearchCentre for Point-of-Care Technology(February 2007).• An overview of the activities of theCommon Chapter of the Republic ofIreland’s National Development Planand Northern Ireland’s StructuralFunds Plan for the Special EUProgrammes Body – in partnershipwith FPM Chartered Accountants(February 2007)• A report on public attitudes to thedevelopment of cross-border healthservices, with particular reference to152JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

The President of the University of Virginia, Professor John Casteen, addressed the springUniversities Ireland Council meeting on 12 February 2010: (from left to right) Professor James JBrowne, President, National University of Ireland, Galway; Professor John Hegarty, Provost, TrinityCollege Dublin; Professor John Casteen; Dr Hugh Brady, President, University College Dublin.GP out-of-hours services, for CAWT(January 2007)• A report on education and skillsin the North West, for the IrishDepartment of Education andScience and the Northern IrelandDepartment for Employment andLearning (2006)• An Evaluation of the Education forReconciliation Project (Year Oneand Two), for the City of DublinVocational Education Committee(2003-2005)• A Review of Cross-Border MobilityInformation Provisions in the Southof Ireland, for the North/SouthMobility Information Group (2003)• An Evaluation of the Upstate TheatreCompany’s ‘Crossover’ crossbordercommunity drama project(2002-2004)• ‘Towards a Strategic Economicand Business Research Agendafor the island of Ireland’, forInterTradeIreland (2002)• A report on public feedback to thePricewaterhouseCoopers/IndeconObstacles to Mobility study, for theNorth/South Ministerial Council(2002)• A study into the feasibility ofextending University for Industry/learndirect to the Republic of Ireland,for University for Industry (2001)• An evaluation of the Co-operationand Working Together (CAWT)cross-border network of healthboards and trusts, for CAWT(2001)• A ‘scoping study’ of North-SouthSchool, Youth and TeacherExchanges, for the Department ofEducation Northern Ireland andthe Department of Education andScience (2001)JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 153

SEMINARS AND STUDY DAYSThe Centre holds regular seminars andstudy days in Armagh, Dublin and inthe border region to examine strategicareas of interest to North-South policymakers.These bring together groupsof policy-makers, senior practitionersand academics to discuss a researchpaper prepared by the Centre underthe chairmanship of a distinguishedauthority in the field. As the Centre’sresearch programme has developed,these seminars have moved fromstudying broad policy fields to examiningmore focussed areas which have beenthe subject of specific research projectsand commissioned work. Cross-borderseminars and study days have beenorganised in the following areas:• Agriculture• Education• Tourism• Information and CommunicationTechnologies• Health Services• Mental Health Promotion• Developments in TelecomTechnologies• Local government links• Foot and Mouth disease• School, Youth and TeacherExchanges• European citizenship education• The euro• Business research• The North-South Consultative Forum• Ageing• Border region history*• Border region regeneration*• Waste Management• Economic co-operation*• Planning and mobility in thenorth-west*• Science and Citizenship• Information provision• Housing and sustainablecommunities• Education and skills in the northwest• Mental health research• Personal banking• Web 2.0 aspects of online crossborderinformation• Cross-border statistics• Cross-border consumer issues* For the Mapping Frontiers, PlottingPathways projectNORTH/SOUTH RESEARCH FORUMThe first meeting of the Centre’sNorth/South Research Forum tookplace on 9 December 2009. This newinitiative, which is funded by the EUINTERREG IVA programme (managedby the Special EU Programmes Body)through the Ireland/Northern IrelandCross-Border Cooperation Observatory(INICCO), aims to bring togetherresearchers, policy-makers and fundersinterested in North-South and crossbordercooperation in Ireland every six154JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

