War and peace?
Thu, 01 Dec 2011 15:37:00 GMT
Dr Catherine McGlynn and Professor Jim McAuley - their new book earns major plaudits
AFTER intensive grassroots research which included interviews with scores of ex-paramilitaries in Ulster, a book co-authored by Professor Jim McAuley and Dr Catherine McGlynn of the University of Huddersfield has been awarded a prestigious prize and hailed a “triumph”, with major implications for the treatment of political prisoners in conflicts all over the globe.
The award judges described the book as “the most important work undertaken on the roles of former paramilitary prisoners in developing the Northern Ireland peace process”. And the authors were praised for the rigour of their research for the book, entitled Abandoning Historical Conflict?
Judges for the Brian Farrell Prize, awarded by the Political Studies Association of Ireland, stated that Prof McAuley and Dr McGlynn, plus their co-authors Professor Jonathan Tonge of the University of Liverpool and Dr Peter Shirlow, of Queen’s University, Belfast, “strayed far from their university comfort zones, travelling across Northern Ireland and even interviewing the last remaining Provisional IRA prisoners in the Irish Republic in their quest to discover more about how peace took hold and why”.
The book was the product of research funded to the tune of £80,000 by the Leverhulme Trust. Some 150 Loyalist and Republican ex-prisoners were interviewed in a bid to find out why people who had been involved in violent struggle converted to peace. Among the interviewees were members of the IRA in South Armagh, usually noted for their code of silence.
The Brian Farrell Prize judges stated that: “Many books have been written covering the roles of Blair, Ahern and Adams. Abandoning Historical Conflict? has a different focus. The book is a methodological triumph, highlighting the capacity of academics to seek grassroots perspectives whilst adding their own nuanced interpretation. The result is a subtle analysis of the interplay of military, economic, political and personal changes which yielded peace”.
The panel of judges concluded that Abandoning Historical Conflict? is a “seminal work” with far-reaching implications for the treatment of prisoners and their role in reconstructing society in conflicts around the world.
Professor McAuley, of the School of Human and Health Sciences at the University of Huddersfield, has been researching Ulster politics, especially Loyalism, for 25 years. He and his colleagues drew on their network of contacts in the Province in order to find a roster of 150 interviewees, fairly equally-divided between Loyalist and Republican.
“I don’t think this was a project that we could have done cold. The strength of it is that we could draw on our contacts. Other people would not have been able to do that.”
- Abandoning historical conflict? Former political prisoners and reconciliation in Northern Ireland byJames McAuley, Catherine McGlynn, Peter Shirlow and Jon Tonge is published by the University of Manchester Press.
