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The Good Friday/Belfast Agreement and the Memory of the Civil Rights Movement

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While 2018 marks the twentieth anniversary of the signing of the Good Friday Agreement (GFA) in Northern Ireland, it also marks the fiftieth anniversary of the civil rights movement and the protests of 1968. One of the key innovations of the Agreement is that it makes issues of rights central to the broader consociational framework, with the entirety of section 6 devoted to ‘Rights, Safeguards and Equality of opportunity.’ Sarah Campbell considers the civil rights movement’s reputational trajectory since 1998, questioning why this is so, and why it is so ripe for appropriation.

Image courtesy of interviewee. May 21, 2024

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The speaker discusses the intertwining histories of the Civil Rights Movement and the Good Friday Agreement in Northern Ireland, particularly reflecting on their significance during the 20th anniversaries of both events in 2018. The Civil Rights Movement is recognized as both a catalyst for the conflict and a key element in advancing rights and peace in a post-conflict society. Key points include:

1. **Significance of Civil Rights Movement**: This video video movement emerged in the 1960s in response to issues such as housing, employment discrimination, and police brutality, particularly against the Catholic community in Northern Ireland.

2. **Good Friday Agreement**: Celebrated as a resolution to conflict, it included a focus on civil rights, recognizing the importance of rights in both the origins and solutions to conflict.

3. **Political Polarization**: The SDLP (Social Democratic and Labour Party) and Sinn Féin, both nationalist parties, each claim a legacy in the Civil Rights Movement, leading to ongoing disputes over historical ownership and narratives.

4. **Collective Memory and Identity**: The evolution of collective memory around civil rights has transitioned from a negative view of the movement to a more positive acknowledgment of its impact, particularly following the peace process initiated by the Good Friday Agreement.

5. **Legacy Issues**: Despite the peace achieved, issues of discrimination, housing, and unemployment remain contentious and significant in current political discourse.

6. **Future Considerations**: The speaker emphasizes the need to address a wider range of rights, not limited to sectarian divides. The changing demographic landscape, including an increase in immigration, necessitates consideration of gender and racial rights alongside traditional civic rights.

7. **Continuing Work**: It is acknowledged that while violence has decreased, the promised "peace dividends" of the Good Friday Agreement have yet to materialize, highlighting the ongoing challenges facing Northern Ireland.

In conclusion, the speaker calls for recognition of multiple narratives regarding civil rights, advocating for a more inclusive approach to understanding and advancing rights in Northern Ireland beyond just Catholic-Protestant tensions.

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X-TIMESTAMP-MAP:LOCAL=00:00:00.000,MPEGTS=900000

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Reason I kind of come, kind of looked at this topic

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was in 2018, there was a, an awful lot of commemorative,

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chat and activities that were happening

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around the 20th anniversary of the Good Friday agreement,

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but 2018 was also the 50th anniversary of the

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Civil Rights Movement in Northern Ireland.

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So those two things were happening concurrently.

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Um, and when people talked about the Civil Rights Movement

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or about the Good Friday agreement,

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the Good Friday agreement had a whole section on rights,

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civil rights as, as part of the, I guess

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the ways of, of, progressing a post-conflict society.

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Um, and so there was a recognition, I guess that's rights

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and the issues of rights were, part of the conflict

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and part of the solution to the conflict.

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And so the civil rights movement then takes on a kind of,

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a greater significance, I guess, for, a lot

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of people in Northern Ireland as both the start

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of the conflict and, and the end of the conflict.

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Um, so the civil Rights movement then to kind

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of think about it, it's, you know, the idea

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that there was a, this,

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the Good Friday agreement is seen as a vindication of that,

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indicates

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that the Civil Rights movement in itself was

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hugely significant.

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Um, it comes about it, it becomes to kind

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of international significance in the 5th of October in 1968

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in Derry, a civil rights march that had been banned.

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Um, the police kind of, overreact to that.

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And so this is where we, we get to kind of birth of the,

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international movement,

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or a mass movement at that point.

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But it starts much earlier in the 1960s around grievances

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that conflicts in particular had in Northern Ireland about

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housing, about jobs, employment, about the, kind

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of brutality of the, the royal salary or the oil uc

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and the police force there about special powers acts.

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Um, and, but it was around housing that's, an awful lot

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of the very early activity starts.

