Transforming Conflict in Northern Ireland and the Border Counties: Some Lessons from the Peace Programmes on Valuing Participative Democracy

Many of the proposed solutions to the Northern Ireland conflict failed partly because of over-concentration on the political through 'Track I' actors. So once a political agreement was reached, the conflict was viewed as having been 'solved', rather than opening the door to a whole new process. The Peace I and Peace II Programmes in Northern Ireland and the Border Counties in the Republic of Ireland have taken the opposite approach. By concentrating on the involvement of 'Track III' actors through social and economic development they have highlighted the equal value of grassroots participatory democracy to top-level representative democracy. This article examines the significance of this aspect of the work of the Peace programmes as a key post-conflict transformation tool since 1995 as the third phase of the programme Peace III comes on stream.