months to discuss a research and/orpolicy issue of current interest.The topic of the first meeting in Dundalkwas ‘What is the future for local andcross-border economic developmentin the context of the global economiccrisis?’ The keynote speakers wereMichael Smyth, Head of the School ofEconomics, University of Ulster, andCeliine McHugh, a senior policy advisorwith Forfás, the Republic of Ireland’snational policy advisory body forenterprise and science.CONFERENCESThe first major conference organisedby the Centre, jointly with the Centre forInternational Borders Research (CIBR),was held at Queen’s University Belfast inautumn 2000 under the title ‘EuropeanCross Border Co-operation:Lessons for and from Ireland.’ Thisinternational conference was openedby the Irish President, Mary McAleese,and was addressed by a wide rangeof distinguished speakers, includingthe then First Minister of NorthernIreland, David Trimble and the DeputyFirst Minister, Seamus Mallon; thethen RUC Chief Constable, Sir RonnieFlanagan; the head of the EU’s crossborderINTERREG programme, EsbenPoulsen; the international emergencycommunications expert, ProfessorEdward Johnson; AmbassadorHermann von Richthofen of the German-Polish Governmental Commission;and the then SDLP leader John Hume.Participants came from 13 countriesto discuss cross-border co-operationin five areas: administrative institutions,security and policing, business and theeconomy, the environment, and cultureand the arts.The Centre has also organised sixNorth-South conferences on aspectsof higher education on behalf of theDepartment for Employment andLearning (Belfast) and the Departmentof Education and Science (Dublin).The first of these, in October 2002in Armagh, was on ‘Ireland as aCentre of Excellence in Third LevelEducation.’ This conference, whichwas attended by the presidents of sevenof the nine universities on the island ofIreland, was addressed by several worldauthorities on higher education. Theseincluded Professor Malcolm Skilbeck,the OECD’s former Deputy Directorfor Education; former US Secretary ofEducation, Richard Riley; the Director-General for Education and Culture inthe European Commission, Nikolausvan der Pas, and the Chief Executive ofthe English Higher Education FundingCouncil, Sir Howard Newby.In May 2003, the second conferencewas held in Cavan on ‘InternationalEducation: A Capacity Builder forthe Island of Ireland?’ The keynotespeakers were Lindy Hyam, ChiefExecutive of IDP Education Australia,a world leader in international educationand development services, and NeilKemp, director of the Education UKDivision of the British Council. Theconference was chaired by SirGeorge Quigley.In November 2003, the third conferencewas held in Belfast on ‘WideningAccess to Third Level EducationJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 155

on the Island ofIreland: TowardsBetter Policy andPractice’. Thekeynote speakerswere Dr ArnoldMitchem, Presidentof the Councilfor Opportunityin Education in Washington DC, achampion of access to higher educationfor low income and disabled Americansfor 35 years, and Samuel Isaacs,Executive Officer of the South AfricanQualifications Authority.The fourth conference– entitled ‘Cross-Border HigherEducation Cooperationin Irelandand Europe’ – washeld in Cavan in May2004. This examinedexamples of goodpractice in crossborderhigher education elsewhere inEurope, notably in the Oresund regionof Denmark and southern Sweden(with keynote speaker Professor LindaNielsen, Rector of the University ofCopenhagen), and the EUCOR networkbetween French, German and Swissuniversities in the Upper Rhine region.The conference was co-chaired by SirKenneth Bloomfield and Noel Dorr.The fifth conference was held inBelfast in June 2005 under the title‘Higher Education and Business:Beyond Mutual Incomprehension’.The keynote speaker was RichardLambert, member of the Bank ofEngland’s Monetary Policy Committee,former editor of theFinancial Times andauthor of the seminalLambert Review ofUniversity-BusinessCollaboration for theBritish Government.The conference wasopened by the IrishMinister for Education and Science,Ms Mary Hanafin TD, and the NorthernIreland Minister for Employment andLearning and Education, Ms AngelaSmyth MP. Other speakers included thePresidents of Queen’s University Belfastand NUI Maynooth, Professor PeterGregson and Professor John Hughes,and leading Irish entrepreneurs Dr ChrisHorn and Dr Hugh Cormican.The sixth conferencewas held in Malahidein March 2006 withthe title ‘What role forHigher Educationin the Developmentof the 21st CenturyWorkplace?’ Thekeynote speakerswere the BoardChairman of the Intel Corporation, DrCraig Barrett; the Directors General ofthe Confederation of British Industryand the Irish Business and EmployersConfederation, Sir Digby Jones andTurlough O’Sullivan; the Education andTraining Officer of the Irish Congressof Trade Unions, Peter Rigney; theChief Executive of Forfás, MartinCronin, and the President of DublinCity University, Professor Ferdinandvon Prondzynski. The conference wasopened by the Secretary General ofthe Irish Department of Education and156JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

