Dealing with the past in Northern Ireland: Resources

This is an ever-growing list of resources I have compiled (first published 29 June 2012) on dealing with the past in Northern Ireland. 

My last update, following the release of the most recent government policy consultation, was reposted and updated on 6 January 2021.

Key Policy Documents & Resources

Sequential list of key policy documents & resources

• The Model Bill Team’s Response to the NIO Proposals. Download
• Addressing the Legacy of Northern Ireland’s Past, July 2021, Command Paper CP 498. Download
• Veterans of the Northern Ireland Troubles protected (newspaper article on British Government "proposals" as no official sources exist at this point) (6 May 2021). Read [External]
• Addressing the Legacy of Northern Ireland's past Northern Ireland Affairs Committee consultation (Interim Report) and Evidence (26 October 2020). Download [External]
• Addressing the Legacy of Northern Ireland's past Northern Ireland Affairs Committee consultation: The UK Government's New Proposals (open to 1 June 2020). Download [External]
  
• Ministerial Statement: Addressing Northern Ireland Legacy Issues: Written statement - HCWS168 (18 March 2020). Download [External]
  
• Analysis of the Stormont House Agreement (SHA) consultation responses (July 2019). Download [External]
  
• Consultation: Addressing the Legacy of Northern Ireland's Past (closed 10 September 2018). Download
• Draft Northern Ireland (Stormont House Agreement) Bill (10 March 2016). Download [External]
• Healing Through Remembering: Guide to the Stormont House Agreement (SHA) (2016). Download [External]
• Report of the Special Rapporteur on the promotion of truth, justice, reparation and guarantees of non-recurrence on his mission to Northern Ireland: Comments by the State (16 Nov 2016). Download
• Report of the Special Rapporteur on the promotion of truth, justice, reparation and guarantees of non-recurrence, on his mission to the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (March 2016). Download
• 'Model Bill Team' based at Queen's University Belfast and Committee on the Administration of Justice. Stormont House Agreement – Model Implementation Bill and Explanatory Notes (17 September 2015). Download [External]
• Stormont House Agreement (23 December 2014). Download
• Proposed Agreement (31 December 2013). An agreement among the parties of the Northern Ireland Executive on Parades, Select Commemorations, and Related Protests; Flags and Emblems; and Contending with the Past (also known as Haas O'Sullivan Proposals). Download [External]
• House of Commons Northern Ireland Affairs Committee (December 2009). The Report of the Consultative Group on the Past in Northern Ireland. Response. Download [External]
• Report of the Consultative Group of the Past (January 2009). Download [External]
  
• House of Commons. Northern Ireland Affairs Committee. (2008). Session 2007-08, evidence from Brandon Hamber, Cate Turner, Alan McBride and Sandra Peake. Download
• Healing Through Remembering (2006). Making Peace with the Past: Options for truth recovery regarding the conflict in and about Northern Ireland. Download
  
• House of Commons. Northern Ireland Affairs Committee (October 2005). Ways of Dealing with Northern Ireland's Past: Government Response to the Committee's Tenth Report of Session 2004-05. Download
• House of Commons Northern Ireland Affairs Committee  Ways of Dealing with Northern Ireland's Past: Interim Report - Victims and Survivors  Tenth Report of Session 2004–05. Download
  
• Healing Through Remembering Consultation on Dealing with the Past (2002). Download
  
• "We Will Remember Them": Report of the Victims Commissioner (April 1998). Download [External]
  

Articles by Brandon Hamber and Colleagues

• Hamber, B. (2021, 15 July). Amnesty a line in the sand? It’s not even close. Belfast Telegraph.
• Hamber, B. (2020, 12 December). Moment of Truth…Victims of Northern Ireland’s Troubled Past Can’t Wait Forever. Belfast Telegraph.
• O'Neill, S. & Hamber, B. (2020). Response on Mental Health to Dealing with the Past Consultation. Northern Ireland Affairs Committee Consultation on "Addressing the Legacy of Northern Ireland's past: The UK Government's New Proposals". INCORE, University of Ulster. Submitted online 31 May 2020.
• O'Neill, S. & Hamber, B. (2018). The need for a victim and survivor centred, trauma-informed approach: A Response to the Addressing the Legacy of Northern Ireland's Past Consultation. INCORE, University of Ulster. Submitted online 5 October 2018.
• Hamber, B. and Kelly, G. (2018). Response on Reconciliation to the Consultation Paper: Addressing the Legacy of Northern Ireland's Past. INCORE, University of Ulster. Submitted online 5 October 2018. 
• Hamber, B., & Kelly, G. (2018). Reconciliation: A Northern Ireland Case Study. In Kofi Annan Foundation and Interpeace (Eds), Challenging the Conventional: Can Post-Violence Reconciliation Succeed? (pp. 98-148). New York/Geneva: Kofi Annan Foundation & Interpeace.
• Brandon Hamber, 2008, Submission to the Consultative Group on the Past in Northern Ireland. (Submission, January). Belfast, Northern Ireland.
• Brandon Hamber, 2006, Getting to the Truth Through Talking, Daily Ireland, 14 March 2006.
• Brandon Hamber, 2004, Time to stop permissible lies about the past, Polity, 26 November.
• Brandon Hamber, 2004, Submission to the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee. Reconciliation: Ways of dealing with Northern Ireland's Past (Submission, December). London: Northern Ireland Affairs Committee.
• Brandon Hamber, 2003, A Truth Commission for Northern Ireland, Blog Post, 11 June 2003
• Hamber, B. (2002). Rights and Reasons: Challenges for Truth Recovery in South Africa and Northern Ireland. [Journal Article]. Fordham International Law Journal, 26(4), 1074-1094.
• Hamber, B. (Ed.). (1998). Past Imperfect: Dealing with the Past in Northern Ireland and Societies in Transition. Derry/Londonderry: University of Ulster, INCORE.

