ZERO SUM CONFLICT
CRES 610 - WINTER 2007
M/W 10:00-11:50
Knight 281
Prof. David Frank
dfrank@uoregon.edu
Chapman Tel 6-4198
Prof. Shaul Cohen
scohen@uoregon.edu
Condon 107G Tel 6-4500
Office hours Tuesday and Friday 10:00-11:00
This course will use Northern Ireland as a primary case to focus on social conflict, territorial disputes, and options for moving toward political accommodations. It will operate in a mixed lecture/seminar format, and touch upon a range of issues that reflect the broad impact of zero sum conflicts, including sectarian dynamics in the work place, the family, the educational system, government, popular culture, and "the street." It will explore structural elements that are part of the Catholic-Protestant/Republican-Nationalist-Unionist-Loyalist struggle, as well as the narratives that stem from and contribute to the encompassing dispute. In lecture and discussion we will move among several different scales as we incorporate the experience of the individual, the community, and the nation(s) and attempt to identify strategies that help mitigate or transform the zero sum situation that has characterized much of Northern Ireland for generations.
Requirements:
Regular attendance and participation in discussions is
essential for the success of the course. Reading material should be
prepared in advance of our meetings. You will be graded on a mid-term
examination, an in-class presentation week 8, 9 or 10 of the term, and a
final paper. Each of these will be worth 30% of the grade, with the
remaining portion coming from class participation. You must also learn a
list of terms, people, and places in Northern Ireland in order to allow for
discussion of course issues (look under the Assignments section on Blackboard). We are happy to
accommodate students with special-ed needs, please contact us at the beginning
of the term to make the necessary arrangements.
Readings:
Much of our reading material has been collated on the CAIN
website(Conflict Archive on the INternet) which can be found at
cain.ulster.ac.uk , and has an enormous
collection of original and secondary sources relating to the conflict in
Northern Ireland. You must also read Colin Coulter's Contemporary
Northern Irish Society: An Introduction, and the New York Times
for which you can get a cheap M-F subscription. For an ongoing discussion
of current events in Northern Ireland, plus commentary on various bits and
pieces, you can browse the Slugger
O'Toole blog.
Week 1
Read John Darby's introduction to the conflict on the CAIN website,
http://cain.ulster.ac.uk/events/peace/darby03.htm . Darby is a former
director of INCORE, the center for conflict resolution at the University of
Ulster - Magee in Derry/Londonderry. Also read Cohen and Frank, "Jerusalem and the Riparian Conflict Simile" in
Political Geography 2002 21(6):745-765, a pdf is available through Blackboard.
Two additional articles for you to have read by next week are Coleman and
Fisher-Yoshida, 2004 "Conflict Resolution Across the Lifespan: The
Work of the ICCR," Theory Into Practice 43(1):31-38 and Phillip
Tetlock's 2003 "Thinking the Unthinkable: Sacred Values and Taboo
Cognitions" Trends in Cognitive Sciences 7(7):320-324.
Week 2
Begin reading Coulter, Introduction and Chapter 1 "The Nature of Division:
Ethnicity, Nationalism and Sectarianism."
Week 3
Continue with Coulter Chapter 2 "The Significance of Social Class."
Read also Claire Mitchell's 2003 "Protestant Identification and Political Change
in Northern Ireland," Ethnic and Racial Studies 26(4):612-631, and
her 2005 piece "Catholicism and the Construction of Communal Identity in
Northern Ireland" in Irish Journal of Sociology 14(1):110-130, both
available as pdfs in Blackboard.
Week 4
Terms Test on Monday! Coulter Chapter 3 "The Status and Position of Women."
Week 5
Coulter Chapter 4 "Official Representations of the Conflict in
Northern Ireland: The British State and the Media." Also read
Peter Shirlow's 2003 "Ethno-sectarianism and the Reproduction of Fear in
Belfast" in Capital and Class #80:77-93, pdf in Blackboard
Week 6
Coulter Chapter 5 "Alternative Representations of the Conflict in
Northern Ireland: Republican and Loyalist Murals." Read also
Graham and Nash 2006 "A Shared Future: Territoriality, Pluralism, and
Public Policy in Northern Ireland," Political Geography 25:253-278,
available on Blackboard.
Week 7
Coulter Conclusion "Good Times for a Change?" Read also Fealty
et al.'s 2003 A Long Peace: The Future of Unionism in Northern Ireland
available on Blackboard (and not nearly as long as it looks!)
Week 8
Monday - Presentations
Week 9
Monday - Presentations
Week 10
Monday - Presentations