Tuesday 1st July 2025
Blog Page 2128

Why Sonia Sotomayer was a strong pick

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Obama has chosen Sonia Sotomayer to replace David Souter on the Supreme Court. It was, I think, an excellent pick.

First, the pick dovetails well with the President’s core governing philosophy, without giving in to his opponents. He could have gone much more to the left of Sotomayer — she is probably describable as a liberal judge, but she’s not extreme (she was, we should note, appointed to the District Court for the Southern District of New York by President George H. W. Bush). In other words, the strong liberal wing of Obama’s support is moderately pleased, but in choosing Sotomayer he’s less likely to lose the middle ground. That’s important. He wants (as probably any first-term President would) to have his nominee confirmed by a large margin. He wants to appear unlike a partisan hack. Probably he’s done the right thing here.

Second — and interrelatedly — this is virtuoso politics. Electorally speaking, this could have a startling effect. Hispanics are the fastest-growing group in the US electorate. Bush won in 2000 and 2004 at least in part because, as a former governor of Texas, he had a good relationship with Hispanic American voters. The Hispanic vote swung strongly towards Obama this cycle. By being the first President to nominate a Hispanic (and of course a Hispanic woman), he will certainly encourage long-term Hispanic support for the Democrats. And because Sotomayer seems so well-qualified — at least in terms of her academic record and judicial experience — the Republicans will have a hard job fighting the nomination without seeming, to some at least, as anti-Hispanic. Obama has pushed them into a corner — the Republicans are in a spot where, at best, they will still likely lose much of the Hispanic vote for the next few election cycles.

So now begins a lengthy confirmation process which both sides must play extremely carefully. The nominee, and the White House, must do two things at all times. First, keep touting Sotomayer’s record and personal history, in precisely the way they did in yesterday’s announcement in the East Room, and in this release. The confirmation hearings in the Senate will be nationally televised, likely on the main networks, which means the nominee is as much talking to the public as to the Senate judiciary committee. And the public will fall for her personal story. It is rags-to-riches, it is success-against-the-odds, it’s precisely the sort of thing which will sell her as a person. Second, be honest. Don’t try to obfuscate, or to hide stuff. It will get found out if it’s there. I very much doubt there is any ‘dirt’ on Sotomayer, but any questions about her legal history should be answered honestly, or at least with the willingness, when asked about any controversial statements, to simply admit you were “wrong”. The public, I think, finds honesty refreshing.

The Republicans must absolutely not do what the likes of Limbaugh and Fox News, and even Huckabee and Romney, have done thus far. The first two examples there are clearly “nutcase kneejerk stupid moderate-alienating responses” (as I believe is the technical jargon). The second two — the responses from Huckabee and Romney — are problematic in much the same way: in their attempt to get out a message fast, they only look like shouty partisans who have not reflected, have not researched, have just come up with a bog-standard, ill-conceived talking point.

If Republicans really want to stop her (and I’m not sure that in the final calculation they will want to), they can only do it by a smart, legalistic, substantive approach concentrating on her past rulings and not her personality. They cannot make baseless statements devoid of measured reference to facts (at least not this soon after the announcement) without seeming like obvious partisan hacks, which will be suicidal against the first Hispanic nominee who is the pick of a very popular President.

Here’s the rub: I think she’ll be nominated, and handily, unless something altogether unexpected comes up.

The Insect Play

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The Insect Play opens in the woods where a drunken tramp sleeps on the ground. Butterflies flit near him. His slumber is interrupted by a lepidopterist who is collecting butterflies for his scientific collection, but naughty tramp scares them away. The scientist buzzes off and the tramp then launches into a spiel bemoaning singleton life.

Somewhere in amongst the invertebrates and undesirables is a play about 1920s Czechoslovakia. The butterflies represent the feel-good flappers of the younger 20s generation. The Trinity Players capture their intelligence well, and Sam Losey’s flirtatious waspishness is noteworthy. Felix (Andrew Smith), the lepidopter poet who makes up for his lacking experience with eager Romantic masochism, is equally proficient.

Michael Hanbury-Williams delights as the paternally over-protective head of the family, while Emma Carrington-Brook’s Mrs. Cricket is his pleasingly neurotic wife, a cliché paralleled effectively by Hannah Cox, who, after much method-acting, is convincing as a comic dung-beetle in search of her pile. The ant scene, however, still bugs me a bit: the actors’ line-pacing certainly needs polishing to match the flow of the earlier butterfly scenes. But aside from this flaw, the scene’s depiction of a communist ant army – with rich Russian accents – is a comic and enjoyable episode.

