Postgraduate Researchers

PhD Research Student - Social Sciences, Law & Education

Project title: ‘Communities in Security: Minority experiences of ‘everyday security’ on the island of Ireland.’ 

Project abstract: 

In the aftermath of the Troubles, Northern Ireland (NI) witnessed a transition to a more stable form of civil security, contrasting the country’s history of militarism and paramilitarism. How security is produced and what actors are involved in its production is now a largely plural affair involving formal (statutory) and informal (civil) structures. However, whilst central to the transition to a post-conflict order, policing and security governance remain contentious. This is in spite of the policing partnership structures and oversight structures (such as the policing ombudsman) established in the wake of the Good Friday Agreement (1998), and subsequent St Andrew’s Agreement (2006) that paved the way for policing board participation (2007). Thus far, studies capturing this transition in security governance have focused on the two main lines of societal division and centred on the contributions of CNR (Catholic, Nationalist, Republican) and PUL (Protestant, Unionist, Loyalist) communities, as well as focusing on the formal/state structures. In response to a research gap, this project explores the position of a range of ethnic-racial minority identities outside the principal communities that make up the majority population; it examines experiences of ‘everyday security’ [policing and safety beyond state structures], focusing on how these experiences compare to the ‘majority’ population; and how ethnic-racial minority identities organise/navigate informal security within civil society. 

The research adopts a working hypothesis that informal actors are key to security creation/provision in contested societies, and critically, that minority groups experience ‘everyday security’ differently than the ‘majority’ population. In this context, ‘everyday security’ includes the multi-dimensional models of practice, engagement with, and in/direct production of security and is examined through the lens of individual and group lived experiences. Critically, this project provides previously uncaptured data relating to individuals and groups with minority identities.

Supervisors:  Dr. Matt Bowden (TU Dublin), Dr. Amanda Kramer (QUB), Dr. Allely Albert (QUB) 

Funder: North South Research Programme (NSRP)

Orchid Profile: 0009-0008-4007-0536