I was born and raised in East Belfast. I can remember life before the Belfast ‘Good Friday’ Agreement and I have spent much of the last four years studying the contemporary politics of Northern Ireland. Yet, I am hesitant to comment on the scenes of violence playing out of the streets of this city because I do not feel adequately qualified. 

Northern Ireland is a divided place. Our ‘troubled’ history is well known. The lines dividing green and orange, nationalist and unionist, Catholic and Protestant, republican and loyalist are etched across our cities, embedded in our education systems, built into our democracy and painted on our walls. These are the divisions that are written about in history textbooks, political memoires and, occasionally, the national media. But there is another, lesser acknowledged, division in Northern Ireland and it is one that underlies the current unrest and reactions to it: that is the unspoken split between those who are able to choose to be detached from our ‘troubling’ past and those for whom the ‘past’ is still a lived reality. 

As someone privileged enough to have grown up in the former category, I am very aware of my ignorance of the latter. I know that I don’t know what it is like to have lost loved ones in a conflict that is now said to be over. I know that I don’t know what it is like to live under the threat of potential paramilitary punishments. I know that I don’t know what it is like to live in the shadow of so-called ‘peace walls’ that are locked every night, opened every morning and not often crossed. 

In short, my experience of post-1998 Agreement Northern Ireland has differed radically from those whose hands have this week lifted bricks, stones, fireworks and petrol bombs. I want to suggest that this is part of the problem. 

But first, let me be clear: violence solves nothing. Attacks on the police lead only to harm, hurt and criminal records for those who carry them out; destruction of property only damage the place and community the perpetrators are standing in and coming from. 

While the above is all true, the fact that hundreds of young people – mostly under 18 years of age – think so little of their future that they are willing to throw it away in a blaze of petrol-soaked rage is nothing short of tragedy, an indictment of our imperfect peace. 

Violence should never be condoned but it ought to be contextualised. So, speaking from the relative ignorance of my privileged, detached, position, here are some things that I do know but have not yet heard in discussions about the most recent iteration of the ‘Northern Ireland problem’.

In January 2021, over a quarter of those who receive Universal Credit payments in Northern Ireland had deductions applied to their allowances with an average of £56.72 being cut in payments made to 33,684 of the 121,083 households who rely on this support. According to the most recent NISRA data, 17% of households reliant on Universal Credit can be found in the areas where recent riots have taken place – Newtownabbey (4,480) , Carrickfergus (2,560), Shankill (2,610), Falls (3,690) and North Belfast (6,870). 

The child poverty rates in West Belfast and North Belfast – the two constituencies that border the Lanark Way ‘peace wall’ – sit at 24% and 23% respectively, these are the highest in Northern Ireland. Further, pre-existing educational inequalities in Northern Ireland have been exacerbated by school closures during the pandemic and young people from disadvantaged urban backgrounds here have been disproportionately impacted by lack of access to schools and youth centres.

Overall, Northern Ireland has higher rates of suicide and mental health illness than the rest of the UK with around 1 in 5 adults reported to have a diagnosable mental health condition at any given time. This mental health crisis – which was not helped by a three-year hiatus in devolved government – is particularly acute in areas of Belfast where the worst riots have taken place. Between 2013 and 2018 North Belfast and West Belfast had the highest suicide rates with an annual average of 31 and 26 per 100,000 people respectively; the UK average for the same time period was 14 per 100,000 people.

These socio-economic realities are not cited to argue causation or, less, justification, but they are also no coincidence. As Northern Ireland seeks to step back from an all too familiar boundary between fragile peace and violent conflict, our political leaders would maybe do well to focus less on blaming one another for the ‘troubles’ of our past and instead work to improve the wellbeing of those young people still suffering under its legacy.

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