Alex Gilmore, as the chief inventor of the Russian ant-army, deserves recognition for the unsettling aura of menace he brings to the part. Harry Richards should be picked out too, playing the lone human, and central character, of the tramp. His sardonic and gently inebriated lines focus the play, providing the philosophical framework through which the audience can see not simply novel insect characters but the antenna’d avatars of human stereotypes. The empathy he builds up with the audience is also important in preventingThe Insect Play from lapsing into some kind of critical human dissection. Though the brothers Capeks’ message can sometimes come across as superficial, you get the feeling that they want you to enjoy life, whatever your social situation or personal take upon it.

The cast is promising, the play is interesting and overall it should be a good show. If enjoyment of life is indeed one of the conclusions to be drawn from this satire, I’m certainly buzzing in anticipation to see this production of The Insect Play on Trinity’s pleasant, insecticided lawns. 

 

Cameron’s on the case

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Guess what! You can stop losing sleep over the state of politics in Britain. All those nights of waking up in cold sweats over the declining authority of parliament are over. David Cameron has the answer – “New Politics.” The old ways of centralisation, bureaucracy and red tape will be swept away in a tsunami of Compassionate Conservatism.

In a (very) long article in the Guardian, Mr Lovable Potato-face himself sets out his plans for a new Britain, where only a “massive, sweeping, radical redistribution of power” can save us from the eternal evils of the state. To his credit, Mr Cameron has once again demonstrated his razor-sharp political instinct. Publishing his plans exclusively in the Guardian reaches into Labour’s heartland, while pointing out an area where he and Polly Toynbee (the Guardian’s left-wing crusader) agree will help assuage the fears of millions of liberal leftists – people who can’t deny a tugging attraction to Cameron yet wonder if they can really bring themselves to commit the mortal sin of voting Conservative.

Even if the government were not quite so tired and disgraced, such political astuteness from Cameron would win him the next election. Contrast with Number Ten’s frankly unbelievably poor handling of the Ghurka fiasco. Exactly who was it who thought that battling those brave, venerable defenders of our great nation was a good idea? Brown’s formidable jowls quiver at the prospect of an election, and rightly so.

An encouraging sign in Cameron’s article is that finally we are getting some tangible policy promises, rather than vague statements of intent. For instance the number of MPs will be cut by 10%. Fair enough. There aren’t enough seats for them in the Commons when they all show up together anyway. This reform will avoid antagonising many a creaking, arthritic knee, if achieving little else.

One of the most radical proposals is to introduce fixed term parliaments, removing the power to call an election from the prime minister. This is the most effective weapon in the PM’s arsenal – the political A-bomb with which he can dangle the prospect of unemployment in front of every MP in Parliament. It would be politically stupid (if constitutionally clever) to strip the PM of this power, and Mr Squidgy has a state-of-the-art political radar. That’s why, compared to the other absolute promises, this proposal merits only “serious consideration” – a classic get-out phrase for all unrealistic yet popular ideas.

Life would be so much more fun if Cameron were more like Anthony Steen MP, who claims voters are only really angry about MPs expenses because they’re jealous of his “very very large house.” Alas, the slickness of Cameron’s media machine almost compares to the one that brought Blair to power many moons ago. It will win the Conservatives the election, after which I’ve a suspicion we’ll all sit twiddling our thumbs, waiting in vain for the joyous age of the “New Politics” to begin.

The Party’s Just Getting Started

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The Green Party clearly assume they have an image problem. “Think you know us? Think again” is the slogan with which they are campaigning for the European parliamentary elections on June 4th. Can the Green Party mould their single issue voice into a broad-based political platform that appeals to mainstream voters? Their leader, Dr Caroline Lucas, thinks they can, and no one is better placed than her to make it happen.

I met Dr Lucas after the launch of their South-East campaign for the upcoming poll. The event had all the ceremony and media coverage one would expect, but was attended by barely a dozen people who weren’t press or party officials. She seemed undaunted; perhaps because she recognised that for many there in person her speech would be like a sermon to the converted, Dr Lucas spoke straight at the television camera. She has an easy confidence and a clear grasp of what she is trying to convey. It is this clarity of vision that she thinks is essential to the prospects of the Green Party: it was the “urgency of getting our message across as effectively as possible” that motivated the party’s constitutional shift to a leadership system in 2008.

