Social Psychology Special Issue

Candida Darling
indicating a large consensus for an end to
the conflict.
Since then, there have been concerted
efforts to bring about peace, with millions of
pounds invested in community programmes
and government initiatives. The need for
reconciliation has been deliberated for some
time, with the term reconciliation appearing
in Northern Ireland government documents
a total of 46 times in the last nine years
(OFMDFM, 2013).
Is peace progressing today?
This conflict has been officially over for
nearly 17 years, yet there are violent flare-ups
everyday (over 1300 a year); including
bombings, shootings and a refusal by many
in civil society to consider actions necessary
to end this cycle of violence (Nolan, 2014).
Can psychology offer an insight into the
reasons for this?
Firstly, this 30-year conflict will have
considerably impacted upon the nature of
group identity in Northern Ireland, thus
raising the stakes for ‘identity fusion’ to
manifest. Swann et al. (2009) propose that
identity fusion occurs when individuals
become so attached to their social group
they behave as though their personal and
social identities are functionally equivalent.
Consequently, a real or perceived challenge
to group ideals or principles is perceived as
an attack on the self. Subsequently it is
suggested that there is more group support
for extreme actions such as violence, ideologies
are entrenched and there are accompanying
strong associations with ingroup
responsibility and an extreme reaction to the
out group (Swann et al., 2009). This fusion
of personal with social or group identity
could be the reason that it is seemingly
impossible to end the sectarian nature of
Northern Irish society; a significant
emotional investment is likely to endure in
belonging to one community or another.
Thus challenging the sectarian nature of
post-conflict society in Northern Ireland to
bring about sustained peace impacts not
only politically but endangers self-concept
and self-knowledge (Gomez et al., 2011;
Turner, 1982). This self-concept is bound up
in group adherence to meta-narratives
(Auerbach, 2009), however, reconciliation is
determined by a move towards shared narratives;
causing a paradox which has real
consequences for peace in post-conflict
Northern Ireland. This leaves the state in a
tenuous position regarding its future peace.
Method
Participants
Twelve community leaders; journalists,
education professionals, political leaders
and cross community workers, recruited via
targeted snowball sampling, took part in the
study. Respondents were aged between 26
and 62 years (five male and seven female);
prospective participants were approached
via telephone or email and, post-interview,
were asked to recommend someone else in
their field.
Materials
Respondents were questioned for approximately
an hour using semi-structured interviews
with a schedule based on Auerbach’s
conceptions of reconciliation. Interviews
were recorded, transcribed and data was
analysed using IPA.
Preliminary results
Given that the conflict in Northern Ireland is
complex it is unsurprising that there are
many versions or narratives of events. For
example, as I have indicated, the length of
the conflict is highly contested as evidenced
by a participant whose husband was killed in
1972, who stated:
‘We were all living together you know,
there were no problems and then one day
out of nowhere the Catholics went mad…
they hate us… they are trying to take
everything from us.’
She was talking about the start of ‘The Troubles’
in 1968. Others, as I have specified,
have suggested they were the culmination of
years of colonial intervention and was the
final result of a deliberate contrived
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