Background
to the Research
- This
research programme was established to: "assess the impact of inter-cultural
and inter-community thinking on community relations training provision
over the last ten years (1986-95) through a sample of people's experiences
on courses and their used of training subsequently".
- The proposal
was made in response to published Research Aims and Objectives by the
CCRU in 1994, which invited research which "will enable policy
makers, community relations practitioners, academics and the general
public achieve a better understanding of aspects of community relations.
Research
Approach
- A postal
survey of over 2006 organisations and groups across Northern Ireland
responsible for training adults aged 17+ was carried out. The main aim
of the questionnaire was to find out whether education and training
providers in Northern Ireland dealt explicitly with the region's social
and political divisions.
- Following
analysis of the questionnaire data, twelve different 'cultures of learning'
within which training takes place were identified and analysed for their
strengths and weaknesses.
- In-depth
interviews were also undertaken with organisations in two District Council
areas. One area was in the east of the province and one in the west;
one predominantly Protestant in population, the other predominantly
Catholic. Furthermore, one area was urban/suburban in character and
the other overwhelmingly rural.
Main
Findings
Public
Policy
- There
is an absence of a coherent definition of community relations in Northern
Ireland. The term is widely used and poorly understood. For this reason,
the goals of community relations were broken down into three broad headings
- equity, diversity and interdependence. The successful completion of
these goals must lie at the heart of a policy framework for the divided
communities that make up Northern Irish society.
- The local
studies confirm the largely unchallenged willingness of public bodies
to deliver equitable services along traditional sectarian lines. This
inevitably results in the embedding of these divisions in a modern institutional
form.
Structures
and Training
- The successful
development of a culture which supports equity, diversity and interdependence
requires action to be taken at three levels: policy-making, structural
and procedural, and new forms of training and learning. While there
has been some advance in the area of broad policy-making and some community
groups have developed useful models around training and learning, the
structures and procedures of vital institutions and organisations in
civil society such as government, business, culture and media have overwhelmingly
relied on denial or exclusion in coping with the strains of division
in Northern Ireland.
- Having
divided those providing training and learning in Northern Ireland into
fifteen different sectors for the survey, it was found that less than
40% of education and training groups in Northern Ireland in all sectors
provide any training whatsoever which deals explicitly with equity or
the political divisions and their impact. Among the 40% who do provide
some training, the approach was usually minimal and often focused on
the legislative framework. What explicit attempts to address division
that there are stem largely from the 1980s or thereafter.
- It is
apparent that there is a great deal of community relations training
and work which fails to address the main issues at stake. At the centre
of good community relations work must be the explicit search for practical
ways of working in a society where there are fundamental disagreements
about the nature of the state, equity and law.
- What
training there is, is usually short in length and relatively infrequent.
Only in the youth sector were long training and learning events popular.
The numbers participating in training events in this area also tend
to be small - less than 100 per year per training body.
- Practical
obstacles rather than principled objections were the main reasons cited
in the survey for the absence of training in so many areas, particularly
the absence of financial back-up and suitable trainers and the relative
lack of priority given to this kind of learning and training.
Findings
Relevant to Specific Sectors
- Those
groups that are addressing equity, diversity and interdependence are
still primarily based in the community, voluntary and youth sectors.
Relationship building was the main focus of training in the non-formal
sectors.
- Training
in how to deal with the discussion of controversial matters was not
widespread, and most groups deal with division by trying to distance
themselves from it, in spite of the impact.
- A great
deal of community relations work fails to address the central issue
of how Catholics and Protestants can inter-relate in a society over
which they are fundamentally divided.
- Community
Relations is still seen by business, management and many public services
as the responsibility mainly of young people and community groups. There
is very little evidence that either the public or private sector of
the economy had developed a systematic response to living with division
regarding it as, at best, an irrelevance and, at worst, something to
be ignored for as long as possible.
- The business
sector, with some notable exceptions, has traditionally remained apart
from social and political upheavals in Northern Ireland and has preferred
to steer a middle course and not upset any side. The outcome has been
the lack of any clear thinking, even in business schools, regarding
the private sector's contribution to peace and stability. Training in
the private sector of the economy depends on the size of the firm; small
firms provide next to no training in any area in these themes.
- Training
in the public sector dealing with community divisions is strongest in
local government, probably as a direct result of CROs. Nonetheless,
this does not mean that even Local Government regards this training
as part of the mainstream of its staff training programme.
- The Peace
and Reconciliation Partnerships have implicitly put additional momentum
behind the issues of equity, diversity and inter-dependence. However
the involvement of CR's in the Partnerships and the influence they have
is a matter of personalities rather than policy. This is typical of
the lack of seriousness applied to the issue by public planners and
bureaucracy.
- Connections
between community relations programmes and the peace and reconciliation
strategy are a matter of ad hoc personal relationships rather than any
coherent planning.
- Possibilities
of addressing the impact of community divisions are particularly short
in the 'core cultural' areas of Northern Irish life such as sporting
bodies, the media and in cultural or arts groups. There was virtually
no capacity to deal openly with the impact of division in these bodies.
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