The position of Principal Speaker that the Greens used until last year was meant to be a symbolic rejection of the top-down models that the major parties in Parliament used, but the move away from it, says Dr Lucas, was “a very pragmatic decision”. When I ask her whether this pragmatism was in fact a capitulation to the media agenda that shapes the political culture she evades the implicit criticism, insisting that the public like to have “a person they can recognise and associate with those ideas” – I take that as a politician’s ‘yes’. They have clearly embraced that personality culture judging by the prominence of Dr Lucas’ friendly visage on the campaign leaflets that have poured through my letter box in the last week. She is as fresh-faced as David Cameron, her short-cropped hair strikes an effortlessly modern look, and, uniquely amongst current party leaders, she’s a woman.

 I am interested in whether Dr Lucas sees gender as an important dimension of politics, in particular regarding the under-representation of women in the House of Commons. She immediately fleshes out the context of the problem: the image of “grey-suited men in Westminster” and the “Punch-and-Judy politics” of their parliamentary exchanges just “isn’t very attractive to women”. She is insistent that the Greens “try to do politics differently”, but this brings us back to the tension between principle and pragmatism that surrounded the leadership issue. I press Dr Lucas on how her party is “more women-friendly” as she claims it is and she outlines on the one hand the support that they offer their female candidates in balancing the demands of a family and a political career, but she also makes reference to the “culture” within the party that, in contrast to the Lib-Lab-Con model, is about accountability and accessibility.

As a woman, she aims to offer “an inspirational type of leadership” in contrast to the “clunking fist of Gordon Brown or the spin of David Cameron”, rejecting an “authoritarian” style of managing her party. I wonder whether this noble approach (including the mandatory re-election of the leader every two years) is only possible because the party has no seats in the Commons, no need for whips, no backbenchers to cajole – in fact, little hope of getting these things either.

  Unsurprisingly, Dr Lucas resists the conclusion that the Greens are bereft of prospects in the British Parliament; although she is herself an MEP, a position elected by a system of proportional representation in stark contrast to first-past-the-post. Even within the Westminster system, she passionately believes, there are a “handful” of seats that are within reach of electing a Green MP, listing constituencies to substantiate her claim. So, what are the Green Party’s ambitions for the next general election, which may only be months away? One million votes.

She is clearly in favour of state-sponsorship for all parties to level the playing field of funding campaigns, but beyond that she insists that we must “massively rejuvenate our entire parliamentary system”. In her eyes the recent scandal of MPs expenses only adds to the chronic failings of the culture and institutions of British politics, which – when it is not riling them up – switches ordinary people off. She is animated when she insists that “politics has to be something much broader, much more vibrant, much more alive”.

Surely the European Union invokes at least as much anger and apathy though, I suggest. She doesn’t disagree, but insists that this is a product of a “eurosceptic” media and a political elite who refuse to acknowledge that, for instance, on the environment 80 per cent of our legislation originates in Brussels.

As a campaigner on environmental issues she believes it is often possible to have “more influence in Europe” than if she were a backbencher in London, an admission that will not prevent her seeking her own seat in the Commons as Green Party candidate for Brighton Pavilion at the next election. It is with this in mind that I interpret her central European Parliament campaign policy of 1 million ‘green-collar’ jobs in Britain as part of a Green New Deal, reconstituting Roosevelt’s Keynesian revolution for today’s economic as well as environmental crisis.

Dr Lucas may be a great champion of Europe and a dedicated MEP, but she recognises that the Greens will need to offer the voting public bread-and-butter issues with a tangible impact if they are going to make headway in domestic politics. What will prove fascinating to observe over coming years is whether the pragmatic desire for political influence that has recently fired the Green Party under Dr Lucas will inevitably compromise the values and integrity which give them a small but respected niche in our polarized political landscape. If it does not, maybe Caroline will have succeeded in her quest to “redefine what politics is”.

Europe At The Polls

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What is the European Parliament?

The European Parliament (EP) is the only directly elected institution in the European Union. The first direct elections were held in 1979, and Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) are elected at five-year intervals. Together with the Council, the EP forms part of the legislative branch of the EU. Whereas the Council represents the interests of national governments, the Parliament is meant to represent European citizens.
The EP is organized similarly to a national parliament  with 7 Euro parties with distinct policy platforms. The 785 MEPs  sit together with their party group, rather than with their national delegation. The largest group in the EP is currently the centre-right European People’s Party (EPP), which includes the British Conservatives. The second largest group is the Party of European Socialists (PES), where the British Labour Party belongs.

