In name, at least, the peace in North Ireland has persisted since the Good Friday Agreement. However, the core issues at the heart of the period known as “the Troubles” have not been resolved, resulting in legacies of violence, colonialism, and religious division. The subsequent complacency and misguided efforts towards reconciliation by the states involved have contributed to an absence of justice and continuing historical rifts between the predominantly Catholic nationalists and predominantly Protestant unionists. 

The root of the conflict in Northern Ireland dates back over eight hundred years. In the 12th century, the Celtic island of Ireland was first invaded by Normans from what is today England, setting off centuries of suppression of Irish Catholics by the British state and British Protestant settlers, akin to Britain’s treatment of its later overseas colonies. In the early 20th century, the failed Easter Monday Uprising, followed by guerrilla warfare, birthed the Anglo-Irish Treaty and effectively partitioned the island into the Irish Free State (which would become the Republic of Ireland in 1949) and Northern Ireland - a majority Protestant corner of the island that would remain part of the United Kingdom [1]. In Northern Ireland, the Protestant monopoly on political power caused civil unrest, provoking the British to send troops in 1969 [2]. This spark lit the fuse of sectarian tension and brought about a thirty-year period of on-and-off violence, known as “the Troubles.” At the heart of the conflict were the political differences between Catholic nationalists, who wanted Northern Ireland to be part of the Republic of Ireland, and Protestant unionists, who wanted Northern Ireland to remain part of the United Kingdom [3]. This conflict saw the participation of unionist and nationalist paramilitaries, notably the Irish Republican Army (IRA), as well as state agents such as the British Army and police. 

After several years of on-and-off negotiations, the 1998 Belfast or Good Friday Agreement was reached, effectively ending the Troubles [4]. This agreement between the British and Irish governments and the four of the major political parties in Northern Ireland at the time kept Northern Ireland within the United Kingdom but allowed for a referendum for the unification of Ireland whenever the Secretary for Northern Ireland believes that a majority would vote in favor of reunification [5]. Additionally, it called for a devolution of political power from the British government to the newly-formed assembly at Stormont Estate in Belfast, which gave Northern Ireland a larger degree of autonomy than it had previously enjoyed [6].

The thirty-year violent conflict generated by the persistent oppression of native Irish Catholics by British Protestant settlers and the resulting dispute over Northern Ireland’s political standing did not dissolve overnight. Following the Good Friday Agreement, violence and sectarian tensions in Northern Ireland saw less media attention, but did not in any way disappear, nor did the last vestiges of British colonialism. While the Good Friday Agreement called for the devolution of power to Stormont, the British government reimposed direct rule on Northern Ireland, not once, but twice in the years following 1998. In 2007, the St. Andrews Agreement finally restored the devolved powers that the Good Friday Agreement called for and eliminated British direct rule [7]. Other examples of the persistence of the tensions that bred the conflict include the “peace walls”, which were the unspoken boundaries that separated Catholic and Protestant neighborhoods and school districts to prevent sectarian conflict, and the continued presence of paramilitary groups that instigated and inflamed the Troubles [8]. A 2015 report on paramilitary groups in Northern Ireland affirmed the continuing existence of paramilitary groups established during the Troubles and the formation of new paramilitary groups, consisting of dissident republicans, leading to the majority of recent terrorist attacks. While no longer conducting terrorist activities on the same scale as those in the late 20th century, Troubles-era paramilitaries act as the criminal underbelly of Northern Ireland today and engage in activities like smuggling, drug dealing, murder, and extortion of local businesses. The report judged that these groups would “continue to exist and . . . continue to pose a threat to national security and engage in serious crime” [9]. The survival of spatial segregation and active paramilitary groups points to how easily Northern Ireland could revert to conflict and highlights how hostilities never really left the island. 

The lack of justice in many of the cases from the Troubles provides further points of contention for both sides of the conflict. In the past few years, judicial rules and recent legislation have eliminated the possibility of justice for many Northern Irish families involved in the Troubles. Just this past September, the British Parliament passed legislation—the Legacy Act—that would prevent any future prosecution or civil suits against perpetrators of “Troubles” era violence including militants and members of the British military. It also directed these legal inquiries to the newly engineered Independent Commission for Reconciliation and Information [10], an organization whose goal is “to provide information to families, victims and survivors of Troubles/Conflict-related deaths and serious injury and promote reconciliation,” rather than providing legal avenues for justice [11]. Part of the legislation is conditional amnesty for anyone who helps the Commission carry out their investigations [12]. Condemned by the Republic of Ireland and ruled as in violation of the European Convention of Human Rights by the Belfast High Court in Northern Ireland, the law is also highly criticized by the public in Northern Ireland [13]. While the so-called Nazi desk-murderers are still being prosecuted almost 80 years after the fact, culprits of violence in Northern Ireland within the last few decades will not be held responsible for their actions. 

This is not the only instance of government-sanctioned impunity in Northern Ireland in recent years. Bloody Sunday, January 30, 1972, is a black spot in Northern Ireland’s dark recent history. In one of the most publicized events of the Troubles, British soldiers opened fire on a civil rights demonstration in a majority Catholic part of Londonderry, killing thirteen and wounding fifteen protesters. The Widgery Tribunal, the first body convened to investigate Bloody Sunday, cleared the soldiers and British authorities of blame. A second inquiry into the events of January 30 released in 2010, the Saville Inquiry, found that civilians were not warned before they were fired on and that the soldiers fired first [14]. Prosecutions of the soldiers investigated in the Saville Inquiry, referred to by letters rather than name, were slow to come and, even now, continue to evolve, fourteen years after the report was released. Having dropped the case of Soldier F, who was to stand trial for the murders of William McKinney and James Wray and five attempted murders on Bloody Sunday in 2021, Northern Ireland’s Public Prosecution Service (PPS) reopened the case last December, but still has not set a date for the trial [15]. Soldiers A and C were acquitted for the murder of Joe McCann [16], a member of a branch of the IRA killed in the months following Bloody Sunday [17]. Another section of the Saville Inquiry investigated the evidence given by soldiers to the Widgery Tribunal and found that multiple paratroopers had "knowingly put forward false accounts in order to seek to justify their firing" [18]. This past April, the PPS announced that the fifteen army veterans being investigated and a former alleged member of the IRA would, in fact, not face prosecution for giving false evidence in the Widgery Inquiry—only thirteen years after the Saville inquiry emerged [19]. Substantial inquiry into the events of January 30, 1972 show British soldiers firing at a crowd of civilians, without provocation. Yet, the pace of PPS is persistently sluggish, demonstrating the institution’s lack of commitment to justice for Bloody Sunday victims and victims of the conflict as a whole. 

The proximity and cultural similarities between Northern Ireland and England have allowed the international community to see the Troubles as a delicate internal conflict. Even following Bloody Sunday and demands for action from congressional leaders, the Nixon administration refused to meddle in “what was regarded as essentially an internal UK matter” [20]. This distancing perception of the conflict and the idea that it is a closed chapter in Ireland’s history should not allow Great Britain to absolve themselves and their military of responsibility for their role in the conflict and in obstructing justice. Violence in Northern Ireland may not be at the same explosive heights as they were in the late 20th century, but the religious segregation between Catholics and Protestants, the potent nationalistic debates, active paramilitary groups, and unresolved issues of justice and impunity from the Troubles are ample kindling for future violence.