This Good Relations Week seminar explored the potential of social and community farming to cultivate good relations between different communities in Northern Ireland. It featured insights from a panel that included Dr Matt Williams, Conservation and Education Manager at Jubilee Farm (Northern Ireland's first community-owned farm), Tiziana O’Hara from Cooperative Alternatives, and Dr Aoibeann Walsh from Rural Support. The event was chaired by ARK's Dr Jonny Hanson.  

It took place in the Great Hall at QUB, 19th September, 10:00 - 12:00.

On 6 September, ARK hosted a seminar to present key findings from the 2024 KLT and YLT surveys. ARK's Professor Dirk Schubotz highlighted results relating to education, rights and gender-based violence at the event, which took place at YouthAction Belfast.

On 28 August, ARK hosted a seminar to launch a working paper highlighting the three main features that define paramilitarism in contemporary Northern Ireland - Legitimacy, Utility and Threat. These key features are consistent, although they have manifested differently over time. Written by Brendan Sturgeon, Duncan Morrow, Lucy Geddes, Dominic Bryan, Siobhán McAlister, Claire Hazelden and Peter Sheridan, the paper provides a simple way of understanding a set of complex social practices.

One in 5 adults in Northern Ireland have a probable mental illness.  In addition, our history of conflict here may have contributed to more complex mental health difficulties.  Thus, accessing timely and appropriate mental health supports is vital.  In this seminar, Professor Siobhan O’Neill and Dr Nicole Bond (Office of the Mental Health Champion) highlighted findings from the 2023 Northern Ireland Life and Times survey, exploring public experiences of accessing mental health supports.

The event took place on Tuesday 14 May 2024, 10.30 to 12.00, in the Boardroom at Clifton House, Belfast.

The Welfare State is perhaps the biggest social policy success of the post-war generation. 

The ARK Ageing Programme invited Dr. Eve Worth (University of Exeter), author of The Welfare State Generation: Women, Agency and Class in Britain since 1945 to present evidence of the impact of the welfare state on the progress of women as individual agents and important workers in public sector jobs. Her work sheds light on many of the challenges facing today’s generation of students – debt, precarity and the absence of strong ties to reliable institutions of the state.

In this event, we discussed whether the welfare state is worth saving, and what role each generation can play in maintaining social cohesion in a time of insecurity and hyper-individualisation.

In this talk, Professor Catherine Needham (University of Birmingham, School of Social Policy) presented findings from a new book Social Care in the UK’s Four Nations - Between Two Paradigms to explore differences between jurisdictions, and what impact the differences are having. 

Drawing on extensive interviews with national and local policy makers across the UK, the research raises vital questions about the role of ‘standardisation’ and ‘differentiation’ as approaches to solving the social care crisis.

This event on 29 November 2023 celebrated 20 years of the Young Life and Times (YLT) survey of 16 year olds.  YLT has covered a wide range of questions concerning young people's lives and it has become one of the main tools to inform policy making on and for young people in Northern Ireland. 

Cate McNamee (Queen's University Belfast) used data from the 2022 Young Life and Times survey to explore young people's romantic relationships.

This event on 29 November 2023 celebrated 20 years of the Young Life and Times (YLT) survey of 16 year olds.  YLT has covered a wide range of questions concerning young people's lives and it has become one of the main tools to inform policy making on and for young people in Northern Ireland.

Una O'Connor Bones (Ulster University) discussed policy and YLT data in relation to education, citizenship and diversity. 

This event on 29 November 2023 celebrated 20 years of the Young Life and Times (YLT) survey of 16 year olds.  YLT has covered a wide range of questions concerning young people's lives and it has become one of the main tools to inform policy making on and for young people in Northern Ireland.

The speakers included the Commissioner for Children and Young People, as well as expert researchers who we have worked with over the last 20 years. They considered what young people's lives in Northern Ireland are like 25 years after the Good Friday Agreement and reflected on the positive contributions young people make to life in Northern Ireland. 

This event on 29 November 2023 celebrated 20 years of the Young Life and Times (YLT) survey of 16 year olds.  YLT has covered a wide range of questions concerning young people's lives and it has become one of the main tools to inform policy making on and for young people in Northern Ireland. 

Siobhan McAlister (Queen's University Belfast) and Gail Neill (Ulster University) highlighted the research exploring the experiences of young women in relation to violence and respect.