History in the thought of the architects of peace in Northern Ireland: Gerry Adams, John Hume, and David Trimble.
View/ Open
Dolan2016.docx (290.4Kb)
Dolan2016.pdf (1.489Mb)
Date
23/11/2016Item status
Restricted AccessEmbargo end date
31/12/2100Author
Dolan, Thomas Pierce
Metadata
Abstract
This thesis explores the historical imaginations exhibited by the key political architects
of the Northern Ireland Peace Process: Gerry Adams, John Hume and David Trimble. It
compares and contrasts ways in which each has engaged the ideological resource of
history throughout their respective biographies, exploring the various visions of history,
both Irish and otherwise, that have intrigued them, and the environments and experiences
that moulded their view of the past. Exploiting a wide range of archival sources, along
with original interviews and conversations with the ‘peacemakers’ themselves, it
considers how Adams, Hume and Trimble learnt about history; how they subsequently
imagined and wrote about it, and how they ultimately applied it within their influential
political thinking. It is a study of the relationship between historical and political
imagination, delivering fresh and revealing intellectual profiles of the ‘peacemakers’.
Significantly, it demonstrates how ideas and visions of history, commonly perceived as
somehow to blame for conflict in Northern Ireland, were put to positive use by Adams,
Hume and Trimble. It therefore considers how visions of history contributed to the
ideological evolution of peace and political stability on the island.