Police and Military in Ulster: Peacekeeping or Peace-Subverting Forces?

In: Journal of peace research, Band 15, Heft 3, S. 243-258

Abstract

The division of labor between a state's military & police force is dictated by fundamental state ideologies & resultant political strategies for creation & maintenance of a particular sociopolitical order. The division of labor consequently must be analyzed historically & concretely. Ulster is the focus for exploring this more general phenomenon. To explain Whitehall's current utilization of police & military, especially its push at present to replace the British Army with the Royal Ulster Constabulary, one must trace the evolution of the British state system as it affected Ulster back to the eighteenth century. What becomes clear is that the ethnic stratification system was the principal determinant of how the central state elites created & continually adjusted military-police relations in Ulster. Out of an analysis of changing police-military-ethnic relations in Ulster one gains a keener appreciation of the extent to which security protected in Northern Ireland is the security of the state. The security of ordinary Ulstermen is only secondary. AA.