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Um, and so this, this is where, the, the kind

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of righteousness of the cause kind of comes into being,

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and this is why it becomes so significant then

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for Catholics,

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and for nationalists in, in Northern Ireland as part of

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that collective memory that, the, the actions

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that they took in the, the kind of late 1960s are vindicated

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by the, the Good Friday agreement by the,

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that whole section on rights, both the, by the, the kind

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of late 1990s when we start to have the peace, process

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that kind of di discussions

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and talks both national parties in Northern Ireland,

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both the Social Democratic and Labor Party and Xin Fein.

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Um, there is a kind

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of consensus about the way forward in terms of,

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of reaching an agreement.

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It had to be a kind of, within an all Ireland context

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and, and obviously also include the United Kingdom,

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but perhaps even in within a European context as well.

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Um, but there's still an awful lot of divisions

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between those two political parties. They're

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Still so polarized in an awful lot of issues.

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Um, and some of the issues that they're polarized are on,

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are about the, beginnings of the conflict.

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So who is essentially to blame for that conflict?

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Um, an awful lot of that is

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tied up in the Civil rights movement.

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So, you know, when people talk about the Civil Rights

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Movement, they talk about it as both the movement itself,

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but also as the start of the troubles.

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And so there was a kind of consensus narrative that it,

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that's kind of, emerged.

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And this, it emerged with the Cameron, report in 1969.

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So this was a, a report that the British government,

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had to investigate the, disturbances of 1968.

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Why did they come about? What caused them,

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and do, you know, according to that, report,

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it was essentially that the middle class,

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the Catholic middle class, no longer,

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they were, better educated.

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They no longer acquiesced and,

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and, you know, the unionist miss rule.

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Um, and so they kind of came out,

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spoke up about their rights and, and, and came out

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and protested for them,

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and that this was derailed by kind of very left wing,

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student activists, but also by, Republicans.

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And this is where you get the emergence of the,

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the 35 years of, of conflict.

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So for the SDLP, they felt a huge connection.

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They, they used

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to call themselves the Party of Civil Rights.

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They emerged in 1970.

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An awful lot of the people who, were the originators

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of the movement, the founding members

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of the movement were in the Civil Rights Movement.

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Um, so they felt

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as though they had a kind of ownership of that.

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Um, Shane Fein,

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however, would argue that, you know,

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Republicans were also involved in the Civil rights movement,

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and that it was Republicans who were pushing it more for,

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you know, the more revolutionary aspects of, of

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what the movement could achieve.

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Um, and that's, this is

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where you started out have an awful lot of discussions.

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And, and on, on top of that, then, so you have that,

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that kind of conflict of, you know,

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the intra community conflict between the,

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the nationalist parties, but you also have, do you know how,

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what do unionists think about this?

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And no one disputes

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that discrimination happens in Northern Ireland

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that is no longer under dispute,

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but what is under dispute is

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how much discrimination was there.

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So, you know, essentially the kind

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of consensus narrative indicates that, there was, yeah,

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discrimination wa was extensive.

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Um, unionists will contest that.

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And so the issues of of discrimination remain a very

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contested issue, even post-conflict.

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So issues around housing unemployment continue to be,

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issues of contestation between the, those groups.

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And, you know, when, nationalists talk in, in kind

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of post-conflict, Northern Ireland, they often talk in terms

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of rights.

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Um, and the, the rhetoric of rights becomes a huge part

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of that, that that political discourse

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and unionists don't feel as though they have the same claims

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to those, that kind of

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Language and those kinds of things.

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Um, and so that, that, that ends up being, the,

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a huge aspect, and this is why it becomes ingrained in the

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kind of Catholic, or nationalist collective memory.

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So, like I said, the, the issues with,

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the Group Friday agreement, that the centering of that idea

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that rights was a, a huge, aspect

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of why the conflict breaks out in the first place.

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And it also would play a very central role in,

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how the, the area could move to a post-conflict society,

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becomes, I guess ingrained in the kind of,

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the politics of the region.

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And so for, for many people then,

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and particularly in the nationalist community, it,

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it becomes hugely important about who was fighting

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for rights, and, and who has the ownership of that.

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Um, and so, like I said, there was a,

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there is a consensus narrative about that.

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And the SDLP have held onto

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that consensus narrative since 1970,

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since their emergence in 1970.