Astronomer Jay Tate and Professor Mark Bailey address participants at the 2009 ‘Discover theStars at Armagh: the Second Cross-Border Schools Science Conference.’Science, Brigid McManus, and thePermanent Secretary of the NorthernIreland Department for Employment andLearning, Dr Aideen McGinley. The eventwas organised in collaboration with theIBEC-CBI Joint Business Council.In March 2007 theCentre joined withArmagh Observatoryto organise‘Discover theStars at Armagh:a Cross-BorderSchools ScienceConference.’ Thisbrought together 260 students fromsecondary schools in Belfast, Armagh,Dublin, Dundalk, Drogheda, Dungannon,Kilkeel, Cookstown, Fermanagh,Monaghan and Westmeath to engagein two days of astronomical activitiesin Armagh. The event was fundedby the Northern Ireland Departmentof Culture, Arts and Leisure and theIrish Department of Education andScience, and was designed to attractstudents aged 13-14 towards scienceand scientific thinking at a critical stageof their academic careers. A 32 pagebooklet, edited by Dr Miruna Popescu,was produced for the participatingschools by Observatory studentsand staff.In June 2008 the Centre organised amajor conference in Dundalk entitled‘Cross-Border Cooperation as partof the Northern Irish Peace Process:Some Lessons for Europe’ which wasattended by over 130 people from 13countries: Ireland, England, Scotland,France, Spain, Germany, Belgium,Netherlands, Italy, Serbia, Kosovo,JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 157

China and the USA.The conference wasopened by the IrishMinister for Justice,Dermot Ahern TD,and among thespeakers wereStephen Kingon,Chairman, InvestNorthern Ireland; Martin GuillermoRamirez, Secretary General of theAssociation of European BorderRegions; Ronald Hall, Head of theEuropean Commission’s NorthernIreland Task Force; Professor ElizabethMeehan, former Director of the Instituteof Governance at Queen’s UniversityBelfast; Silvia Gobert-Keckeis ofMission Opérationelle Transfrontalière(MOT) in Paris; Linda Blom from theEuregio Gronau-Enschede (Germany-Netherlands); and Gorka Espiau Idoiaga,Senior Advisor for Peacebuilding to theBasque Government. This conferencewas funded by the EU Peace Twoprogramme.On 29-30 April 2009, the Centre,the Royal School Armagh, theArmagh Observatory and the ArmaghPlanetarium came together to organise‘Discover the Stars at Armagh:the Second Cross-Border SchoolsScience Conference’. Again thisbrought together 260 students from16 secondary schools on both sidesof the border to learn about astronomyand related sciences and mathematics,using the unique joint facilities of theArmagh Observatory and Planetarium.The keynote lecture on ‘The Scienceof Armageddon’ was given by theleading British astronomer, Jay Tateof Spaceguard UK in Wales, andthere were structured educationalactivities around the Planetarium’s ‘StarShow’ and the Observatory’s work onmeteorites and the Human Orrery. Theconference celebrated 2009 as theUnited Nations International Year ofAstronomy.PUBLICATIONSIn 2001 the Centre published, inassociation with Cork University Press,a series of short books containingessays by leading writers on key issuesof interest to both Irish jurisdictions:• Multi-Culturalism:the View from theTwo Irelands byEdna Longley andDeclan Kiberd,with a forewordby President MaryMcAleese• Can the CelticTiger cross theIrish Border? byJohn Bradley andEsmond Birnie,with a foreword byPeter Sutherland• Towards a Cultureof Human Rightsin Ireland by IvanaBacik and StephenLivingstone, with aforeword by Mary RobinsonWHAT THEY SAYThe Centre for Cross Border Studiesis an important catalyst for bringing158JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

