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Parades in Northern Ireland
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Parades are an important part of Northern Irish culture. Although the majority of parades are held by ostensibly Protestant, unionist or Loyalist groups, nationalist, Republican and non-political groups also parade. Parading is often considered to be an assertion of a group's control over a particular area, and as a result parading can be highly controversial. However in recent years the vast majority of parades have occurred peacefully.
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Parades are an important part of Northern Irish culture. Although the majority of parades are held by ostensibly Protestant, unionist or Loyalist groups, nationalist, Republican and non-political groups also parade. Parading is often considered to be an assertion of a group's control over a particular area, and as a result parading can be highly controversial. However in recent years the vast majority of parades have occurred peacefully. A Parades Commission exists to settle disputes about controversial parades, although not all parading groups recognise the Commission's authority.
Protestant parades
The majority of parades in Northern Ireland (nearly 70% in 2003/4) are organised by Protestant or pro-union groups, and thus some sections of the community have tended to see attempts to restrict parades as an attack on Protestant or unionist culture. Parades by these sections of the community typically take place on Saturdays. This means that participants and spectators do not have to take time off work, and avoid parading on Sunday, which some Protestants believe should only be spent on purely religious activities. The only exceptions to this are the 12th of July, which is held on the same date each year, (unless the 12th falls on a Sunday, in which case it will be postponed to Monday the 13th) and church parades, which are held on Sunday.
Orange Institution
The Orange Institution holds hundreds of parades throughout Northern Ireland every year. The biggest of these are usually on the twelfth of July ('The Twelfth'), in commemoration of the Battle of the Boyne. Individual lodges also parade at various times of the year, particularly leading up to the Twelfth from the start of June. Parades in memory of the dead of World War I, particularly the 36th (Ulster) Division at the Battle of the Somme are held in July and November. Junior lodges from Armagh, South Tyrone and Fermanagh parade annually at the end of May. On the last Saturday in October, Reformation Day is celebrated with the year's last major Orange parades. In Belfast, these proceed to Saint Anne's Cathedral for a church service.
Apprentice Boys
The Apprentice Boys of Derry exist in commemoration of the Siege of Derry in the seventeenth century. The Boys' biggest celebration is on the Saturday nearest the 12th of August each year, in commemoration of the lifting of the siege. They also parade on the Saturday nearest 18 December, in commemoration of the original apprentice boys shutting the gates of the town against King James II's troops, and at Easter. Most Apprentice Boys' parades are held in the city of Derry.
Royal Black Institution
The main parade of the Royal Black Institution is held on the last Saturday of August and is known as Last or Black Saturday. This was originally held on the 12th of August in commemoration of the end of the Siege of Derry, but in the 1950s the date of the event was moved. Local parades are held in Belfast in the two weeks beforehand. Its other major event is the 'sham fight' at Scarva on the 13th of July, in which an actor playing William of Orange ritually defeats an actor playing James II, thus re-enacting the Protestant victory at the Battle of the Boyne.
Salvation Army
As in other countries, the Salvation Army in Northern Ireland sometimes parades with brass bands. Salvation Army parades are generally not seen as controversial or sectarian, and their parades have not led to any problems.
Bands
As well as accompanying the above organisations on their parades, many marching bands also hold their own parades, often as a fund-raising activity. These are sometimes combined with band competitions which other bands throughout the United Kingdom will be invited to compete in. Band parades tend to be less regular, less organised and often more rowdy than those run by established institutions.
Catholic parades
Parades are much less prolific from the Catholic, nationalist or Republican communities than amongst Protestants, unionists or Loyalists. According to the Parades Commission, less than 5% of Northern Irish parades are nationalist. Many Catholic parades are Republican rather than 'Catholic' in any meaningful sense, and a number of protest marches have evolved into annual parades. Most Catholic parades are held on Sundays, after mass.
Ancient Order of Hibernians
The broadly Irish nationalist Ancient Order of Hibernians are sometimes regarded as the 'green Orange Order'. They are the oldest nationalist parading group (unless the Catholic Church is counted) and are seen as the conservative, respectable face of Irish nationalism. Compared to most Protestant organisations they parade relatively infrequently, their main parades being on Saint Patrick's Day, at Easter, and on Lady Day. At various points during the Troubles the Hibernians offered to voluntarily cease parading if Protestant groups would do the same.