What does it do?

The main task of the EP, like a national parliament,is to pass legislation and to exercise democratic control over the other EU institutions. With each revision of the EU Treaties, the European Parliament has been granted additional powers. Today it is a genuine co-legislator in the European Union. That is, it is responsible for legislation, together with the Council, in most policy areas.Around 50% of UK legislation with a significant economic impact has its origins in EU legislation, and the EP thus has considerable influence on politics and economics in this country. One example of recent EP activities is legislation forcing mobile phone operators to lower their prices. It has also passed rules aiming to reduce CO2 emissions by 20% within a decade. Unlike national parliaments, the EP does not directly decide the composition of the EU executive, although it has veto over the appointment of the European Commission. It also does not have legislative initiative, as most national EU parliaments do.

What could these elections change?

The Euro elections will decide the composition of the European Parliament, thus the policy direction. Some of the key policy issues that the next Parliament will deal with include designing a framework of financial regulation, deciding on regulation to combat climate change, and coordinating common management of immigration flows to/within the EU.
The European Parliament also plays an important role in deciding the future of European integration, including future enlargement of the Union to include Croatia, Macedonia and Turkey.
If the centre-right European People’s Party remains in power, then the current Commission President, Jose Manuel Barroso, is also likely to be reappointed for a second term. If, however, the Socialist group wins a larger share of the seats, they may force the Council to appoint another candidate with a more leftist policy agendasuch as fingerprints and face recognition data or an iris pattern scan.

How will they affect British politics?

The Labour Party looks set to do badly in the Euro elections. This may trigger renewed calls for Brown’s resignation within the Labour Party. The Conservatives will use this as another opportunity to call for an immediate general election, which they are likely to win, maybe even by a landslide.
In general, it will be parties on the fringes of British politics that reap the benefits from the recent furor over MP expenses. In particular, the UK Independence Party will do well. The British National Party is likely to win its first European seat. If the Conservative Party loses seats to UKIP and BNP, the party leadership may be tempted to adopt a more hard-line position on issues concerning the EU, immigration and law and order. David Cameron has already pledged that his party will leave the centrist EPP after the election and establish a new party group of Eurosceptic European Conservatives in the EP.

Do people vote for their European candidate, or is it really a reaction to their national government?

Elections to the European Parliament are generally described as ‘second-order’ elections. That is, they are elections of less importance than general elections, and thus characterized by low turnout and lacklustre campaign. They often constitute a plebiscite on the national government’s performance, where vote choice is primarily decided by domestic political concerns rather than European politics.
This is particularly the case in Britain, where the political parties make few attempts to campaign on European issues and voters are uninformed about the European politics.  In other European countries, there is a more rigorous debate on European issues, and voters are more likely to vote on the basis of concerns relevant to the European Union.
Turnout levels also vary considerably between member states. In the 2004 Euro elections, less than 20% of the electorate voted in Slovakia and Slovenia,whereas 82% voted in Malta and 73% in Italy. The participation rate in Britain at 38% was below the EU average of 46%.

tick…tick…Boom

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On the opening night of his Broadway hit RENT, the struggling artist Jonathan Larson died. After his death multiple versions of the scenes and songs his earlier work tick…tick…Boom were found and reconfigured as a three-actor musical by playwright David Auburn and orchestrator/ arranger Stephen Oremus.

Influenced by his mentor, Stephen Sondheim, tick…tick…Boom expands the single monologue concept. tick…tick…Boom is a rock-monologue describing Larson’s dejection at the failure of Superbia, his rock re-telling of 1984.
It is John (Hansel Tan) who brings the greatest strength to this production, pulling out vast energy both through his words and through his intense physicality. As he sees the success of his friends, he manages to get some wit out of rather weak words: ‘the seat is heated’ (of the car), ‘there’s a view of the 59th street bridge’. By the end of the first song, it is clear that this will be a production of the protagonist – the others are pushed to the periphery.

Edward Blagrove and Bonnie Hurst are, nevertheless, strong also. In a moment of a witty parody of an office Hurst is at her strongest and her dramatic quality comes through: it’s a shame that her songs bore me, partly through the fact that Larson can’t really draw out the dynamism of Sondheim and partly through the clichéd words: ‘it was only me and you’, ‘we’ve replaced care with illusion’. Blagrove with his strength, both of body and of mouth, makes the perfect foil for Tan.

