'The Irish Question' ('Ирландский вопрос') . Реферат. Политология.
👉🏻👉🏻👉🏻 ВСЯ ИНФОРМАЦИЯ ДОСТУПНА ЗДЕСЬ ЖМИТЕ 👈🏻👈🏻👈🏻
Вы можете узнать стоимость помощи в написании студенческой работы.
Помощь в написании работы, которую точно примут!
Похожие работы на - 'The Irish Question' ('Ирландский вопрос')
Скачать Скачать документ
Информация о работе Информация о работе
Скачать Скачать документ
Информация о работе Информация о работе
Скачать Скачать документ
Информация о работе Информация о работе
Скачать Скачать документ
Информация о работе Информация о работе
Скачать Скачать документ
Информация о работе Информация о работе
Нужна качественная работа без плагиата?
Не нашел материал для своей работы?
Поможем написать качественную работу Без плагиата!
Moscow 1998
07.05.98
The Irish Question
Moscow State Pedagogical University
Snigir
Aleksei
1. The position of
Northern Ireland within the United Kingdom
2. British policy towards
Northern Ireland
3. Theories of political violence in the Northern
Ireland conflict
The
inhabitants of Ireland are mainly Celtic by origin, and the majority never
accepted the Reformation. In 1801 a new law added Ireland to the United
Kingdom. By this time much of the land belonged to Protestant English
landlords, and the Act of Union followed the period in which rebellions
peasants were brutally suppressed. But in the six Northern Counties the
Protestants were not a dominant minority: they were the majority of the
population. Most of them were descendants of Scottish and English settlers who
had moved into Ireland several generations before. They considered themselves
to be Irish but remained as a distinct community, and there was not much
intermarriage. There had been conflicts and battles between the two
communities, still remembered along with their heroes and martyrs.
In
1912, when the liberals were in power, with the support of the main group of
Irish MPs (for Ireland had seats in the UK parliament). The House of Commons
passed a Home Rule Bill, but the House of Lords delayed it. It was bitterly
opposed by the Protestant majority of the people in the six northern counties
and by the M Ps they had elected. They did not want to be included in a
self-governing Ireland dominated by
Catholics.
Eventually,
the island was partitioned. In 1922 the greater part became an independent
state, and (in 1949) a republic outside the Commonwealth. Its laws, on divorce
and other matters, reflect the influence of the Catholic Church. The six
northern counties remained within the United Kingdom, with seats in Prime
Minister and government responsible for internal affairs. In the politics of
Northern Ireland the main factor has always been the hostility between
Protestants and Catholics
Until
1972 the Northern Irish Parliament (called Stormont) always had a Protestant
majority. By 1960s Catholics produced serious riots. The police were mainly
Protestants. They used their guns. Several people were killed. The UK Labour
government of the time had sympathy with the Catholics grievances. The
Protestant parties regularly supported the Conservatives, while some MPs
elected for Catholic parties took little or no part in the work of the
Parliament.
In
1969 the UK Labour Government sent troops to Northern Ireland, with others to
help impartially to keep order. But to most Catholics UK troops have become
identified with the Union of Northern Ireland with the UK. Many Catholics
don’t like the idea of the division of the island, but recognize that the union
of the North with the Republic could only be imposed against the wishes of the
majority in the North, and would probably lead to a civil war. Less moderate
Catholics have some sympathy with their own extremists, the Irish Republican
Army [IRA], who are prepared to use any means, including violence, in support
of the demand to be united with the Republic of Ireland.
In
1969-72 the UK governments, first Labour, then Conservative, tried to persuade
the Protestant politicians to agree to changes which might be acceptable to the
Catholics, but made little progress. In 1972 the UK government decided that
the independent regime could not solve its problems, and put an end to it.
Since then the internal administration has been run under the responsibility of
the UK cabinet. In political terms this decision of Mr. Heath’s government was
an act of self- sacrifice. Until 1972 the Irish [Protestant] Unionist MPs had
regularly supported the Conservative in the UK Parliament, but since then they
have become an independent group not linked to any UK party. Most of them,
like the Northern Irish Catholic MPs, have taken little part in UK affair
except those involving Northern Ireland.