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Like I said, right after 2010, they described themselves

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and their website as the Party of Civil Rights.

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Um, since 2010, they've kind of described themselves as,

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you know, that civil rights is part of their DNA, those,

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that's, that's, some of the, the kind of rhetoric

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that they use it civil rights is, is within the s DLPs, DNA,

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and that, you know, they have been fighting for housing

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and employment for, you know, decades,

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kind of as they, they come into the process

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and into the peace process, they also start to lay claim

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to some of this, this kind of re rights rhetoric.

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Um, Jerry Adams, for example, talks about how he was,

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you know, an activist during the Civil Rights Movement,

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how he, was one of the civil rights activists.

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He, you know, very controversially in 2016.

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He, he, writes a tweet after watching dj, on Chains.

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And he, he talks about the connections between the,

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the Civil Rights movement in Northern Ireland

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and the, the Black Civil Rights movements in, in America.

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And he said, you know, an awful lot

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of people had an issue with this

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because they said, you know,

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why was Jerry Adams playing claim to this, this history?

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Um, where is Adam emerge from?

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Um, and, you know,

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because whites takes on not that significance, that's,

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that's where it becomes even more important.

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So in the 1970s and 1980s,

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and right up until the kind of mid 1990s,

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there wasn't this kind of, contest over people

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and civil rights, civil rights,

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and the commemoration of civil rights was never

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really a positive affair.

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It was never something that had any kind of,

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even within the national community, not even, you know,

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any kind of commemorative events.

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Um, after 1998, you start to see that become a much more

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positive and, and, and, to be almost a fully kind of,

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positive experience.

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And so in, in 2008, in the 40th anniversary, this is

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The, the first time that you start

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to see the Civil Rights Movement as being part, of that,

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language of post-conflict, Northern Ireland.

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So in 2008, you had the first kind of official commemoration

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of, of civil rights, and you have, you know,

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very high profile politicians.

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So the, president of the Irish Republic

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and the former president of the Irish Republic,

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you know, make speeches about how those activists

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and gen, of the civil rights era have essentially,

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made huge, I guess progressions

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for anti-discrimination legislation in Northern Ireland.

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And without them that the, you know,

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that anti-discrimination legislation wouldn't exist.

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And so, this is where you start

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to see people laying claim to that you also had, you know,

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right up until the last 15 years

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or so, that's the

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archives were closed for that period were closed.

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And so, the actual, proper research on

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that period of time is only really,

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been investigated in the last, 15 years or so.

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Um, before that, people were more reluctant

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because of the righteousness of, of the cause and,

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and the reluctance to kind of question the motives of,

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of any of the people who

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were involved in the, in the movement.

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They, people tended not to look at that, as much,

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in the last 15 years or so.

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Like I said, those archives have been opened,

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since 1998.

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People who were active in the movement, are more,

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are are less reluctant, I guess, to,

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put their voice on the record.

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So there's more people who are willing to,

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do oral history interviews, for example.

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Um, and that, but that has led to that kind of context of

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who the ownership of, of history,

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because it's, it's has huge symbolic value.

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Um, and so this is where it's, it's, it's, it's, it's,

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it takes on, significance.

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And the also when we kind of think about something that,

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you know, something not significant

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that happened in the past,

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that it changed the whole generation of people.

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Um, when you think about the civil rights movement within

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the space of just a few years, between 1968

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and 1972, they brought down a monolithic government

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that had existed for 50 years in a few short years.

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That happened, huge changes took place in Northern Ireland,

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in, in that, in that very short time period.

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And so a transformed, I think, generation of people now,

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that generation who were active in the Civil Rights

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movement, who came of age, who were at university or,

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or young people at that, that particular time, they go on

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to, have a si hugely significant role in the decades

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later in the decades since then.

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So a lot of them go into politics, they go into media,

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they go into the judiciary, they go into civil service,

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they go into, you know, the law.

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And so the people who are,

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who were really active members of the Civil Rights

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Movement in the 1960s end up being the ones

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who are negotiating the Good Friday agreement in the 1990s.

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Um, and that, that is, is hugely significant.

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So they want those, they want those.

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So of course, as, these things open up and as more

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and more people just, talk about their, experiences

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of that time, there's a recognition that the,

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the movement itself is not homogenous,

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that there's a heterogeneity to it,

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and that people want to ensure that their stories get told.

