Economics in Belfast

When we visit neighborhoods to see conflict we always go to the lower class neighborhoods.  The conflict really doesn’t exist in higher middle class and upper class neighborhoods.  Most of the students here at Derryvolgie hall are from the high middle to upper class, and most of them don’t really know much or concern themselves with the conflict too much.  By going into some neighborhoods and talking with people there is the general consensus that the more violent parts of this conflict occur in lower class areas.
Lower class areas are where all the murals are and where the paramilitaries are located.  People in these lower class areas have a greater tendency to violence and to joining a paramilitary group for a number of reasons.  There is an extremely large lower class here in Belfast because it has lost all of its heavy industry.  Parts of Belfast have become somewhat of a welfare state due to the unemployment of families that used to work in the shipyards and linen industry have been without jobs for two or three generations.  Males from unemployed families will have a tendency to join a paramilitary group because they are not able to fulfill their commission as the primary wage earner in the family.  Because each side, Protestants and Catholics, are both poor they feel like they are oppressed victims.
This conflict and instability only hurts both sides, Catholic and Protestant, by hurting local economy and bringing everyone down.  Businesses will not invest in the local economy because it is not profitable in an area of conflict and instability.  The businesses would lose profit due to the fact that they would have to pay the local paramilitary group for proper “protection.”  The business also runs the risk of losing potential customers or loss of capital through paramilitary activity.
The stability in Belfast right now is good because more businesses are starting to invest in the area due to the increased stability and ready workforce.  If this stability increases it will bring all the economic classes up.  This will create less tension and ill feeling in many neighborhoods as people will be doing better economically and will not feel victimized and oppressed.  With this lowered tensioned and the fact that everyone will be doing better economically the conflict will decrease and violent conflict will be nonexistent.  At that point once everyone is doing better people will be more willing to work things out and compromise.