Left to right, Bruce Robinson, Head of the Northern Ireland Civil Service, Andy Pollak, and MaryBunting, Northern Joint Secretary, North South Ministerial Council, at the Belfast launch of the2009 ‘Journal of Cross Border Studies in Ireland’.people to work together across a rangeof social and economic issues and thusfind out what they have in common. Thetragedy of the recent past on this islandis that we turned our backs on eachother and did everything separately. Thevalue the Centre adds is to show howmuch more we can achieve by workingtogether. The whole reconciliationproject on the island of Ireland is aboutpeople learning that they have so manyinterests in common. The Centre’sresearch and development work iskey to building that kind of practical,mutually beneficial cooperation andcollaboration.The Taoiseach, Brian Cowen TD,March 2009The Centre for Cross Border Studies andits researchers are to be congratulatedon their terrific record of achievementover the past 10 years. They have beenat the forefront of policy research anddevelopment on a cross-border basisat a time of very significant change onthe island, providing leadership andenergy and dynamism in this key area.They have added to the knowledgebase and brought together policymakers,academics and researchersto seek practical solutions to issues ofreal relevance to people in NorthernIreland and the Republic of Ireland. Oneexample of this kind of relevant work,undertaken in close collaboration withthe North South Ministerial Council, isthe development of the Border PeopleJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 159

mobility information website. The crossbordermobility issues on which thiswebsite provides information are a keypriority for Ministers on both sides ofthe border.I warmly and openly pay tribute to theCentre’s work. Without their energyand enthusiasm, the kind of practicalcross-border cooperation issues nowconsidered part of the mainstreamcertainly wouldn’t be considered asself-evidently important as they now are.When the Centre set out on its journey10 years ago they were not consideredself-evident at all. I particularly commendthe new series of INTERREG-fundedresearch projects on the border regioneconomy, cross-border spatial planning,health, impact assessment and mobilityinformation which they are currentlyembarking on.Head of the Northern Ireland CivilService, Bruce Robinson, March 2009I mean it quite genuinely when I saythat we wouldn’t be able to work atthe level that we are working at – atministerial or departmental level – ifthe ‘on the ground’ cross-border workhadn’t been happening for the lastfew years. If the type of interactions,workshops, seminars, publications andvisiting speakers hadn’t been going onin frameworks like that of SCoTENS,the barriers wouldn’t have beenbroken down to the same degree. Thecontribution that SCoTENS, the Centrefor Cross Border Studies and AndyPollak have made to the overall processof peace and cooperation in thiscountry is probably not widely noticed,but it is certainly well-recognised andwell appreciated as part of the overallprocess.Irish Minister for Education and Science,Mary Hanafin TD, November 2007What the Centre for Cross BorderStudies is doing is really important. Wehope that you will provide analytical andresearch support to what we’re trying todo in the British-Irish IntergovernmentalConference, pushing forward asignificant North-South agenda on apurely practical basis, and looking atthe concept of an all-island economy.We need to maximise the benefits ofthis cross-border work, identifying whatwill and will not succeed. This is notan academic exercise – its practicaloutcomes are almost limitless. Ineconomic terms this is a pretty smallisland which should be looking outwardstowards the global economy rather thaninwards. We need to be encouragingcross-border cooperation to gain themaximum benefits for Northern Irelandin that global context. This is very richand fruitful territory for the Centre to beworking in.Secretary of State for Northern Ireland,Rt Hon Peter Hain MP, February 2007The Centre for Cross Border Studiesalways takes a very fresh and innovativeapproach, bringing together sources ofenergy on both sides of the border thatused to be back to back but are now inan extraordinary dialogue.President Mary McAleese,February 2005160JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