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And there's a, then, claims laid to who,

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who should have, the ownership of that.

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Obviously since 1998, you know, the,

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economic situation in Northern

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Ireland has changed significantly.

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The, the, the kind of social outlook

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of Northern Ireland has changed significantly.

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You've got, you know, housing crisis,

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you've got an economic crisis in 2009.

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You've got kind of austerity

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policies that are being introduced.

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And so this completely changed, you know,

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the present really changes how people look at the past

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and collective memory is very much a

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representation of the past.

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It's not, you know, it's not history.

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It is a representation of how people understand that past.

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And so when they're reflect on it,

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they're reflecting on it from the position of the present.

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Um, and so, you know, when they're,

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they're looking at the kind

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of current problems in Northern Ireland,

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of which there are many,

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and particularly in, in that kind of two decades

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after the, the agreement is signed, they, they recognize

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that some of the, the, issues that remain are the ones

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that were there in the 1960s.

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So housing, unemployment remains some of the kind

13:27.125 --> 13:28.485
of key, major issues.

13:28.745 --> 13:30.605
And so when people talk about, you know,

13:30.605 --> 13:32.005
particularly the nationalist,

13:32.435 --> 13:35.725
parties when they're talking about it, in parliament

13:35.725 --> 13:36.925
and installment,

13:36.995 --> 13:39.965
they're oftentimes talking about the present very much

13:40.185 --> 13:41.205
in relation to the past.

13:41.545 --> 13:45.005
And they, they, they use the, the memories of civil rights

13:45.005 --> 13:46.125
to, to invoke that.

13:46.145 --> 13:49.205
And, and so they talk about, you know,

13:49.785 --> 13:52.725
no longer being second class citizens, they talk about that,

13:53.025 --> 13:56.325
how what people out onto the streets in the 1960s

13:56.385 --> 13:57.885
and there needs to be something done about it,

13:57.885 --> 13:59.325
or this is going to reoccur again.

13:59.705 --> 14:02.645
Um, and so they, they very much go hand in hand.

14:02.645 --> 14:05.595
And so what you also find is

14:05.595 --> 14:07.635
because the national parties are competing

14:07.635 --> 14:10.075
for the same votes, and so the votes of people, they,

14:10.075 --> 14:13.075
they need to mobilize people around their own agendas.

14:13.075 --> 14:15.315
And so there is a claim then whenever,

14:15.915 --> 14:17.715
whenever they are talking about a housing crisis

14:17.815 --> 14:20.195
or, on unemployment

14:20.195 --> 14:22.955
or under employment, that they have to show

14:22.955 --> 14:24.315
that they've been the ones who've been

14:24.475 --> 14:25.515
fighting for that for decades.

14:26.015 --> 14:28.235
Um, and so this is where you start to get the clash

14:28.235 --> 14:30.155
between SDLP and Champagne,

14:30.415 --> 14:34.075
and particularly within Parliament about, who

14:34.655 --> 14:37.595
has the most right to, to lay claim to that.

14:38.185 --> 14:40.635
Essentially, what I wanted to kind of demonstrate,

14:40.915 --> 14:43.925
I suppose, is that, I, I,

14:44.025 --> 14:46.405
and I think that the, the idea

14:46.435 --> 14:48.805
that the Good Friday agreement is the kind of end

14:48.805 --> 14:50.605
of the conflict has been exposed

14:51.145 --> 14:52.405
In the last two decades.

14:52.685 --> 14:55.565
I think it's, it's, you know, in 2018 when,

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and even in, in 2023 when there was commemorations

14:58.645 --> 15:02.165
around the 20th and the 25th anniversary people,

15:02.315 --> 15:06.885
obviously were, you know, prior of the,

15:06.945 --> 15:09.445
the Good Friday agreement prior to what had been achieved,

15:09.745 --> 15:12.045
but recognized there was still an awful lot of work to do.

15:12.065 --> 15:15.405
And that the Good Friday agreement was a process,

15:15.865 --> 15:18.365
and that it was, it was an ongoing process.

15:18.585 --> 15:21.445
And so issues of legacy continue to

15:22.125 --> 15:24.125
dominate the discussions in Northern Ireland

15:24.225 --> 15:26.725
and continue to, I guess, separate the,

15:26.745 --> 15:29.245
the different communities, you know, particularly

15:29.245 --> 15:31.805
with the legacy Bill that has been in, introduced

15:31.865 --> 15:33.885
by the, by the Tory government in, in Britain.

