1995-10-01a- CIA Conference Report: THE CHALLENGE OF ETHNIC CONFLICT TO NATIONAL AND INTERNATIONAL ORDER IN THE 1990S GEOGRAPHIC PERSPECTIVES 01-Oct-95

C00123268
In coming to grips with the behavioral patterns in the The current cease-fire and complex negotiations to
Shankill-Falls frontier,... it must be recognized that reintroduce Sinn Fein into the political process as a
the two territories forming the frontier zone do not constitutional actor are finely balanced-dependent
nest compatibly within the same state-they are parts on a combination of Republican political realism and
of two apparently incompatible nationalisms, the Conservatist/Unionist compromise. However, theIrish on the one hand and the Northern Irish version British-Irish border, together with the urban enclaves
of the British on the other.. . .Thus the orientation of of Republican support in Belfast and Derry, will be
the Protestant Shankill is "Ulster and British" while
the Roman Catholic Clonard is "Celtic Irish" in incli- significant geographic reminders that political ideals
nation. This suggests, therefore, that the local frontier and principles are often rooted in very specific locales
in the vicinity of Cupar Street is not just an expres- and are given real purchase by varying perceptions of
sion of urban ethnic differences, but is a microcosm place.
of national division. Boal and Livingstone, 1983, p.
154. (See figure 2.)
Minority Nationalism
Boal and Livingstone draw attention to the signifi-
cance of scale and the possibility of international ten- Ethnic minorities are an important element in the
sions being focused within an urban district. political landscape of Western Europe. Much of the
Depending on which level in the scale hierarchy one power of minority autonomist nationalism in the
chooses, specific places, such as the Clonard and region lies in the ability of minority leaders to mobi-
South Shankill, can be successively interpreted as: lize people on the basis of their historical occupation
1) peripheries of West Belfast; 2) peripheries of their of the land. Territory figures prominently as a context
respective national cores-Roman Catholic Ireland for sociopolitical processes and as a repository for a
and Protestant Northern Ireland; or 3) a periphery threatened group identity and sustenance, while
within a periphery of Great Britain and Northern Ire- nationalism-despite its potential for destruction-
land, what Seamus Heaney (1975, p. 60) has called provides a beguilingly complete sociocultural frame-
the "besieged within the siege." (See figure 3.) work for political and economic action. Herein lies the
significance of resisting harmful outside influences in
In their discussion, Boal and Livingstone also bring to both material and culturallideological terms and the
the fore the question of how to interpret place specific concern with developing a comprehensive definition
events in such a context. They analyze the influence of the nation and its territory to establish political
that culture, stress, violence, gnd lack of information legitimacy that can provide the basis for a call for
have on the conduct and intensity of group conflict some form of autonomy (Williams, 1994). A. D.
where key strategic locations are so infused with sym- Smith (1993, p. 11) has phrased its allure thus:
bolic meaning that any criminal act can be interpreted
as a "political demonstration of loyalty" to one side or nations derive their profound hold over the feelings
the other. This is the geographic equivalent of some and imaginations of the people because they are his-
prisoners, who, as in the Easter Rising of 1916, refuse torically embedded. They are rooted in older and
to accept their classification as "common criminals" more long-lasting ethnic ties, myths, and sentiments
but rather as "political prisoners of war" regardless of from which these modern nations draw much of their
the nature and type of offence committed. History has emotional and cultural sustenance and much of what
a way of mythologizing the mundane, and often makes them distinctive, even unique. If nationalism is
the normalization of the unique, then we should not
squalid, acts of man as martyrdom and heroism, be baffled by its global power. It satisfies the dual
craving to preserve what is felt to be a collective self
This concept of a frontier divide could also be applied and all its special culture values, while inserting that
elsewhere in Europe, for example, within Brussels and self as a political community into the community of
along the Belgian linguistic divide. It also has mean- nations by endowing it with the standard attributes of
ing for the cultural zone of transition separating Que- the nation.
bec from the rest of Canada.
43