ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on the construction of suspect communities' in relation to counterterrorism practices and the impact of these representations on Irish communities and Muslim communities in Britain. It also focuses on two eras of political violence. The first coincides with the Irish Republican Army's (IRA) bombing campaigns in England between 1973 and 1996, when the perpetrators were perceived as Irish terrorists'. Second, the main threat of political violence has been portrayed as stemming from people who are assumed to be motivated by extreme interpretations of Islam and are often labelled as Islamic terrorists'. The basis for the comparison between these two eras, noting similarities, whereas much public discourse sees the two eras as clearly delineated. The chapter explores the implications for social cohesion of the outcomes of processes of suspectification' on the everyday lives of Irish communities and Muslim communities and on the possibilities for the expression of a multiplicity of belongings.