15:34.385 --> 15:36.605
But ideas of the past

15:37.145 --> 15:41.005
and how the past is remembered continues to be a,

15:41.165 --> 15:43.805
a significant, a significant issue.

15:44.105 --> 15:47.925
And I think it's, it's important for, people to be aware

15:47.995 --> 15:51.005
that, there is not one single past

15:51.225 --> 15:53.485
and that we're never going to get one single past.

15:53.545 --> 15:56.645
And what we're going to get is, many, many voices

15:57.265 --> 16:00.125
and, kind of mu multivocal past.

16:00.185 --> 16:04.605
And we need to be able to, to, allow these two exist

16:05.145 --> 16:07.205
and to stop trying to keep ownership

16:07.225 --> 16:08.325
to these, these sorts of things.

16:08.325 --> 16:09.405
Because in the end day,

16:09.405 --> 16:12.845
no one owns the civil rights movement, no one.

16:13.065 --> 16:16.205
Um, and in the same way as no one owns any particular event,

16:16.585 --> 16:21.005
or any, particular, significance happening in,

16:21.005 --> 16:22.205
in, during the conflict.

16:22.585 --> 16:27.485
Um, and so what is important is, is the legacies of that

16:27.585 --> 16:29.605
and, and who has been left behind and,

16:29.665 --> 16:32.325
and particularly the families that are, are left dealing

16:32.325 --> 16:33.365
with an awful lot of stuff.

16:33.705 --> 16:36.005
And what's also significant is

16:36.105 --> 16:37.285
how do we move forward from that?

16:37.585 --> 16:40.805
So yes, it's important to understand our past

16:41.065 --> 16:44.565
and to, allow these different voices

16:44.705 --> 16:48.165
to be heard about the past and certainly to get truth

16:48.185 --> 16:50.965
and justice in, in, parts of the past.

16:51.185 --> 16:52.205
But there's also a present

16:52.305 --> 16:54.205
and a future to continue to live into.

16:54.345 --> 16:57.765
And so when we think about post-conflict, Northern Ireland,

16:58.025 --> 16:59.605
yes, there's been a decrease in violence,

16:59.705 --> 17:03.765
but where is the, the, we haven't seen any of the,

17:04.055 --> 17:06.325
peace dividends that have been promised as part

17:06.325 --> 17:07.405
of the good party agreements,

17:07.625 --> 17:09.245
and these are the things that we need to be,

17:09.345 --> 17:10.925
to be working on, and these are the things

17:10.925 --> 17:12.085
that we need to be thinking about.

17:12.505 --> 17:14.525
Um, and rights is very much part of that,

17:14.545 --> 17:18.125
but not so much in terms of Catholic versus Protestant.

17:18.125 --> 17:20.565
We also need to be thinking much, more widely about

17:20.565 --> 17:22.485
that we need to be thinking about gender rights.

17:22.825 --> 17:25.365
We need to be thinking about, racial rights.

17:25.705 --> 17:28.285
Um, we need to be thinking about, you know, particularly,

17:28.465 --> 17:32.245
there's been, a huge increase in the number

17:32.245 --> 17:33.885
of immigrants who've come to live in Northern Ireland.

17:34.105 --> 17:38.645
So and so issues of race have become much more,

17:39.005 --> 17:41.965
prominent than, sectarian issues in Northern Ireland.

17:42.105 --> 17:43.685
So these are some of the things that we have

17:43.685 --> 17:45.045
to kind of continue to think about.

17:45.045 --> 17:47.125
And so when we think about that legacy

17:47.225 --> 17:48.885
and history of rights, we need

17:48.885 --> 17:49.925
to think about it in the round

17:49.945 --> 17:52.005
and not just in terms of Catholic and Protestant.

00:00 - Reason I kind of come, kind of looked at this topic was in 2018, there was a, an awful lot of commemorative, chat and activities that were happening around the 20th anniversary of the Good Friday agreement, but 2018 was also the 50th anniversary of the Civil Rights Movement in Northern Ireland.

