Twenty-five years ago, Great Britain and Ireland signed Good Friday Deal, ending decades of bloodshed known as the Troubles. With the stroke of a pen, Northern Ireland has become one of the world’s most ambitious experiments in how to reconcile a deeply divided society.
Even now, remnants of division between Protestant and Catholic Northern Ireland remain: barriers between neighborhoods are known as peace walls; murals with images of Queen Elizabeth II or heroes of the Republic of Ireland; Union Jacks and Irish tricolor flags fluttered from the lampposts.
But more and more, these are monuments. As it celebrates a quarter-century of peace, Northern Ireland is seeking its place as part of both the United Kingdom and the island of Ireland, seeking to transform ancient division a recipe for future prosperity.
At the heart of the Good Friday Agreement is a commitment to maintain a political balance between the unionists, mostly Protestants, who want Northern Ireland to continue to be part of the UK, and nationalists, mostly Catholic, in favor of unification with the Republic of Ireland.
It was a challenge because for the first time, Catholics outnumber Protestants in Northern Ireland. The prospect that this could lead to Irish unification has alarmed unionists, who use holidays and historic anniversaries to assert their religious identity. Nationalists, more confident about their future, celebrate their Irish identity at sporting events.
In the decades since the Troubles subsided, Northern Ireland has become like many Western countries – a secular society in which the younger generation has little time for the sectarian concerns of parents and their grandparents.
Whether in a pub or a concert hall, young Protestants and Catholics tend to mingle easily, united by a desire for friendship and a good time. For them, the Rainbow Pride flag is just as likely to be hung from the ceiling as the flags of Ireland or England.
The barbed-wire fences and border posts that once divided Northern Ireland from Ireland have largely disappeared even before the 1998 agreement. But scars remain, like the so-called peace walls. gracefully winding through Belfast. Some, like the one that separates Catholic Springfield Road from Protestant Springmartin Road, are visible for miles.
Another place that has become a magnet for tourists, who take taxis through it, fantasize about a violent past as residents of Falls Road, Belfast’s Catholic stronghold, and Shankill Road, Tin partners its healing, continue their daily life.
For the core members of Northern Ireland, known as the Loyalists, Brexit is painful, with many desperate that it had created a gap between them and the rest of the UK. They aspire to align themselves with the alliance, glorifying the British monarch in murals or marching in parade honoring Protestant icons like William of Orange.
But the people in the area as loyal as Belfast sand bar, economically depressed and politically isolated, increasingly feel left behind. Many residents live the discontent of post-Brexit life and see little hope of a brighter future.
For Catholics, who had long felt British rule in Northern Ireland was dominated by Protestantism, the future looked brighter. Sinn Fein, the major party of the Irish nationalist faction, became biggest party on the council of the North in last year’s election.
It appealed to voters by emphasizing kitchen concerns such as education and healthcare. For now, these issues are more important to growing Catholic families than a united Ireland.
But the reminders of the bloody past can be jarring. In East Belfast, not far from the shipyard where the destroyed ocean liner Titanic was built, a masked paramilitary gunman glowed from the side of a building.
Victims of violence and their families grapple with the legacy of years of conflict in Northern Ireland. Some campaigns are still for new investigations long ago car bomb or killingthirst for justice in a society eager to move forward.
The Troubled Conflict has spooked foreign investors, leaving Northern Ireland with an eroded economy at a time when Ireland is benefiting from membership in the European Union.
But there is a new optimism in trendy cafes in Belfast and other cities. The unique nature of Northern Ireland’s Post-Brexit Trade Status giving it unlimited access to the UK as well as the vast European single market.
From the breakwater basalt columns of the Giant’s Causeway to the protruding prow of the Titanic museum in Belfast, Northern Ireland is restructuring into a tourist attraction, popular for attractions other than the Troubles.
Artists are turning derelict buildings in Belfast into studios, part of a booming contemporary art scene. In popular culture, Northern Ireland’s second largest city, Derry, has become synonymous with the popular TV series “Derry Girls.”
However, the past has never fully released its grip on Northern Ireland, whether in political murals or dueling flags that tell visitors when they enter an area. loyalist or nationalist population.
The Knockagh Memorial attests to this enduring ambiguity. It was built to honor those who died in World War I, and later both world wars. But World War I has been determined with loyalists and unionists, even though Protestants and Catholics fell together on its battlefields.