Perhaps, Larson does sometimes get somewhere towards impressing us with originality, but it’s a shame that this only ever seems to give Tan opportunities. It’s autobiographical but it’s maybe too much of a Cartesian biography: others don’t get a look in. Thus, the scene when John walks, alone, through Times Square, considering how he doesn’t want to sell out to Broadway, ‘the Parnassus for the musical theatre world’, is perhaps one of the strongest, reflecting his conflicting desires of fame, but artistic integrity, against his fears for his adequacy.

Staged in a black box with the subtle and sophisticated lighting of Allan Ramsey, the focus will purely be on the actors. This will be great for Tan’s talent and it should be positive for the others. But I’m still concerned that only Tan is able to draw enough out of a work that maybe doesn’t give very much.
This is the last Oxford production by Amy Cooke-Hodgson and Stephen Wiggins, who founded Maple Giant Theatre. Despite the risks of this production, Oxford will surely miss their cutting edge productions, concerts and cabaret evenings!

three stars out of five

Revelations force Poetry Professor resignation

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Ruth Padel, the first female Professor of Poetry at the University of Oxford, has resigned after holding the post for only a week.

The resignation follows the damaging relevation that she had sent e-mails to two national newspapers, associating her with a smear campaign against Derek Walcott, a Nobel laureate and her main rival in the race. In the e-mails, Padel mentions allegations of sexual harassment in Walcott’s history.

The discovery of these e-mails has led many to suspect Padel’s involvement with the campaign. Many academics who initially supported Padel called for her to step down. Lord Bragg, a Labour peer described her behaviour as “disgraceful.”

“She should now stand down from the post,” he added. “A shame, but there it is.”

Padel had maintained, in the past, that she played no part in the smear campaign.

“It’s terrible, because it had nothing to do with me,” she said in an earlier interview with Cherwell.

In an official statement released on Monday, however, Padel acknowledged that she had sent the e-mails. She denied engaging in the smear campaign, as she had only passed on information that was already in the public domain.

“I acted in complete good faith, and would have been happy to lose to Derek,” she said, “but I can see that people might interpret my actions otherwise.”

The e-mails to two journalists were sent in early April, and made references to events in Walcott’s past. Padel wrote in them, “Some [of my] supporters add that what he does for students can be found in a book called The Lecherous Professor, reporting one of his two recorded cases of sexual harassment and that Obama is rumoured to have turned him down for his inauguration poem because of the sexual record. But I don’t think that’s fair.”

Shortly after, John Walsh, a close friend of Padel, detailed and criticised Walcott’s alleged behaviour in an article in The Independent. Within the next few days, between 50 and 100 academics were sent anonymous letters containing an excerpt from the book The Lecherous Professor.

As the campaign escalated, Derek Walcott pulled out from the race. He cited “low tactics” and “low and degrading attempt at character assassination” as the reason for his withdrawal.

Ruth Padel defended the e-mails sent to journalists. She said, “I was contacted by an Oxford student, who believed Mr Walcott’s relations with female students at universities was relevant to her university’s election of a professor.

“Because her concern seemed to be a part of the whole picture, I communicated it to two journalists. I would not have done so had I known of the anonymous mailing, or of any journalist intending to highlight this issue on its own.”

Eloise Stonborough, the secretary of the Oxford University Poetry Society, was glad that Oxford will have another chance to elect a person for the post. She said, “I am sorry that the election came to this but given the circumstances I believe that Ruth Padel has taken the honourable course of action in resigning. I am glad that we now have an opportunity to learn from the mistakes made during this campaign and to conduct the new election in a manner fitting to the important position of the professor of poetry.

“I look forward to finding out more about the potential future candidates for the post”, she added.

The University has said that a new election for the position will be held.

Doctor Faustus

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This Christopher Marlowe play tells the well-known tale of the titular Doctor, a scholar who sells his soul to Lucifer for twenty four years of service from the demon Mephistopheles. It’s a classic tragedy of intellectual over-reaching. At times the action is disturbing, at others, humorous. This is one of the best plays ever written in English, and this production fulfils the demands of the challenging script.