From
1972 onwards successive UK governments have tried to find a « political
solution» to the Northern Irish problems, that is, a solution acceptable to
most Catholics and most Protestants. Several devices have been tried with
little or no success. Protestant politicians are elected on programs, which
involve refusal to accept compromise.
Meanwhile,
the IRA continues its terrorist campaign. It receives both moral and financial
support from some descendants of Irish people who emigrated to the US. Although
so many innocent victims have been killed, many of them by chance or through
mistakes, it does not seem likely that any different British government policy
would have succeed in preventing the violence that goes on.
Northern
Ireland’s economy, based partly on farming, party on the heavy industries of
Belfast, has brought its people to a standard of living well above that of the
Republic, but lower than Great Britain’s. With the decline of shipbuilding
there is no serious unemployment, and vast seems have been spent by UK
governments in attempts to improve the situation.
The
links between Northern Ireland and Britain were close and of long standing, for
Britain’s involvement with Ireland is dated from the 12th century. Ireland had
been ruled directly from Westminster since 1800 under the Act of Union, and the
Irish economy was intimately bound up with that of the rest of the United
Kingdom. Moreover, when Britain abandoned the union after the First World War,
it bestowed wide self- government on Only part of Ireland, the twenty- six
county Irish Free State. The remaining six counties of Northern Ireland were
given a regional parliament and government with limited powers and remained an
integral part of the United Kingdom. But there was no political consensus to
the nature of the state to be established. Northern Ireland was riddled with
ethnic and regional divisions, and to crow all, in 1920s and 1930s its economy
was hardly healthy with its inefficient agriculture and ailing industries. In
fact, Britain was faced with a problem of establishing a regime, which would be
self- supporting and would survive manifold divisions. But Britain failed to
find adequate solution to this problem, and all its attempts brought to a
bloody end.
Britain
determined both the boundaries and the form of government in the 1920 Coverment
of Ireland Act. The controversial six counties included a large Catholic
minority, some one- third of the population within Northern Ireland, including
some predominantly Catholic areas on the borders with the Irish Free State.
The form of government was modelled on Westminster and a subordinate regional
government and parliament were given restricted financial powers but almost
unlimited powers over such vital matters of community interest and potential
conflict as education, local government, law and order. The 1920 settlement
gave the two- thirds Protestant and Unionist majority a virtual free hand and
ended in anarchy and the fall of Stormont in 1972. From the beginning the
British government was anxious that the Catholic minority in Northern Ireland
should accept the legitimacy of the new creation and to that end Westminster
did urge the government of Northern Ireland to adopt a friendlier and more
accommodating attitude towards the minority, particularly in respect of law
enforcement, local government and education. Nevertheless, in the last
analysis, it refused to exercise its sovereignty to block such divisive
measures as the abolition of proportional representation in local government
elections or to counteract sectarian tendencies in education and law
enforcement. The reason that Westminster did not do so was that any firm stand
would have meant the resignation of the unionist government and, in view of its
in built majority, its immediate return to office. Such an eventuality would
have presented alternatives: a humiliating climb down or the resumption of
direct responsibility for the government of the six counties -- the very thing
that the 1920 government of Ireland act had been designed to avoid. As far as
Westminster was concerned, minority rights in Northern Ireland had to be
subordinate to the broader interests of the United Kingdom and British Empire.
There
have been various attempts to sympathize the range of theories which have been
put forward to explain the Northern Ireland conflict and to relate these two
practical remedies and solutions to the problem. The diversity of the theories
which have been put forward have necessarily limited attempts to test them
concisely using empirical data. For example, aside from the theories such as
religion and class which have been most widely canvassed, explanations as
diverse as Freudian social psychology and caste have been put forward. Clearly
it is impossible to attempt to test all these theories using survey data, and
for the purposes of this analysis, only the major theories are examined. There
is a fundamental dichotomy in these theories between those, which are economic
in nature and non-economic. Each has particular implications for the future and
for the possibility of solving the conflict. From the economic interpretation
it logically follows that the conflict is essentially bargainable, and that a
change in socioeconomic conditions will after the intensity of the conflict.
