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Disjunctured narratives: rethinking reconciliation and conflict transformation

Reconciliation has been a notable part of discourses of conflict management and transitional justice in a number of conflictual situations around the world. This article examines the recent emergence of critical theories of reconciliation with particular reference to processes of conflict transformation in Northern Ireland. It evaluates the ways in which conflict transformation in Northern Ireland is specific to that context and the variations in the usage of discourses of reconciliation compared with other ‘post-conflict’ societies. The article highlights critical theories of reconciliation which, although largely supportive of the potential of reconciliation, tend to highlight the arguments and conflicts that notions of reconciliation can generate. By examining the ways in which reconciliation is articulated in Northern Ireland through interviews with representatives of the main political parties, the article contends that narrative approaches are best suited to analysis of the issues in Northern Irish politics. The argument developed here suggests that reconciliation in Northern Ireland is part of a ‘disjunctured synthesis’ whereby the main political parties become locked into narratives of reconciliation based on opposition to the perceived position of the other.