Ben Coopland brought a frenetic energy to the role of Faustus. His soliloquies were delivered with a mania that suited both his early enthusiasm and later despair, perfectly conveying both his character’s charisma and self-delusion..  Gloria Lagou’s Mephistopheles was equally impressive; as Faustus commanded and lectured she followed him around the stage with predatory eyes, creating the impression of a cat playing with its food. Their scenes together crackled with energy. When Mephistopheles tells Faustus that “this is Hell” it sent a shiver down my spine. Faustus can’t quite seem to keep still, and his hasty agitation is perfectly contrasted with Mephistopheles almost feline composure.

The decision to include the comic scenes works well. They act as an effective counterbalance to the Faustus scenes, and help to make Faustus’ aspirations appear all the more ridiculous. They also add a necessary tonal contrast to the play’s more disturbing scenes. The comic characters compliment the innuendo-laced dialogue with well placed physical clowning. The scenes which use the chorus succeed; in an appropriately macabre twist the demons double as friars. Altogether, the play shows evidence of some careful decision-making from director Bryony Hope.

The sinister tone is heightened by original music composed by Philip Knox. Eerie sustained notes play against Faustus’ final soliloquy. The climactic scene builds in a crescendo of tension as Faustus’s fate quite literally drags him down. The play will use a suitably infernal set composed of metal grids backed with metallic blue material, which can be used to show silhouettes. In one such scene a strange mass of demons writhed organically, drawing slowly closer to the doomed Faustus. The effect was truly menacing.  

I would highly recommend this show; it is a brilliant play, and Bryony Hope’s production promises to deliver a thoroughly enjoyable tale of aspiration and damnation.

6th Week, Keble O’Reilly Theatre, Keblefour stars out of five

 

Review: We’ll Meet Again

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New writing is always difficult, comedy even more so, and it’s very rare that a student-written comedy consistently brings home the funny. In this case, however, I am delighted to be able to inform you that We’ll Meet Again does just that.

Set against a backdrop of economic crises, a looming World War III and hurricanes in Wales, the comedy couldn’t get much blacker, and the menagerie of grotesques doesn’t disappoint, from gin-soaked housewives and vaudevillian vagrants to apocalyptic overlord wannabes. The street-level view of armageddon makes the show feel like a kitchen-sink Dr. Strangelove, and the subtle nods to the film (including of the Strangelove version of When Johnny Comes Marching Home) will delight those familiar with it.

At the centre of it all, the middle-class Fairfax family are conveyed with confidence and a firm grasp of timing. Lotty Davies, playing aspiring alcoholic homemaker Gill, seems at home in the role and in her best moments is possessed of a sarcasm and acerbic wit that one cannot help but relish. Her pedantic husband Richard is played with pencil-straightening repression by Amyus Bale; and Katie Borg, playing the daughter, is so convincing as a stroppy, annoying teenager that there are moments when one is tempted to jump on stage and slap her.

The show-stealer, however, was Nicolas Pierce as Steven, their lodger, a man who is not so much square as he is composed entirely of right angles. He is portrayed with such a pathetic, nervous awkwardness that one isn’t sure whether to laugh, cry, or just give him a hug, especially when confronted with his Michaela Don playing Catherine, his foil in a later scene. He is, in a word, funny.

Credit must also be given to Tom Hathaway and Joe Dunlop, who form a superb double act as Eric & Dave, setting up to be leaders in the post-apocalyptic wasteland. Andrew Wilkinson plays Donald, the exuberant tramp, with an engaging air of nonchalance, although occasionally he could do with reigning in some of the excess energy.

The pop culture references fly thick and fast, whether discussing Bruce Willis’ place in the book of Revelations or simply quoting large chunks of Watchmen. This can be viewed as a positive or a negative depending on your own comedic sensibilities.

There are of course areas that could do with some work: the show has little in the way of genuine plot, feeling more like a setting in which to place the funny, but slightly disjointed scenes.

Overall, however, We’ll Meet Again is well worth seeing and, as first years, I think the writers “Stanley and Vera” (Adrienne Joy and Alex du Sautoy) are definitely a pair to watch.

(four stars out of five)

We’ll Meet Again will be performed at the BT, 9.30, 26-30 May

 

The Rough Road to Peace

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The shooting of two armed guards at Atrium army base by Republican extremists in February had some of the hallmarks of the old days. For many in Northern Ireland it has raised fears of a return to a troubled past. The history of Northern Ireland is one of seemingly intractable conflict between Republicans and Loyalists that has lasted for over 100 years, claimed thousands of lives and culminated in the destructive of central Manchester by an IRA blast. But then on a remarkable day in April 1997, the Good Friday Agreement was signed, weapons were put down, the Northern Ireland Assembly instigated and David Trimble, now Lord Trimble, was elected the first First Minister of Northern Ireland.