Irish National Foresters
The Irish National Foresters are a nationalist fraternal organisation. Although they are open to Irish people of any religion they are Catholic- and nationalist-dominated. Their main parading date is the Sunday closest to the first of August.
Republican parades
It is difficult to define the difference between a republican parade and a protest march, as a number of events combine aspects of normal parades and protest marches. Republican parades have probably been the most controversial type of parade in proportion to the number of events held. The presence of paramilitaries and the overt antagonism towards the British and Northern Irish states has led to bans and heavy opposition from unionists. Northern Ireland's biggest annual republican parade is probably that which takes place during Féile an Phobail in August. This began as a protest against internment without trial and has evolved into a festival celebrating Gaelic and dissident culture. Republican parades are also held in January to commemorate Bloody Sunday and at Easter to commemorate the 1916 Easter Rising.
Civil rights marches
In the late 1960s and early 1970s, groups of mostly Catholic activists such as the Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association (NICRA) and People's Democracy attempted to use the protest march tactics of contemporary protest movements elsewhere in the world to draw attention to political, social and economic discrimination against Catholics in Northern Ireland. Perhaps inevitably, these marches were seen in terms of the parading tradition and their presence in Protestant-dominated areas violently opposed. The civil rights marches and the reaction to them were a major contributing factor to the outbreak of the Troubles. They were also a major factor prompting a series of parade bans in the early 1970s.
Easter
Easter is a major parading time for both communities, and is often considered to be the start of the year's 'marching season'. Both Protestants and Catholics commemorate the death and resurrection of Jesus, and some republican groups also commemorate the Easter Rising. According to Neil Jarman, Protestants began parading at Easter in the 1930s to counter Republican parading, but "few people are aware of this, and Easter parades are now an accepted part of the loyalist tradition".
Youth organisations
Some youth organisations, such as the Boys' Brigade, take part in or organise parades and drills throughout the calendar.
Non-sectarian parades
A number of parades are held in Northern Ireland, especially in Belfast, which are not associated with any particular religious tradition. They are subject to the same laws and regulations as other parades.
Lord Mayor's parade
Several cities in Northern Ireland hold Lord Mayor's parades marking the end of the mayor's term in office. These are usually carnival-type events which have evolved from the more stately affairs held in to many cities in the United Kingdom since the Middle Ages. The Belfast parade takes place in May; the 2007 theme was 'Love and Friendship'.
Gay pride
A gay pride parade has been held in Belfast each year since the early 1990s. As Northern Ireland has high levels of fundamentalist Christianity, it is often controversial. In 2005 a number of Christian groups called for it to be banned, but the Parades Commission ruled that it could go ahead. It is sometimes described as one of the few genuinely cross-community events in Northern Ireland.
Remembrance Sunday parades
War memorial parades are often considered to be Protestant, as participants and observers tend to be drawn overwhelmingly from the Protestant community. In addition, some war memorial parades are run by Protestant organisations such as the Orange Order. However those on Remembrance Sunday (the Sunday closest to 11 November) are organised by local councils or the British Legion and commemorate war dead of all religious backgrounds. Remembrance Sunday parades usually consist of a march by veterans or local military units or both to a Remembrance Sunday ceremony, usually held at a war memorial, and often another march to a church service.
Controversy
Parading is a controversial issue in Northern Ireland. Many parades are seen as sectarian or otherwise offensive. In general debates centre on the route of particular parades; people from one community often object to 'the other side's' parades passing through or by 'their' area, for example Orange Order parades marching down Catholic-dominated streets. A few parades are seen as objectionable regardless of route. These are generally those which involve or commemorate paramilitary groups such as the Provisional Irish Republican Army and Ulster Freedom Fighters, and otherwise non-controversial parades have sometimes caused conflict because of a band or lodge carrying a banner or flag associated with a paramilitary group. Gay pride parades have also tended to be controversial.
