Disjunctured narratives: rethinking reconciliation and conflict transformation
| DOI | 10.1177/0192512110389568 |
| Date | 01 January 2012 |
| Author | Adrian Little |
| Published date | 01 January 2012 |
Article
International Political Science Review
33(1) 82–98
© The Author(s) 2011
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DOI: 10.1177/0192512110389568
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Corresponding author:
Professor Adrian Little, Head, School of Social and Political Sciences, University of Melbourne, Australia.
Email: little@unimelb.edu.au
Disjunctured narratives:
rethinking reconciliation and
conflict transformation
Adrian Little
Abstract
Reconciliation has been a notable part of discourses of conflict management and transitional justice in a
number of conflictual situations around the world. This article examines the recent emergence of critical
theories of reconciliation with particular reference to processes of conflict transformation in Northern
Ireland. It evaluates the ways in which conflict transformation in Northern Ireland is specific to that context
and the variations in the usage of discourses of reconciliation compared with other ‘post-conflict’ societies.
The article highlights critical theories of reconciliation which, although largely supportive of the potential
of reconciliation, tend to highlight the arguments and conflicts that notions of reconciliation can generate.
By examining the ways in which reconciliation is articulated in Northern Ireland through interviews with
representatives of the main political parties, the article contends that narrative approaches are best suited to
analysis of the issues in Northern Irish politics. The argument developed here suggests that reconciliation in
Northern Ireland is part of a ‘disjunctured synthesis’ whereby the main political parties become locked into
narratives of reconciliation based on opposition to the perceived position of the other.
Keywords
discourse, nationalism, Northern Ireland, post-structuralism, reconciliation, unionism
Introduction: understanding reconciliation in Northern Ireland
In early 2009 the long-awaited report of the Consultative Group on the Past (CGP) (the Eames/
Bradley Report) was published, providing recommendations for ways in which Northern Ireland
could deal with the legacy of the past.1 The report sets out a range of strategies to enable the process
of ‘reconciliation, justice and information recovery’ in order to promote ‘peace and stability in
Northern Ireland’ (CGP, 2009: 6). These recommendations generated considerable controversy and
disgruntlement in a society that is not explicitly reconciled, although undergoing a process of con-
flict transformation. This article examines the theoretical case for reconciliation and the reasons
Little 83
why it has proved difficult to implement conflict management initiatives based on reconciliatory
ideas in the particular context of Northern Ireland.
The purpose of this article is twofold. First, it examines theoretical claims about the capacity of
reconciliation to provide a conceptual framework that facilitates conflict transformation in divided
societies. This necessitates some unpacking of the theoretical literature on reconciliation and, in par-
ticular, an attempt to differentiate between normative approaches which lean towards advocacy of
reconciliation and more critical accounts which provide a more complex and nuanced understanding
of the difficulties that emerge when we apply theoretical constructs like reconciliation to practical
situations in divided societies. Second, this article attempts to outline some of the specificities of the
impact of reconciliation narratives in Northern Ireland to demonstrate the ways in which the applica-
tion of conceptual devices varies between different conflict scenarios. Implicitly, it suggests that the
example of Northern Ireland may demonstrate some of the limitations of the concept when compared
with other societies where ostensibly it may have had greater utility in navigating the difficult waters
of conflict transformation. South Africa is an obvious comparison here and it is alluded to at several
points in the first half of the article. In bringing the two threads of the arguments together, the major
point to be emphasized is that evaluation of theoretical devices, like reconciliation, needs to be deeply
grounded in substantive contexts and the obstacles they involve – an approach that has been some-
what lacking in normative approaches to the concept of reconciliation.
While there is a critical literature on the idea of reconciliation (Humphrey, 2000; Norval, 1998;
Schaap, 2005), there is also a tendency in both academic and popular accounts to imagine recon-
ciliation as a positive process towards the accommodation of political difference (see e.g. Lederach,
1997). Although accepting the transformative potential of reconciliation, this article argues that
there are two key issues at stake in understanding its political implications: first, the need for a
specific and deeply contextual understanding of the meaning of reconciliation and, second, a
requirement to unpack the ideological and linguistic presuppositions that reconciliation invokes
within a specific context. The article uses the example of Northern Ireland as a testing ground for
these issues on the basis that it is a society that has been involved in conflict transformation pro-
cesses in the last 15 to 20 years and one where notions of reconciliation have been invoked as
fundamental to future political and social relations (Schulze, 2008).
What emerges is a complex picture of reconciliation discourses and narratives in Northern Ireland
that demonstrates the deeply contested nature of the concept. Because reconciliation is an unsettled
and elusive concept, it becomes difficult to employ it as a key strand of conflict transformation in
Northern Ireland. Indeed, as the interviews discussed in the second half of the article make clear,
pursuing reconciliation in Northern Ireland might actually makes things worse because it has never
been established as an agreed objective of the peace process. This reflects the contention that, while
reconciliation might be a fruitful concept to use in the context of the management of some conflicts
in the world, it is most certainly not universally beneficial and can be harmful where the implica-
tions of its application have not been thoroughly considered. Many conflictual societies such as
Northern Ireland have moved through processes of conflict transformation without engaging in
overt forms of reconciliation. This suggests that reconciliation should not be placed at the summit of
any general hierarchical model of the most appropriate forms of conflict resolution.
Indeed, in the Northern Ireland example, conflict is not only based upon the schisms between the
arguments of different social groups but also the synthesis of these conflicting perspectives in terms
of political actors defining themselves in contradistinction from their opponents. Thus, this article
contends that there is a ‘disjunctured synthesis’ at work in Northern Ireland that militates against
reconciliation being employed as the conceptual device to facilitate conflict transformation.
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