If the proposals for change to the RUC which, this newspaper revealed late last year, were being considered by the Patten Commission raised unionist ire, some of the suggestions in this new book by Brendan O'Leary and John McGarry are likely to cause apoplexy.
The two professors, noted commentators on politics and ethnic conflict, point out that at the very least the force needs a name change - most probably the Northern Ireland Police Service - and that this, to appeal to nationalists, should have the accompanying title, in Irish, of Seirbhis Phoilios Thuaisceart Eireann. The suggestion is, in fact, a serious one as the RUC has a very distinct credibility problem among nationalists. This book was written before the murder of the Armagh solicitor, Ms Rosemary Nelson, who had, on a number of occasions, complained of harassment and threats from members of the force. Her death greatly increased the pressure for reform of the force to the point that it has handed responsibility for the investigation of her murder to officers from outside Northern Ireland as well as calling in the FBI.
Nelson's murder may have been a turning point for the RUC, so this book could be said to come at a crucial point. The fact that the Patten Commission report has been put back to the autumn, when the marching season is out of the way, is being seen by some as an indication that its recommendations will be far-reaching and unattractive to unionists.
The book addresses, at the outset, the sets of relations between the RUC and the divided communities it polices. Unionists, the authors point out, regard the force with its "royal" and "Ulster" titles in the light of its Ulster Unionist creators who devised it as a paramilitary force, supported by the "B" Specials, to defend the Union with Great Britain. Within a couple of years of its creation it had lost almost all of the Catholic Royal Irish Constabulary (RIC) members and settled into its role as an almost entirely Protestant force under the control of a Ulster Unionist hegemony. It was never accepted by the majority of Catholics. One of the most glaring aspects of the RUC's political affiliations is the fact that until last year the Union flag was flown from RUC stations during the Twelfth of July. It is still flown on public holidays and occasions like the Queen's birthday, even in entirely Catholic and strongly republican areas. Unionists, on the other hand, remain proud of the force's "Ulster" and "royal" connotations, the flag flying and pictures of Her Majesty in station foyers. The relationships between the two communities and the RUC reflect the divisions and diverging aspirations in the North. The Belfast Agreement has been devised to lessen the impact of division on life in the North and the changing of the RUC is central to this. As the authors point out, to be effective, police forces must be acceptable to the communities they serve. It is the absence of this acceptance in the nationalist community which allowed the Provisional IRA to survive and prosper in working-class Catholic areas.
O'Leary and McGarry propose the division of the single unitary police RUC into local forces and services with separate functions on different levels - from low-level traffic policing up to community policing - with a central, expert, investigative core. They point out to the opponents of this diversification that most countries have policing services divided into component parts. The United States has a separate Sheriff's force in almost every town and Belgium has 589 formally independent community policing services.
The religious make-up of the new police force should be changed to reflect both the ethnic and sexual nature of the community - more Catholics and women. The book is an excellent exercise, in theoretical terms, on reform of policing in a divided society but lacks a recognition of the successful role of the RUC in preventing all-out civil war in the North. The reality is that while it may be politically unacceptable to Catholics it has, at the very least, stopped the two communities from engaging in Balkans-type activities from which Catholics would almost certainly emerge second best.
Jim Cusack is The Irish Times Security Correspondent and co-author, with Henry McDonald, of the book UVF