00:19 - So those two things were happening concurrently. and when people talked about the Civil Rights Movement or about the Good Friday agreement, the Good Friday agreement had a whole section on rights, civil rights as, as part of the, I guess the ways of, of, progressing a post-conflict society. and so there was a recognition, I guess that's rights and the issues of rights were, part of the conflict and part of the solution to the conflict. And so the civil rights movement then takes on a kind of,

00:53 - a greater significance, I guess, for, a lot of people in Northern Ireland as both the start of the conflict and, and the end of the conflict. so the civil Rights movement then to kind of think about it, it's, you know, the idea that there was a, this, the Good Friday agreement is seen as a vindication of that, indicates that the Civil Rights movement in itself was hugely significant.

01:18 - it comes about it, it becomes to kind of international significance in the 5th of October in 1968 in Derry, a civil rights march that had been banned. the police kind of, overreact to that. And so this is where we, we get to kind of birth of the, international movement, or a mass movement at that point. But it starts much earlier in the 1960s around grievances that conflicts in particular had in Northern Ireland about housing, about jobs, employment, about the, kind

01:47 - of brutality of the, the royal salary or the oil uc and the police force there about special powers acts. and, but it was around housing that's, an awful lot of the very early activity starts. and so this, this is where, the, the kind of righteousness of the cause kind of comes into being, and this is why it becomes so significant then for Catholics, and for nationalists in, in Northern Ireland as part of that collective memory that, the, the actions

02:15 - that they took in the, the kind of late 1960s are vindicated by the, the Good Friday agreement by the, that whole section on rights, both the, by the, the kind of late 1990s when we start to have the peace, process that kind of di discussions and talks both national parties in Northern Ireland, both the Social Democratic and Labor Party and Xin Fein. there is a kind of consensus about the way forward in terms of, of reaching an agreement.

02:44 - It had to be a kind of, within an all Ireland context and, and obviously also include the United Kingdom, but perhaps even in within a European context as well. but there's still an awful lot of divisions between those two political parties. They're Still so polarized in an awful lot of issues. and some of the issues that they're polarized are on, are about the, beginnings of the conflict. So who is essentially to blame for that conflict? an awful lot of that is

03:12 - tied up in the Civil rights movement. So, you know, when people talk about the Civil Rights Movement, they talk about it as both the movement itself, but also as the start of the troubles. And so there was a kind of consensus narrative that it, that's kind of, emerged. And this, it emerged with the Cameron, report in 1969. So this was a, a report that the British government, had to investigate the, disturbances of 1968. Why did they come about? What caused them,

03:40 - and do, you know, according to that, report, it was essentially that the middle class, the Catholic middle class, no longer, they were, better educated. They no longer acquiesced and, and, you know, the unionist miss rule. and so they kind of came out, spoke up about their rights and, and, and came out and protested for them, and that this was derailed by kind of very left wing,

04:04 - student activists, but also by, Republicans. And this is where you get the emergence of the, the 35 years of, of conflict. So for the SDLP, they felt a huge connection. They, they used to call themselves the Party of Civil Rights. They emerged in 1970. An awful lot of the people who, were the originators of the movement, the founding members of the movement were in the Civil Rights Movement.

04:28 - so they felt as though they had a kind of ownership of that. Shane Fein, however, would argue that, you know, Republicans were also involved in the Civil rights movement, and that it was Republicans who were pushing it more for, you know, the more revolutionary aspects of, of what the movement could achieve. and that's, this is where you started out have an awful lot of discussions.

04:50 - And, and on, on top of that, then, so you have that, that kind of conflict of, you know, the intra community conflict between the, the nationalist parties, but you also have, do you know how, what do unionists think about this? And no one disputes that discrimination happens in Northern Ireland that is no longer under dispute, but what is under dispute is how much discrimination was there.

