The Bloody Sunday Inquiry:Transitional Justice and Postconflict Reconciliation in Northern Ireland

Abstract

Recent research suggests that transitional justice interventions may be essential to advancing post-conflict reconciliation in societies that have been deeply divided by histories of gross human rights abuses. In Northern Ireland, a uniquely 'piecemeal' approach to the past emerged following the Belfast Agreement combining an array of discrete truth-recovery and justice initiatives to address the abuses of the Troubles. One of the most important of these interventions has been the Bloody Sunday Inquiry, which in June 2010, released a Final Report of its findings regarding the controversial shooting deaths of 14 civilians in Derry/Londonderry on January 30th, 1972. This article provides a qualitative assessment of the degree to which the Inquiry has been able to advance crucial aspects of truth and justice for the events of Bloody Sunday and explores how these efforts have contributed to ongoing processes of reconciliation between Catholic/nationalists and Protestant/unionist communities in Northern Ireland.