ABSTRACT
This chapter presents the Northern Ireland case study to begin to contribute to a more fully theorized understanding of opposition to truth recovery and transitional justice. In Northern Ireland, unionist political elites reluctance to countenance the idea that their actions or inactions, or those of the state, played a role in the causes or consequences of the conflict has been instrumental in shaping their opposition to a truth process. The politicization of victimhood in Northern Ireland has had a direct bearing on attitudes to truth recovery. A narrative of sacrifice often by way of physical loss has been particularly strongly associated with the police force which served during the conflict in Northern Ireland, the Royal Ulster Constabulary. In Northern Ireland, the preponderance of arguments of a practical nature has come from unionist sources, although arguably of significance to all parties to the conflict.
