Category: Event

Seminar: UK Combat Impunity

The third seminar in the Dealing with the Past series entitled “Is the UK heading towards combat impunity?” was hosted online on 5 June 2020, with some 65 people joining online.

In the seminar Dr Thomas Hansen, Lecturer in Law and member of the Transitional Justice Institute at Ulster University, focused on a number of initiatives and measures aimed at protecting military service personnel from investigation and prosecution currently being considered by the UK, including a Statute of Limitations, derogating from the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) in future armed conflicts; amending the Human Rights Act, and restricting UK courts’ ability to adjudicate civil claims originating from conflicts abroad.

Dr Hansen argued that these measures, if implemented, are problematic from a human rights and rule of perspective and undermines the UK’s role as a strong defender of human rights in the global arena and a champion of the international rule of law.

The seminar is part of the Transitional Justice Institute (TJI) and INCORE, in partnership with Healing Through Remembering and the John Hume and Thomas P. O’Neill Chair in Peace, online seminar series. The seminar was chaired by Professor Brandon Hamber. The seminar can now be watched online.

Seminar: Trauma-Informed Approach

The second seminar in the Dealing with the Past series was hosted online on 18 May 2020, with some 250 people joining online.

The seminar was entitled “The need for a trauma-informed approach to address the conflict’s legacy” and was delivered by Professor Siobhan O’Neill on 18 May 2020. In this seminar Professor O’Neill presents the evidence on the transgenerational impact of trauma, and highlights the importance of a “trauma-informed” approach to addressing the conflict’s legacy to protect the population from further harm.

The seminar is part of the Transitional Justice Institute (TJI) and INCORE, in partnership with Healing Through Remembering and the John Hume and Thomas P. O’Neill Chair in Peace, online seminar series. The seminar was chaired by Professor Brandon Hamber.

Seminar: Breaking Binary History

The first of the “Dealing with the Past in Northern Ireland” seminar series is now available online. The seminar was entitled “Breaking Binary History: Can the Stormont House Agreement facilitate a broader and more representative understanding of the past?”” by Dr Adrian Grant on 7 May 2020.

The seminar is part of the Transitional Justice Institute (TJI) and INCORE, in partnership with Healing Through Remembering and the John Hume and Thomas P. O’Neill Chair in Peace, online seminar series. The seminar was chaired by Professor Brandon Hamber.

Dealing with Past: Online Seminars

Despite the challenging current context debates about how to address Northern Ireland’s past continue. The Transitional Justice Institute (TJI) and INCORE, in partnership with Healing Through Remembering and the John Hume and Thomas P. O’Neill Chair in Peace, will be hosting an online seminar series to debate these important issues. This online seminar series will explore the Stormont House Agreement and dealing with the past in Northern Ireland and run for the remainder of the year.

Find out more and review the schedule of seminars.

Masculinities & UN WPS Agenda

The WPS agenda, as defined by the UN Security Council, has latterly addressed itself more directly to the question of ‘engaging men and boys’.

Professor Brandon Hamber, the John Hume and Thomas P. O’Neill Chair in Peace, reflects on these developments and its significance in an online seminar available now.


Listen to Seminar

This event is part of the WPS@20 seminar hosted by the Ulster University Transitional Justice Institute to mark the upcoming 20th anniversary of the adoption of Resolution 1325 on Women, Peace and Security by the United Nations Security Council.

Launch BBC Troubles Archive

On 8 November 2019, the Chair worked with the BBC Rewind team to launch on the Magee Campus the  Ten Chapters Of The Northern Ireland Troubles’. The Ten Chapters, produced by the BBC Rewind editorial and technology team, is an online, multi-media series of episodes covering the conflict in Northern Ireland from the 1950s to the 1990s. As part of the launch a workshop was run with 14-22 year olds from the City.

The Ten Chapters of the Northern Ireland Troubles can be accessed here.

The BBC project came about as a result of discussions with the INCORE/CAIN project teams at Ulster University and Queen’s University Belfast, and as part of the tripartite agreement between the BBC and the academic institutions. The CAIN team identified ten broad themes which the BBC’s Rewind team researched then curated and compiled videos and imagery from BBC News NI’s newly-digitised archive. Where appropriate, stills and video from other broadcasters have been incorporated. Designed primarily for those aged 14 and older, the resource can be used in addition to academic resources. It was created independently by the BBC in line with its editorial guidelines and was reviewed for historical accuracy by INCORE/Ulster University academics.

  • Provost of Magee, Professor Malachy O’Neill
  • One of the questions for workshop discussion
  • Dr Melaugh and Dr Lynn from CAIN

Book launch: Family Betrayals

The Chair facilitated a discussion with Dr Wilhelm Verwoerd at the Belfast launch of “Verwoerd: My Journey through Family Betrayals” on 17 October 2019. The discussion focused on key aspects of the book, and particularly Dr Verwoerd’s challenges of coming to terms with the fact that HF Verwoerd, his grandfather, was the South African Prime Minister who is widely considered the architect of the apartheid system. Topics for discussion included key questions of the responsibilities of those who benefitted from the apartheid system, the question of “betrayal” when you take a different path to peacebuilding from those around you, as well as the relevance of the book to wider contexts.