I want to thank the Centre for CrossBorder Studies and Andy Pollak forall their work in helping to bring aboutgreater cross-border understanding in anumber of key areas.Rt Hon Jeffrey Donaldson MP MLA,June 2009The Centre for Cross Border Studiesremains committed to pursuingits continuing successful workin developing practical, mutuallybeneficial approaches to cross- bordercooperation in a wide range of areas.We particularly welcome the Centre’scommitment to dealing with obstaclesto cross-border mobility. On behalf ofthe NSMC Joint Secretariat, the Centreoperates the websitewww.borderpeople.info, whichprovides useful information for peoplewho live, work or study in the otherjurisdiction. The continuing rise in thenumber of people accessing the websiteis a measure of its relevance andusefulness.Andy Pollak and his colleagues in theCentre are an important resource fora number of cross-border bodies inthe education sector, carry out highquality research designed to highlightthe practical benefits of cooperation inspecific areas, and assist in the trainingof officials and others on issues ofrelevance to cross-border cooperation.We look forward to continuing ourcooperation with the Centre in 2010.North/South Ministerial Council JointSecretaries, Mary Bunting and TomHanney, February 2010Centre for Cross Border Studies chairman,Dr Chris Gibson, with staff outside Áras anUachtaráin on 14 September 2009EVALUATION QUOTESby Brian Harvey (Brian Harvey SocialResearch, Dublin)‘Clients of the Centre appraised its workas more than competent, demonstratingthe highest levels of professionalism,coupled with commitment and invariablecourtesy. Expert opinion likewise gavea high assessment of the Centre’sperformance, admiring its quality, output,impact, relevance, value for money,working methods, expertise, vision, tactand diplomacy.Comments were: “its projects arealways very thorough”; “doing a greatJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 161

job in challenging circumstances”; “thedirector has an excellent grasp of whatis necessary to move things along”;“nothing more important than northsouthreconciliation”; “contributes asignificant amount of information to thewider policy arena”; “does importantwork and deserves more exposure”.The Centre was considered to beprofessional, reliable and worked hard.Its staff were “a pleasure to deal with”.They did a “tremendous job”, provided“good support and service”, “they dowhat they have to do – and more.” Allthe staff were good – “but that comesfrom the values set down from thedirector at the top”. They were “efficient,focussed, interested and believed inwhat they were doing”.within tight timeframes and with a smallnumber of staff“.One organisation, whose workhad been facilitated by the Centre,spoke enthusiastically of the Centre’scommitment to arranging cross-bordercontacts and promoting relationshipsbetween groups that had hitherto littlecontact, making the comment that:“Once the relationship was establishedand got going, the Centre walked quietlyaway. It didn’t try to hog the limelightor build an empire but let them get onwith it”.‘Several commented that the Centrewent beyond what was expected,“treating the project pro-actively,bringing fresh energy and commitment,finding imaginative ways to work aroundproblems”.The Centre was admired and respectedfor its commitment, energy, politicaleven-handedness and ability toopen doors to people who might nototherwise be in contact with each other.It has oiled the wheels of co-operationbetter than anyone else could, bringingan ever wider range of people into cooperation– “not just border people, butas far south as Cork”.‘All had a sense that the Centre hadperformed well on minimal staffing andresources. “It is transparent, managingan extensive programme, working162JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

BOARD MEMBERS AND STAFFDr Chris Gibson (chair), chairman, Foyle Meats Groupand Wilson’s Country Ltd; formerly pro-chancellor,Queen’s University Belfast; chair, Chartered AccountantsRegulatory BoardChris GibsonDr Pauric Travers (vice-chair), president, St Patrick’sCollege, Drumcondra, DublinDr Jane Wilde, director, the Institute of Public Health inIrelandHelen Johnston, senior social policy analyst, NationalEconomic and Social Council, DublinPauric TraversProfessor Liam O’Dowd, director of the Centre forInternational Borders Research and professor of sociologyat Queen’s University BelfastProfessor Ronaldo Munck, strategic theme leaderfor internationalisation, interculturalism and socialdevelopment, Dublin City UniversityMairéad HughesColin Neilands, director, Workers’ Educational Association(Northern Ireland)Professor Dermot Diamond, director, ScienceFoundation Ireland-funded ‘Adaptive Information Cluster’,National Centre for Sensor Research, Dublin City UniversityRuth TaillonTony Kennedy, former chief executive, Co-operationIreland, and member, Northern Ireland CommunityRelations CouncilColin Stutt, independent economic consultant, BelfastAndy PollakJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 163