On meeting Trimble you get the overarching impression of a man for whom forceful yet methodical argument has been his trademark. A Nobel Prize winner and an instrumental figure in the Northern Ireland Peace process, Trimble has spent much of his working life talking – painstaking negotiation, back and forth, wearing down opposition until all alternatives have been exhausted, ‘it’s simple unglamorous persistence that wins out.’
So I ask him whether talking is the solution to the world’s most intractable and to the recent shootings by extremists. ‘Yes,’ he answers, ‘but talking to the right people – not to the extremists.’ Given the prominent role of negotiations with the IRA and the Real IRA in the Northern Ireland peace talks, this would seem a rather odd response from such a serial negotiator. But, pleads Trimble, the truth of the peace process is rather different to what we think we know. ‘Negotiations with extremists, the Hain-Powell consensus’ as he calls it, after Blair’s chief of staff, ‘did not bring an end to the Northern Ireland conflict, but rather the work, for many years beforehand was responsible’

Trimble is being nothing short of irreligious. If we thought we’d learnt anything from the nineties in Northern Ireland, it was that getting long lasting peace involved persuading, even charming all types to compromise, extremists included. So we should reject this consensus for dealing with extremists. And yet it’s difficult to imagine a solution to the Israel-Palestine conflict that didn’t include a role for the more extreme factions within Hamas. But Trimble’s no ideologue and accepts that the Good Friday agreement could never have been reached without the RIRA at the negotiating table. What he begs to differ on is how you go about getting to the table in the first place:
‘I’m not saying never communicate with those involved in violence but your very much more likely to succeed if you come with clear conditions for negotiations.’ This seems an old fashioned view, somewhat a reversal of the now conventional wisdom that negotiations must go on even as factions continue to extol violence.

But Trimble, as one would expect from a Nobel Peace Prize winner, is unfazed by conventional wisdom and returns to his experience in Northern Ireland. Conditions worked there he argues. ‘Look at what happened when negotiations were unconditional. We had the situation in 1972 when unconditional negotiations with the extremists, if anything, exacerbated the problem’ although he concedes that probably no talks could have been successful then.

What brought an end to the Northern Ireland troubles was as much the conditions on the ticket to the negotiating table, as the negotiations that went on there. ‘The extremists knew from the start that if there was ‘sufficient’ support for the proposals made at any peace talks, they could remain totally opposed, but it wouldn’t matter, they would be left out of any agreement.’

In criticising the likes of Powell and Blair, Trimble’s doing more than just cautioning against negotiating unconditionally with extremists, he’s rejecting the notion of parachuting personalities into conflict zones at the cost of forgetting that it is dogged determination by the people that matter that’s at the heart of peace-making. Referring to a copy of Jonathon Powell’s diaries describing Clinton’s role in leading the peace talks, Trimble nods and smiles ‘Clinton had no idea how to get the result he wanted – same as Blair – thought he could get what he wanted by charm.’
‘Those outside can encourage and assist but it is the people who are there that must do the deal.’

Trimble comes on to his most recent experience, advising Israelis and Palestinians on solutions to their seemingly intractable conflict – a role that he has taken to much acclaim. Yet he is keen to reiterate, ‘I certainly didn’t do anything that might have been telling other people what to do.’ This, I think, is the lesson Trimble wants observers of the Northern Irish peace process to take away; that there are no lessons, there is no one-size-fits-all model.

‘The experience in Northern Ireland has led to £90 million worth of programmes for working with extremists in Britain. This is based on the premise that non-violent extremists will act as a bulwark against violent extremists, supposed lessons from the Peace Process. But we must totally oppose the ideologies that promote violence.’
So I return to my original question and ask Trimble from his experience what we should think about the recent spate of shootings and apparent upsurge of support for extremism among a new generation of young people, some as young as twelve, in Northern Ireland. Perhaps here the lessons of the peace process have some resonance. He replies that young men are always going to be susceptible to recruitment by extremists; no peace settlement will change that.

Does this mean that even the peacemaker does not believe in a lasting peace in Northern Ireland? He is reminded of the lecture he gave on receiving his Nobel Prize for Peace. ‘I said there that winning was like receiving the reward for a race run while the race is still not quite finished.’ ‘This race, at least, is now won.’