The environment as a second policy dimension in a deeply divided society: The politics of Northern Ireland’s Lough Neagh crisis

Environmental concerns are often marginalised in post-conflict societies. Especially under power-sharing, political parties tend to prioritise their ethno-national electoral segments’ interests, rather than co-operating across divides, reducing cross-cutting concerns to a secondary policy dimension and compromising joint policy-making. Even given inauspicious institutional incentives, however, shared priorities can encourage mass co-operation. This article analyses Northern Ireland parties’ responses to an ecological crisis at Lough Neagh, showing how they commit to its resolution rhetorically, while continuing to prioritise the interests of their distinct ethno-national segments. We demonstrate that segmental parties’ concern for the crisis is instrumental, with the second dimension of environmental policies acting primarily to serve existing interests and to crystalise political identities, compromising the policy response. These parties have outsourced responsibility for the issue of Lough Neagh to a cross-segmental party, and in so doing, we argue, have set it up to fail at the task of addressing the crisis.