Parity of Esteem for All? Migrants and Political Belonging in Northern Ireland

The assumptions that Northern Ireland is home to only two ethnocultural communities does not reflect contemporary life in the region. A political culture built around the Irish constitutional question has often concealed the voice and needs of other social groups who do not so easily fit these categorisations. Within such a system, migrants may find themselves civically marginalised due to language barriers, lack of knowledge about the political structures and an absence of overall representation. The consociational design on which Northern Ireland’s governance is based was established after the 1998 Agreement with a focus placed on notions such as power-sharing and equality (HMSO 1998).

Arguably, this notion of ‘parity of esteem’ has been more broadly applied
within the confines of a bi-cultural rather than a multicultural society. With
the most recent assembly elections garnering turnouts of around 65 per cent
(CAIN 2022), there are clearly large swathes of the population who do not vote
in elections, many of whom are migrants (Electoral Commission 2005). Unionist
and nationalist parties still dominate even though non-voters who might align
to neither bloc, could potentially make significant change within a proportional
representation system. However, the continued prevalence of a politics framed
along ‘national lines’ continues to be largely unattractive to migrants as voters
and also as potential election candidates themselves, although there are some
notable exceptions to this which will be discussed in this chapter.