Websites

• Healing Through Remembering
• Transitional Justice Institute
• CAIN
• CAIN (Section on Victims and Commemoration)
• Bloody Sunday Inquiry
• Commission for Victims and Survivors
  
• Committee for the Administration of Justice
• Consultative Group on the Past
• Historical Inquiries Team
• Pat Finucane Centre

Publications

List of key academic papers on Northern Ireland, dealing with the past and transitional justice, review the annotated list (56 references).

The Case for a Degree in Twitterdemiology

In these challenging times, the University is looking to develop new courses. I suggest we offer a course in “Twitterdemiology”. The degree takes typically 2–3 months to complete, involves sharing, preferably uninformed, opinions on Twitter about the spread of diseases, preferably late at night and slightly drunk. A bonus is you never have to wear a mask during class. Involves some study in terms of looking at the occasional graph on a few websites and making a hasty conclusion. The degree is wholly part-time. The degree strongly appeals to those who like to think they are smarter than others for no good reason other than that social media now allows them to share their views in public unfiltered.

That said, the ability to look at a graph and understand what lines are going up or down is an essential criteria to join the class. Students will only be considered if they enjoy a good conspiracy theory and if they generally think experts are prone to exaggeration. Experience in the field of “Climate Change Denial” will stand you in good stead for this degree. Any former study in basic statistical knowledge is strongly discouraged. In fact, any study of the natural sciences is not considered essential for this course as science often makes things too complicated or produces anomalous results. This is not helpful. 

The beauty of the degree is that it is short and focused, and graduates will leave being clear in their opinions, which is the real benefit of not considering alternative science-based perspectives. We could roll the degree out to thousands of graduates. The course is online, opening an international market. It is also open access and appeals to all strata of society. Students could even take the course while stuck in residence over Christmas or at any time really. It is cost-effective as it takes fewer resources than the traditional 7–10 years it normally takes to become a competent epidemiologist (in fact the University could start a redundancy process for all those in the natural sciences saving millions).

"MERS Coronavirus Particle" by NIAID
is licensed under CC BY 2.0

The course requires limited input from the lecturers, if at all. Some assessment might be necessary for accreditation, but this could take the form of observation of students performance on Twitter and Facebook, and involves taking the odd screenshot. Students will get extra credit for sharing their opinion on other mediums, especially phone-in radio shows. Lecturers can perform their assessment duties without a mask and at home while watching TV in their underwear, thus meeting all health and safety requirements and decreasing staff stress. Such an assessment process does not preclude being slightly drunk at the time and will thus appeal to the lecturing staff immensely, meaning uptake in terms of staffing the new degree should be straightforward. The lecturer time to student ratio is excellent, meaning significant profits could be made through the cost of the official accreditation process alone.

I understand it has been proven that it now only takes a few months to become an epidemiologist and disprove the medical establishment without any formal training whatsoever, so you might ask why do the degree? But offering official recognition for the new science of Twitterdemiology, and a university backed degree, would no doubt appeal to many. I know additional risks may arise such as our new graduates could end up challenging the University on other matters such as many staff continuing to believe mistakenly in evolution and also staff promoting perverted ideas such as social justice and equality (occasionally even teaching students about Marxism, shame on them). In these challenging times, difficult choices need to be made and after all, do we not encourage critical thinking? Furthermore, if we remove all natural sciences from the University, and also stop all this leftist and free-thinking claptrap as the government advises, this problem may not arise.

Career paths are numerous for Twitterdemiologist. Students can go on to be prominent politicians and share their views with a broader audience. Maybe a cross over degree with policy and politics should be considered. Why not replace the Chief Medical Officer with one of our newly minted Twitterdemiologists? Importantly, the degree also allows you to obtain your qualification and practice Twitterdemiology in your own time or while holding down another job. Twitterdemiology thus complements the new government retraining scheme.

The cumulative positive effect on society, as we have already seen through the views of many amateur Twitterdemiologist on mask-wearing and lockdown strategies, has proven immensely helpful. The graphs on Coronavirus infection prove this. So we can build on that. Officially recognising the positive contribution of Twitterdemiology could only enhance the university claims concerning social impact. I strongly suggest we move at speed to formalise this new science.

Published by Brandon Hamber, 23 October 2020, Medium.com. Brandon Hamber is Professor of Peace Studies at Ulster University.

Enhanced Integration of MHPSS in Peacebuilding

On 15 October I gave an address to the "Annual Conference 2020: Harnessing Potential" hosted by The Knowledge Platform Security & Rule of Law. The speech focused on the "Enhanced Integration of Mental Health and Psychosocial Support (MHPSS) in Peacebuilding".  The speech focused on sharing the recommendations for the UN Peacebuilding Architecture Review developed with a multidisciplinary Task Force of which I was a member. The Task Force was established by the government of The Netherlands which is promoting the integration of mental health and psychosocial support in peacebuilding efforts. 

You can listen to my speech below:

Brandon Hamber · Recommendations of the Task Force on MHPSS in Peacebuilding and the Netherlands MFA