Better living conditions, more jobs and material affluence will make people less
interested in an atomistic conflict centering on religion. By contrast, most
non-economic theories imply that it is a non-bargainable, zero- sum conflict:
the gains of one side will always be proportional to the losses of the other.
These theories are summarized in the words: « the problem is that there is no
solution». The Irish, according to popular account are an intensely
historically minded people. Present day problems they explain by what seems to
others an unnecessary long and involved recital of event so distant as to shade
into the gloom of prehistory. History indeed lies at the basis as to shade
into propagandist issue of contemporary Ireland: one nation or to? To many
radicals, this issue is already an archaism in a world increasingly dominated
by transnational capitalism. They prefer to substitute an analysis of «
divided class» for an outdated propagandist device adopted to split the
workers. The idea of « two nations» occupying the same territory has a long
provenance throughout the world.
Catholics
tend to have lower status jobs than Protestants but once we take differences in
family backgrounds and education into account the disadvantage disappears.
There is no evidence of occupational discrimination. In terms of the financial
returns of work, Catholics receive a lower wage than Protestants, and this
persists even after family background, education and occupation are held
constant. There are a variety of explanations, which could account for this
pattern, none of which, unfortunately, can be tested by the data to hand.
Protestants tend to predominate in well paid, capital intensive industries,
such as engineering and shipbuilding, while Catholics are concentrated in more
marginal and competitive industries, such as building and contrasting, with
generally lower wage rates. Consequently, it is possible for a Protestant to
receive a high wage for performing the same task as a Catholic working in
another industry. Since most of these capital-intensive industries are more
extensively unionized than their counter parts, it could be argued that
Protestant bargaining power, and hence wage levels, are greater than similar
non-unionized Catholic workers. Finally, these differences in incomes could be
interpreted as the direct result of religious discrimination against Catholics,
with Catholics simply being paid less than Protestants in the same jobs.
There
is, therefore, not much of an economic basis for the Ulster conflict—actual
differences between the two communities can be explained by family background
and inherited privilege. There remains, however, the possibility that it is
less the objective economic differences that cause the conflict than individual
subjective perceptions of those differences.
It
is often argued that economic deprivation is a major cause of violence, rioting
with Catholics feeling economically deprived compared to Protestants, becoming
frustrated, and venting their frustration through aggression: much of the
British government’s policy for Northern Ireland has focused on alleviating the
economic deprivation of the Catholic minority. But in fact, socioeconomic
considerations have little to do with rioting either for the population as a
whole, or among Catholics and Protestants considered separately. The combined
effect of all socioeconomic variables, is a negligible. Only one of the five
socioeconomic variables has a statistically significant effect. Unemployment
has no significant effect, in spite of the prominent role it plays in official
thinking.
On
this evidence, it seems unlikely that economic changes will reduce conflict in
Northern Ireland. It is, however, possible that economic improvements for the
Catholic community would effect the climate of opinion among Catholics as a
whole, and hence reduce conflict.
Religion
by itself does not have much to do with rioting. Catholics, in particular, are
not significantly more likely than Protestants to riot. The recent troubles
may have been presaged by Catholic civil rights activity in 1968 and 1969,
which led to violence, but in 1973 the violence had escalated and spread to
both communities more or less equally. Nor do religious beliefs have any
significant effect; the devout are neither more nor less likely to riot then
their less devout compatriots. In this, as in other ways, the conflict is not
one of religious belief.
Finally,
political views about the origins of the conflict are important for Catholics
but not as much for Protestants. Let us examine Catholics, beginning with the
comparison of two groups: those who think Catholics are entirely to blame for
the troubles and those who think no blame at all attaches to Catholics. The
first group is some 18 percent less likely to riot than is the second group.