05:10 - So, you know, essentially the kind of consensus narrative indicates that, there was, yeah, discrimination wa was extensive. unionists will contest that. And so the issues of of discrimination remain a very contested issue, even post-conflict. So issues around housing unemployment continue to be, issues of contestation between the, those groups. And, you know, when, nationalists talk in, in kind of post-conflict, Northern Ireland, they often talk in terms

05:42 - of rights. and the, the rhetoric of rights becomes a huge part of that, that that political discourse and unionists don't feel as though they have the same claims to those, that kind of Language and those kinds of things. and so that, that, that ends up being, the, a huge aspect, and this is why it becomes ingrained in the kind of Catholic, or nationalist collective memory. So, like I said, the, the issues with,

06:12 - the Group Friday agreement, that the centering of that idea that rights was a, a huge, aspect of why the conflict breaks out in the first place. And it also would play a very central role in, how the, the area could move to a post-conflict society, becomes, I guess ingrained in the kind of, the politics of the region. And so for, for many people then, and particularly in the nationalist community, it, it becomes hugely important about who was fighting

06:46 - for rights, and, and who has the ownership of that. and so, like I said, there was a, there is a consensus narrative about that. And the SDLP have held onto that consensus narrative since 1970, since their emergence in 1970. Like I said, right after 2010, they described themselves and their website as the Party of Civil Rights. since 2010, they've kind of described themselves as, you know, that civil rights is part of their DNA, those,

07:16 - that's, that's, some of the, the kind of rhetoric that they use it civil rights is, is within the s DLPs, DNA, and that, you know, they have been fighting for housing and employment for, you know, decades, kind of as they, they come into the process and into the peace process, they also start to lay claim to some of this, this kind of re rights rhetoric. Jerry Adams, for example, talks about how he was, you know, an activist during the Civil Rights Movement, how he, was one of the civil rights activists.

07:49 - He, you know, very controversially in 2016. He, he, writes a tweet after watching dj, on Chains. And he, he talks about the connections between the, the Civil Rights movement in Northern Ireland and the, the Black Civil Rights movements in, in America. And he said, you know, an awful lot of people had an issue with this because they said, you know, why was Jerry Adams playing claim to this, this history? where is Adam emerge from?

08:14 - and, you know, because whites takes on not that significance, that's, that's where it becomes even more important. So in the 1970s and 1980s, and right up until the kind of mid 1990s, there wasn't this kind of, contest over people and civil rights, civil rights, and the commemoration of civil rights was never really a positive affair. It was never something that had any kind of,

08:37 - even within the national community, not even, you know, any kind of commemorative events. after 1998, you start to see that become a much more positive and, and, and, to be almost a fully kind of, positive experience. And so in, in 2008, in the 40th anniversary, this is The, the first time that you start to see the Civil Rights Movement as being part, of that, language of post-conflict, Northern Ireland. So in 2008, you had the first kind of official commemoration

09:09 - of, of civil rights, and you have, you know, very high profile politicians. So the, president of the Irish Republic and the former president of the Irish Republic, you know, make speeches about how those activists and gen, of the civil rights era have essentially, made huge, I guess progressions for anti-discrimination legislation in Northern Ireland. And without them that the, you know, that anti-discrimination legislation wouldn't exist.

09:38 - And so, this is where you start to see people laying claim to that you also had, you know, right up until the last 15 years or so, that's the archives were closed for that period were closed. And so, the actual, proper research on that period of time is only really, been investigated in the last, 15 years or so. before that, people were more reluctant because of the righteousness of, of the cause and,

10:08 - and the reluctance to kind of question the motives of, of any of the people who were involved in the, in the movement. They, people tended not to look at that, as much, in the last 15 years or so. Like I said, those archives have been opened, since 1998. People who were active in the movement, are more, are are less reluctant, I guess, to, put their voice on the record.

10:35 - So there's more people who are willing to, do oral history interviews, for example. and that, but that has led to that kind of context of who the ownership of, of history, because it's, it's has huge symbolic value. and so this is where it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it takes on, significance. And the also when we kind of think about something that, you know, something not significant that happened in the past,

11:03 - that it changed the whole generation of people. when you think about the civil rights movement within the space of just a few years, between 1968 and 1972, they brought down a monolithic government that had existed for 50 years in a few short years. That happened, huge changes took place in Northern Ireland, in, in that, in that very short time period. And so a transformed, I think, generation of people now, that generation who were active in the Civil Rights movement, who came of age, who were at university or,

11:31 - or young people at that, that particular time, they go on to, have a si hugely significant role in the decades later in the decades since then. So a lot of them go into politics, they go into media, they go into the judiciary, they go into civil service, they go into, you know, the law. And so the people who are, who were really active members of the Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s end up being the ones who are negotiating the Good Friday agreement in the 1990s.

