ABSTRACT
Reconciliation has become a term of art in discourse on and about Northern Ireland's post-conflict transition. Within academic, elite and everyday political discourse, reconciliation is increasingly seen as synonymous with peace. This chapter argues that reconciliation needs to be invested with the language of social responsibility and turns to Iris Marion Young's final book for guidance on what that might look like. Often politicians and spokespersons for non-governmental organizations or community groups view reconciliation as intrinsic to peace. In this understanding, reconciliation is either the first step or the culmination of a peace process. The merging of peace with reconciliation is having a profound and as yet underappreciated and under explored impact on policy direction in Northern Ireland. The chapter also argues that the elision works to defer substantive issues of governance, democracy and justice. Within Northern Ireland, reconciliation has been seen as a way of repairing the social fabric and is linked to ideas about having a 'shared society'.
