Professor Paul Arthur

Paul Arthur is Professor Emeritus of Politics at the University of Ulster and the former Director of its Graduate Course in Peace and Conflict Studies. His research interests have included the politics of Northern Ireland, British-Irish relations, and the nature of political violence.He started off the discussion with a historical walk down memory lane where he talked about how he’d participated in the civil rights movement march that led to bloody Sunday where he then went on to explain the pillars of peaceful protest (Popova, 2015) namely; 1. determining where injustices are alive, 2. Negotiation, 3. self-purification, 4. taking action, with an emphasis on self-purification he explained that a lot of the troubles conflict was because people were not well trained to purify themselves from violence so what would have been a peaceful protest built up a conflict of continued retaliation. The problem was that there was no shortage of solutions, but all based on a British solution which was factionalized and intimidatory and a big part of it being willful ignorance he went on to explain that Northern Ireland needed a full reform. 

The role of the US government in the peace processes of Northern Ireland stands as a success story of U.S diplomacy. The United States wholeheartedly supports peaceful means for finding a just solution that involves both parts of the community of Northern Ireland, as well as the Governments of Great Britain and Ireland. In the event of such a settlement, the U.S. Government would be prepared to join with others to see how additional job-creating investment could be encouraged to the benefit of all the people of Northern Ireland. In a statement made by Carter in August 1977 (P. J. McLoughlin, Alison Meagher, 2019) events such as the celebration of St Patrick’s day at the white house echoed how much the US stood with people of Irish descent having Peace, as well as political pressure across the UK exerted by the USA. 

Track 2 diplomacy is an unofficial, informal interaction between representatives of adversary groups that aims to develop strategies and create an environment that could contribute to the resolution of their conflict, it can serve as a forum to bring together the different elements to the Northern Ireland problem and put it in touch with a wider community which might have some expertise and good will to expend (Arthur,1990) through unofficial backdoor partnerships with international actors and local paramilitaries, the establishment of technical committees made up of experts to deal with issues without suffering at the hands of bureaucracy, the role of arts; film and writing in telling the stories of the Northern Ireland conflict has created and continues to create massive awareness on conflict dynamics as well as the steps that have been taken such as the Anglo-Irish agreement that set the pace for the good Friday agreement to ensure that Northern Ireland today is not involved in violence. 

A light moment with Professor Paul Arthur

References 

Popova, Maria. (2018). “Martin Luther King, Jr. on Justice and the Four Steps to Successful Nonviolent Resistance”, The Marginalian (2018, March 18th) Martin Luther King, Jr. on Justice and the Four Steps to Successful Nonviolent Resistance – The Marginalian 

McLoughlin, P. J., & Meagher, A. (2019). “The 1977 “Carter Initiative” on Northern Ireland.” Diplomatic History, 43(4), 671–698. https://www.jstor.org/stable/27212432 

Arthur, P. (1990). “Negotiating the Northern Ireland Problem: Track One or Track Two Diplomacy?” Government and Opposition, 25(4), 403–418. http://www.jstor.org/stable/44482532