Sectarianism remains deeply ingrained in North because our politics fuels it

Like clockwork, the annual eleventh and Twelfth celebrations in Northern Ireland were marred by sectarianism. Bonfires were adorned with non-unionist political posters, Irish flags, and sectarian signs reading “Kill All Taigs” and “All Taigs are Targets”. Just as this cycle repeats itself, so too does the cycle of obligatory condemnation from those within the wider community forced to endure these annual acts of normalised hate.

Like the cloud of ash and smoke July inevitably brings, the problem with sectarianism in Northern Ireland hangs over the region far longer than two summer days each year; it is deeply rooted and institutionalised across education, housing, policing, and employment — mainstreamed by political parties, and platformed by the media. To tackle sectarianism, we need more than just leadership — we need legislation.

The Good Friday Agreement included several commitments to challenge the sectarian structures that Northern Ireland was built upon. They included the “right to freedom from sectarian harassment”, “the right to freely choose one’s place of residence”, and “the right to freedom and expression of religion”.

There have been decades of stasis in implementing shared housing schemes, removing peace walls, expanding integrated education, and instituting policing reforms

And yet, nearly a quarter of a century on, children continue to be born, raised, and reared under their parents’ and grandparents’ long-outdated generational norms. Such is the level of failure to tackle sectarianism in all its forms that we have yet to define sectarianism as a stand-alone hate crime aggravator in law.

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At present there is no legal definition of sectarianism in Northern Ireland; current incitement to hatred legislation does cover forms of sectarian incitement but does not use the word, instead it uses other markers such as nationality, religion, and other indicators of ethnicity. This ad hoc approach allows sectarianism to fall outside the scope of anti-discrimination and human rights standards.

Burning effigies overshadow Loyalism's "funday"

Listen | 23:52

At Eleventh Night bonfires and 12th of July parades, the experience hits very differently depending on your background. Northern correspondent Seanín Graham reports on events she witnessed and people she spoke to, and how the burning of effigies of female politicians has overshadowed the events and drawn criticism from all sides of the political spectrum.Plus: Much of the fight to define the meaning of Loyalist events now takes place online, in shared videos, memes and posts, explains Paul Reilly, a researcher at the University of Glasgow who has looked at the role of social media in sectarian conflict in Northern Ireland.

In its most recent report on the UK’s compliance with treaty-based obligations on minority rights, the Council of Europe once again called for sectarianism to be defined in legislation. To date, neither the Executive Office nor Department of Justice have sought to take forward this recommendation from international experts.

The structural changes required to break the cycle of sectarianism simply are not being put in place. There have been decades of stasis in implementing shared housing schemes, removing peace walls, expanding integrated education, and instituting policing reforms. The Together: Building a United Community strategy to remove all peace-walls by 2023 will be massively overshot, the Patten report aspiration of a 50-50 police force has been frozen at 30 per cent for a decade, and education remains 93 per cent segregated.

How our politics operates is inherently sectarian, it remains steeped in segregation — us vs them, nationalist vs unionist, a perpetual culture war

What persists in Northern Ireland is not the vision of the Good Friday Agreement but a large-scale failure to adequately combat the structures and practices in place which perpetuate segregation and sectarianism.

In the past fortnight alone, sectarian incidents included: a family in East Belfast being violently forced from their home, paramilitary flags being placed outside a catholic church in County Antrim, and a 13-year-old boy hospitalised after a violent sectarian attack in East Belfast.

What’s just as concerning is the political response to sectarian incidents. According to the DUP the removal of loyalist bunting from a field in Tyrone is a “hate crime”, but the party is silent on the burning of Irish flags or the posting of sectarian slogans targeting the “other” community.

Read more

• The Twelfth of July: ‘A day in for Catholics, a day out for Protestants’
• Dublin must choose between good relations with unionism or NI protocol, senior Orangeman says
• PSNI investigating after effigies of female politicians hung from loyalist bonfires

Sectarianism remains so deeply ingrained in Northern Irish society because our politics fuels and facilitates it. One need only look to the decisions made by ministers within the Department of Education and the Department of Communities to witness the ugly head of sectarian decision-making. This is further borne out in wider areas of decision-making and funding allocation including infrastructure, where efforts to address the sectarianism-fuelled decisions which cut off entire counties from rail infrastructure and remove educational opportunities have been met by continued political blockages.

How our politics operates is inherently sectarian, it remains steeped in segregation — us vs them, nationalist vs unionist, a perpetual culture war that is formalised and normalised through everyday institutional structures. As demographics continue to shift, serious conversations need to be had over whether the powersharing structures of the Stormont Assembly are designed to facilitate powersharing — or to perpetuate segregation.

As we gear up for the 25th anniversary of the Good Friday Agreement, we need a period of hard reflection over how little progress has been made in challenging sectarianism in all its forms, There needs to be a wider conversation over the role of the media and politics in mainstreaming sectarian attitudes — should it be deemed acceptable for an elected politician to declare on-air that Irish citizens in NI should leave their home and go across the border if they want to be Irish? Or for the mocking and denigration of Irish language to be allowed on national TV and the assembly and other political chambers?

That this kind of casual sectarianism has become normalised for yet another generation in Northern Ireland is a political failure on a grand scale. Yes, we need to talk about bonfires, but the conversation can’t stop there.