Challenges to Emerging and Established Powers: Brazil, the United Kingdom and Global Order by Marco Vieira & Jonathan Grix

Author:Marco Vieira & Jonathan Grix [Vieira, Marco & Grix, Jonathan]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: International Relations, European, Caribbean & Latin American, Political Science, World, General
ISBN: 9781317269946
Google: IGFQDwAAQBAJ
Goodreads: 36809878
Publisher: Routledge
Published: 2017-10-02T00:00:00+00:00

Inequality within the UK

Unlike the preceding two security challenges, inequality is not mentioned in either the SDSR or the NSS. Nonetheless, both vertical inequality (that is, the social and economic gap between individuals or households) and horizontal inequality (namely, the social and economic gap between different culturally defined groups)55 have been relevant as drivers of insecurity within the UK, and this is unlikely to disappear, given the dramatic increase in income inequality since the 1980s.56 If, as the official view maintains, security includes protection of the people “so that they can grow and prosper”, and also concerns “the well-being of the United Kingdom as a whole”, it is difficult to fathom how large gaps in social and economic welfare within the population can be seen as anything other than security issues. While inequality in the UK per se may not yet meet Ayoob’s threshold for a security challenge, its role as both (1) a catalyst for actions that threaten the survivability of the UK’s boundaries and (2) a motivation for actions that undermine the legitimacy of the UK’s governing elites and state institutions merits its inclusion here.

One does not have to go too far back in the past to find an example of how inequality has triggered major security problems for the UK. The ubiquity of anti-Catholic discrimination in Northern Ireland during the 1960s and 1970s and its role in prompting the creation of the Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association (NICRA) has been well documented elsewhere.57 Inequality was rife in housing allocation, private and public sector recruitment, as well as political representation, and it was in response to such disadvantage that NICRA was formed and began to organise public demonstrations. An earlier group—the Campaign for Social Justice—had begun an awareness-raising drive, but this had not led to remedial action by the Stormont government. Stormont’s ban on NICRA’s 1968 demonstration in Derry, and the use of batons on those who sought to defy the ban, began a descent into conflict between the two communities, culminating in the 1969 deployment of British troops into Northern Ireland and the emergence of the Provisional IRA.58 While an ethno-nationalist conflict was at the heart of “The Troubles”, it was social and economic inequalities, as well as the decision by the Stormont government to ignore these and crack down on the demonstrators instead, which initially sparked the cycle of violence. Although the Good Friday Agreement of 1998 largely brought “The Troubles” to an end, a residual threat of Northern Ireland-related terrorism remains today.59 While promoting equality of opportunity in the public sector was prioritised in the Good Friday Agreement, it is not inconceivable that if social and economic conditions deteriorate badly along community lines again, violence may return to Northern Ireland.

In addition, the UK has also seen how underlying conditions of inequality, plus a triggering event, can lead to violence. The London riots of August 2011, following the shooting of Mark Duggan by the police, is a clear example. The riots, which continued over five nights

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