So for Catholics, rioting seems to have strong instrumental overtones in that
those who have well defined views that attribute blame to Protestants are much
more likely to riot. Their riots, like many block riots in the United States,
are in part a means of seeking address for grievances. But for Protestants the
interpretation placed on the conflict is much less important. Those who think
Protestants themselves are entirely to blame are only 9 percent less likely to
riot then are those who think Catholics are entirely to blame. Protestant
rioting thus seems to be more reactive in the sense that its stems not so much
from a coherent view about their aims, or their adversaries’ aims, or the
nature of the conflict, as it does from other sources, notably reaction to
Catholic violence.
Inhabitant
житель
Majority
большинство
Rebellion
восстание
Peasant
крестьянин
Suppress
запрещать, подавлять
Minority
меньшинство
Descendant
потомок
Martyr
мученик
Partition
расчленять
Internal
внутренний
Hostility
враждебность
Riot бунт ,беспорядки
Grievance жалоба , обида
Impartially беспристрастно
Regime режим
Campaign кампания
Intimate объявлять , хорошо
знакомый
Bound граничить
Bestow давать, дарить,
помещать
Riddled изрешеченный
Controversial спорный
Subordinate подчиненный
Urge убеждать, побуждение
Enforcement давление, принудительный
Sovereignty суверенитет, Верховная власть
Abolition отмена, уничтожение
Counteract
sectarian tendencies
нейтрализовать сектантские наклонности
Resignation смирение, отставка
Humiliating унизительный
Resumption возобновление
Diversity различие, разнообразие
Empirical эмпирический
Canvass обсуждать,
собирать(голоса)
Diverse
разный
,иной
Caste каста
Survey изучаемый,
рассматриваемый
Dichotomy деление класса на 2
противопоставляемых подкласса,
Bargainable выгодный
Gloom мрак , уныние
Contemporary современный
Device устройство, средство,
план, девиз
Wage зарплата
Hence с этих пор,
следовательно
Income доход
Inherited наследованный
Deprived лишенный
Frustration расстройство(планов),
крушение(надежд)
Alleviating смягчающий, облегчающий
Negligible незначительный
Recent новый, свежий,
современный
Presaged предсказанный
Devout искренний, набожный
Compatriots соотечественник
Coherent понятный,
последовательность
Adversary противник, враг
1.
Richard Kearney. The Irish Mind.
Exploring Intellectual Traditions. Dublin 1985
2.
Harold Orel. Irish History and
Culture. Aspects of a people’s heritage. Dublin 1979
3.
Jonah Alexander, Alan O’Day. Ireland’s
Terrorist Dilemma. Dordrecht 1986
4.
T.M. Devine, David Dickson. Ireland
and Scotland .Edinburgh 1983
5.
Peter Bromhead. Life in Modern Britain
.Longman Group UK Limited, 1992
Реферат. Политология.
Муниципальные Стандарты Социального Обеспечения Курсовая Работа
Реферат: Парниковый эффект - глобальная экологическая проблема
Всероссийское Сочинение 5 Класс
Описание Насти Ивлевой Сочинение
Сочинение Рассуждение На Тему Художественные Особенности Басен
Контрольная работа: Политические традиции в России
Контрольная работа №3
Реферат: Бронзовка мраморная
Реферат по теме Классификация, экспертиза и сертификация игрушек
Реферат Перевозка Детей
Реферат по теме Финансы коммерческих организаций и предприятий
Доклад по теме Doors
Контрольная Работа Теория Вероятности 9 Класс
Реферат: Определение концентрации атомов в газе методом атомно абсорбционной спектроскопии
Курсовая работа по теме Дегазация вооружения и военной техники
Дипломная Работа Борщи
Контрольная работа по теме Современные типы политических партий
Курсовая работа по теме Проект информатизации управления фирмой
Реферат: Правовой режим земель лесного фонда
Реферат: Методы работы с рисками в социальных программах
Похожие работы на - Виникнення та розвиток Ольвії і Херсонесу
Статья: К точке отсчета... или Большие проблемы точного определения возраста в геохронологии и дендрохронологии
Сочинение: Пушкин а. с. - Тема поэта и поэзии в творчестве а. с. пушкина.