Introduction

On Good Friday 1998 most of the main parties to Northern Ireland's violent conflict reached a major peace agreement. The accord involved significant constitutional, administrative and security reforms. In addition to a power-sharing devolved Assembly for Northern Ireland and many other provisions, the Good Friday Agreement also provided for the establishment of a Civic Forum:

The Civic Forum met twelve times in 2000–02 but was not invited to meet again after a collapse of the devolved institutions. It was conveniently forgotten about and kicked into the long grass. In any event, it was largely made up of appointees of the main political parties. The story (or non story) of the Civic Forum is indicative of a wider issue found in many peace processes: the locking out of citizenry from the political process. In many cases, this process of locking out occurs simultaneously with an elite political narrative that refers to popular input and the public endorsement of any peace accord. Crucially, and in some very rare cases, citizens have realised that they have been effectively locked out of political and peace processes and seek ways of being heard and shaping an evolving political dispensation.

Using Northern Ireland as an example, this chapter seeks to unpack the tensions between formal processes of peacemaking and peace consolidation conducted by governments, political parties and much of civil society, and processes of peace formation that connected more readily with popular mood, needs and aspirations. What emerges is a story of several peace processes that were able to overlap at times but often did not. The unpacking of the Northern Ireland peace process is informed by a power analysis or a concern to ask the question: where did power lie?