Northern Protestants: On Shifting Ground

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Susan McKay first visited this topic twenty years ago, when the north was still basking in the glow of the early days of the ceasefires. Maybe the title would be - 'A settled people, on firmer ground', having taken their place in a new Ireland where they had proper representation in parliament, their customs and traditions protected and they weren't subject to the whims of an increasingly weary and hostile westminster government. There's constant, unsettling chatter about a poll for a united Ireland, for the first time in years.

But it is on the more personal, human level that “Northern Protestants: On Shifting Ground” is really illuminating. His plea is echoed in various degrees of plaintiveness throughout the book, suggesting a profound frustration, particularly among the young, with the combative politics of unionism versus nationalism. That anxiety was already acute because of the looming possibility of Scottish independence and its ramifications for the union as well as the inexorable rise of Sinn Féin, a party predicated on the establishment of a united Ireland. In May this year, when Edwin Poots made his inaugural speech as leader of the Democratic Unionist party, having ousted Arlene Foster, he adhered to that familiar combative rhetoric.Some of it is familiar and depressing - the threats of violence if the protocol, this months loyalist bogeyman, is not removed.

The presence of a range of female voices was particularly welcome, though the lack of progressive voices from a male, explicitly loyalist or faith-based perspective doesn't necessarily reflect my experience. Ulster Unionists are facing a demographic tipping point, with the likely loss of their long-standing majority status within Northern Ireland. What emerges most forcefully from her myriad encounters is a quiet, matter-of-fact pragmatism about religion, identity and social issues that runs counter to that stridency of the DUP narrative. Based on over sixty in-depth interviews with a wide range of northern Protestants, Susan McKay presents an uncompromising and clear-eyed examination of her own people – the Protestants of Northern Ireland.I was particularly taken with the politics of Dawn Purvis, ex of the PUP, and how she was much more interested in tackling inequality in education, health and gender. As is the case elsewhere, many younger people have rejected party politics altogether, embracing more global issues such as climate activism and gender politics.

But, that said, I think this offers an important record of diverse voices in the wider Northern Irish PUL community (to use a number of contested designations) at this crucial time. McKay offers a valuable insight into how ordinary people are coping with the looming fundamental changes that are coming.Northern Protestants: On Shifting Ground” is essential reading for anybody who has any interest in Northern Ireland, or in the concept of reconciliation. There was an initial wariness but the barriers soon came down, or as much as they could as the conflict was still ongoing. But what elevates Susan McKay’s masterful book is that it challenges our preconceptions about a community that is regularly reviled by their political opponents, and shines a light on the heretofore overlooked diversity within that community.

Had I read a book like this as a teenager, I imagine it would have shocked me enough to change my adolescent views on whether it's possible to reconcile left wing ideas with any kind of formalised unionism.Her interviews engage voices from across the socioeconomic spectrum and they often speak with striking clarity. Many feel that, as one interviewee puts it, “social issues have been neglected” in the constant manoeuvring over the national question, while there is a profound frustration with the Stormont assembly’s long, dysfunctional drama of stalemate and standoff.