Attempts to control parading
Since the nineteenth century the British and Northern Irish governments, as well as various local authorities, have attempted to control parades and the disorder which sometimes accompanies them. The Orange Order and its parades were banned for a period in the nineteenth century, a policy which was overturned after a campaign of defiance led by William Johnston of Ballykilbeg. In 1922 the 1st Government of Northern Ireland passed a Special Powers Act which allowed the Home Affairs Minister to do virtually anything he thought necessary to preserve law and order. Over the next thirty years this was used many times to ban or re-route nationalist, republican and some left-wing parades, marches and meetings. In 1951 the government passed the Public Order Act which required parade organisers to give the police forty-eight hours notice of their intent to parade. The local head of police could then ban or re-route the parade if he felt it might lead to a breach of public order. The only exceptions to this rule were funerals and parades normally held along a particular route. Since Orange parades had been allowed along the same routes without interference for years, this essentially meant that most Orange parades were exempt from having to give notice. The new Act was used disproportionately against nationalist parades, although from time to time Ministers attempted to stop Protestant groups from parading through predominantly Catholic areas. This always met with fierce hostility from the Orange Order and often from within the Ulster Unionist Party which made up the government. Several Home Affairs Ministers were forced to make public apologies after interfering with Protestant parades and two (Brian Maginess and W.W.B. Topping) were moved from the position after banning Protestant band parades.
From the late 1960s, parading and marching became a much more fraught issue. The civil rights marches held by People's Democracy and other groups were seen by many Protestants as Catholic parades which were provocatively marching through Protestant areas. The Public Order Act was used against numerous marches, and the issue of parading and of who was allowed to march in what area became even more heated. In 1969 an Apprentice Boys parade in Derry led to what is now known as the Battle of the Bogside, considered by many to mark the start of the Troubles. Several months-long bans on parading were made in the early 1970s, although none of these covered the main Protestant parading period. The Special Powers and Public Order Acts were modified on several occasions in the 1970s and 1980s.
Several areas have been the focus of a disproportionate amount of conflict over parading. These include Derry, Ormeau Road in Belfast, and especially the Drumcree area of Portadown. The Drumcree conflict flared up in the 1970s, the mid 1980s and the mid to late 1990s. Disputes over whether the Orange Order should be allowed to parade through Catholic areas were often accompanied by severe violence. In 1998 the Parades Commission was set up in an attempt to deal with this and other disputes. The Commission has the power to ban, restrict, re-route or impose conditions on any parade in Northern Ireland. The Orange Order has refused to acknowledge the Commission's authority, although the lodges involved in the Drumcree dispute have recently agreed on principle to negotiate.
Number of parades
According to the Parades Commission, a total of 3405 parades (not counting funerals) were held in Northern Ireland in 2007. The following table groups these parades by type and sponsoring organisation.
| Organisation or type | Religious affiliation | Number of parades | No. of sensitive parades | | Loyalist bands | Protestant | 483 | 33 | | Orange Order | Protestant | 452 | 23 | | Civic (including schools, trade unions, community groups) | Non-aligned, mixed or either | 249 | 5 | | Apprentice Boys of Derry | Protestant | 231 | 17 | | Royal Black and Royal Arch Purple | Protestant | 167 | 5 | | Church parades (including Boys' Brigade, Girl Guides, Legion of Mary etc.) | Catholic and Protestant | 157 | 0 | | Military (including British Legion) | Non-aligned | 149 | 1 | | Other | | 98 | 0 | | Nationalist bands | Catholic | 59 | 11 | | Other nationalist/republican (includes political parties) | Catholic | 51 | 5 | | Hibernians and Foresters | Catholic | 28 | 2 | | Other unionist (includes political parties) | Protestant | 21 | 0 | | Residents' groups | Catholic | 6 | 2 | | Total loyalist (excluding church parades) | Protestant | 1354 | 78 | | Total nationalist/republican (excluding church parades) | Catholic | 144 | 20 |
The Police Service of Northern Ireland uses different statistics, and recorded a total of 2863 parades in 2007. Of these, 2270 were loyalist, 144 nationalist, and 449 neither. Four of these were illegal and of these three were nationalist. 45 parades were re-routed, of which all but two (one nationalist, one other) were loyalist, and 78 parades had other conditions imposed, of which 70 were loyalist, 7 nationalist and one neither. Disorder occurred at just ten parades, of which nine were loyalist and one nationalist. This is a significant decline from previous years; in 2005 disorder was recorded at 34 parades.
See also
Sources
- Neil Jarman, extract from Material Conflicts: Parades and Visual Displays in Northern Ireland (1997): http://cain.ulst.ac.uk/issues/parade/jarman.htm
- Key dates in the parading calendar at CAIN Web Service: http://cain.ulst.ac.uk/issues/parade/chpa1.htm
- Irish Emergency Parades Committee (IPEC) and Brehan Law Society, International Observer and Breannual report on marching season from 2001 - 2007 : http://www.ipecobservers.org/
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