11:59 - and that, that is, is hugely significant. So they want those, they want those. So of course, as, these things open up and as more and more people just, talk about their, experiences of that time, there's a recognition that the, the movement itself is not homogenous, that there's a heterogeneity to it, and that people want to ensure that their stories get told. And there's a, then, claims laid to who, who should have, the ownership of that.

12:29 - Obviously since 1998, you know, the, economic situation in Northern Ireland has changed significantly. The, the, the kind of social outlook of Northern Ireland has changed significantly. You've got, you know, housing crisis, you've got an economic crisis in 2009. You've got kind of austerity policies that are being introduced. And so this completely changed, you know,

12:50 - the present really changes how people look at the past and collective memory is very much a representation of the past. It's not, you know, it's not history. It is a representation of how people understand that past. And so when they're reflect on it, they're reflecting on it from the position of the present. and so, you know, when they're, they're looking at the kind of current problems in Northern Ireland,

13:11 - of which there are many, and particularly in, in that kind of two decades after the, the agreement is signed, they, they recognize that some of the, the, issues that remain are the ones that were there in the 1960s. So housing, unemployment remains some of the kind of key, major issues. And so when people talk about, you know, particularly the nationalist, parties when they're talking about it, in parliament

13:35 - and installment, they're oftentimes talking about the present very much in relation to the past. And they, they, they use the, the memories of civil rights to, to invoke that. And, and so they talk about, you know, no longer being second class citizens, they talk about that, how what people out onto the streets in the 1960s and there needs to be something done about it, or this is going to reoccur again.

13:59 - and so they, they very much go hand in hand. And so what you also find is because the national parties are competing for the same votes, and so the votes of people, they, they need to mobilize people around their own agendas. And so there is a claim then whenever, whenever they are talking about a housing crisis or, on unemployment or under employment, that they have to show that they've been the ones who've been

14:24 - fighting for that for decades. and so this is where you start to get the clash between SDLP and Champagne, and particularly within Parliament about, who has the most right to, to lay claim to that. Essentially, what I wanted to kind of demonstrate, I suppose, is that, I, I, and I think that the, the idea that the Good Friday agreement is the kind of end of the conflict has been exposed

14:51 - In the last two decades. I think it's, it's, you know, in 2018 when, and even in, in 2023 when there was commemorations around the 20th and the 25th anniversary people, obviously were, you know, prior of the, the Good Friday agreement prior to what had been achieved, but recognized there was still an awful lot of work to do. And that the Good Friday agreement was a process, and that it was, it was an ongoing process. And so issues of legacy continue to

15:22 - dominate the discussions in Northern Ireland and continue to, I guess, separate the, the different communities, you know, particularly with the legacy Bill that has been in, introduced by the, by the Tory government in, in Britain. But ideas of the past and how the past is remembered continues to be a, a significant, a significant issue. And I think it's, it's important for, people to be aware that, there is not one single past

15:51 - and that we're never going to get one single past. And what we're going to get is, many, many voices and, kind of mu multivocal past. And we need to be able to, to, allow these two exist and to stop trying to keep ownership to these, these sorts of things. Because in the end day, no one owns the civil rights movement, no one. and in the same way as no one owns any particular event, or any, particular, significance happening in,

16:21 - in, during the conflict. and so what is important is, is the legacies of that and, and who has been left behind and, and particularly the families that are, are left dealing with an awful lot of stuff. And what's also significant is how do we move forward from that? So yes, it's important to understand our past and to, allow these different voices to be heard about the past and certainly to get truth

16:48 - and justice in, in, parts of the past. But there's also a present and a future to continue to live into. And so when we think about post-conflict, Northern Ireland, yes, there's been a decrease in violence, but where is the, the, we haven't seen any of the, peace dividends that have been promised as part of the good party agreements, and these are the things that we need to be, to be working on, and these are the things

17:10 - that we need to be thinking about. and rights is very much part of that, but not so much in terms of Catholic versus Protestant. We also need to be thinking much, more widely about that we need to be thinking about gender rights. We need to be thinking about, racial rights. we need to be thinking about, you know, particularly, there's been, a huge increase in the number of immigrants who've come to live in Northern Ireland. So and so issues of race have become much more,

17:39 - prominent than, sectarian issues in Northern Ireland. So these are some of the things that we have to kind of continue to think about. And so when we think about that legacy and history of rights, we need to think about it in the round and not just in terms of Catholic and Protestant.

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