City Research Online City, University of London Institutional Repository Citation: Pinkerton, P. (2012). Resisting Memory: The Politics of Memorialisation in Post- conflict Northern Ireland. The British Journal of Politics & International Relations, 14(1), pp. 131-152. doi: 10.1111/j.1467-856X.2011.00458.x This is the accepted version of the paper. This version of the publication may differ from the final published version. Permanent repository link: https://openaccess.city.ac.uk/id/eprint/15002/ Link to published version: http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-856X.2011.00458.x Copyright: City Research Online aims to make research outputs of City, University of London available to a wider audience. Copyright and Moral Rights remain with the author(s) and/or copyright holders. URLs from City Research Online may be freely distributed and linked to. Reuse: Copies of full items can be used for personal research or study, educational, or not-for-profit purposes without prior permission or charge. Provided that the authors, title and full bibliographic details are credited, a hyperlink and/or URL is given for the original metadata page and the content is not changed in any way. City Research Online: http://openaccess.city.ac.uk/
[email protected] Resisting Memory Introduction∗ When a society moves out of a period of inter-communal conflict, political energies often turn to questions of how that violent past may be best remembered in order to allow for societal healing. Contemporary Northern Ireland is no exception1. The different strategies that may be utilised to deal with the legacy of the ‘the troubles’ – that is, the violent conflict roughly spanning the years 1969-1998, involving a variety of paramilitary, military and security forces, across the sectarian Nationalist-Catholic and Unionist-Protestant divide2 – were summarised in Chapter 5 of the report of the UK government- appointed Consultative Group on the Past.