The director of the Centre is Andy Pollak, formerly religion and educationcorrespondent of The Irish Times, and in the early 1990s coordinator of the OpsahlCommission.The Centre’s deputy director (research) is Ruth Taillon, formerly researchcoordinator with Border Action (a partnership of Combat Poverty Agency andPobal). Its IT manager is Joseph Shiels, a former software developer with Fujitsuand consultant with PricewaterhouseCoopers.The Centre’s finance and administration manager is Mairéad Hughes. Thedirector’s PA and events manager is Patricia McAllister. The INICCO projectadministrator is Eimear Donnelly. The information officer is Annmarie O’Kane.The company secretary is Margaret Connolly, head of accounting services atQueen’s University Belfast.Patricia McAllister Joseph Shiels Eimear Donnelly Annmarie O’Kane164JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

EXTRACTS FROM 2008-2009 FINANCIAL STATEMENTSThe opinion of the independent auditors, PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP:• The financial statements give a true and fair view, in accordance with UnitedKingdom Generally Accepted Accounting Practice, of the state of the charitablecompany’s affairs at 31 July 2009 and of its net incoming resources, includingits income and expenditure for the year then ended;• and the financial statements have been properly prepared in accordance withthe Companies (Northern Ireland) Order 1986, and• the information given in the Directors’ Report is consistent with the financialstatements.STATEMENT OF FINANCIAL ACTIVITIES FOR THE YEAR ENDED31 JULY 2009Incoming resourcesUnrestricted Restricted Total TotalFunds Funds Funds Funds2009 2008£ £ £ £Activities for generating funds - 755,684 755,684 646,020Other income 334,983 - 334,983 472,239Total incoming resources 334,983 755,684 1,090,667 1,118,259Resources expendedDirect charitable expenditure 311,064 688,698 999,762 866,944Costs of generating funds 21,526 2,634 24,160 14,141Total resources expended 332,590 691,332 1,023,922 881,085Net movement in funds 2,393 64,352 66,745 237,174Fund balance carried forward 104,389 370,768 475,157 237,983at 1 August 2008Fund balance carried forward 106,782 435,120 541,902 475,157at 31 July 2009JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 165

All amounts above relate to continuing operations of the company.The company has no recognised gains and losses other than those included in theresults above and therefore no separate statement of total recognised gains andlosses has been presented.There is no difference between the net movement in funds for the period statedabove and its historical cost equivalent.BALANCE SHEET AS AT 31 JULY 20092009 2008£ £Current assetsDebtors 730,523 629,352Cash at bank 200730,523 629,552Creditors: amounts falling due within one year (188,621) (154,395)Net current assets 541,902 475,157FundsUnrestricted 106,782 104,389Restricted 435,120 370,786Total funds 541,902 475,157Unrestricted funds are amounts which are expendable at the discretion of the Boardin furtherance of the aims of the company.Restricted funds are amounts which are expendable only in accordance with thespecified wishes of the sponsor. The restricted funds consist of grants and awardsfor specific projects or administrative functions carried out by the company.166JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5

CONTACT DETAILSMAIN OFFICEThe Centre for Cross Border Studies39 Abbey StreetArmagh BT61 7EBNorthern IrelandTel: (028) 3751 1550Fax: (028) 3751 1721(048 from the Republic of Ireland;00 44 28 for international calls)DUBLIN OFFICEThe Centre for Cross Border StudiesRoom QG11Business SchoolDublin City UniversityDublin 9IrelandTel: (01) 7008477Fax: (01) 7008478(00353-1 from Northern Ireland)E-mail addresses:a.pollak@qub.ac.ukm.hughes@qub.ac.ukr.taillon@qub.ac.ukj.shiels@qub.ac.ukp.mcallister@qub.ac.ukeimear.donnelly@qub.ac.uka.okane@qub.ac.ukAndy PollakMairéad HughesRuth TaillonJoseph ShielsPatricia McAllisterEimear DonnellyAnnmarie O’KaneWebsites:www.crossborder.iewww.borderireland.infowww.borderpeople.infoJOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5 167

This Journal was designed byAshley BinghamSenior DesignerLeslie Stannage DesignArbor Building71-75 Donegall PassBelfast BT7 1NRTel: 028 9022 4455Email: info@l-s-d.comWeb: www.l-s-d.com168JOURNAL OF CROSS BORDER STUDIES IN IRELAND No.5