To explore the project themes a range of research questions will be addressed including:

  • What are the challenges in managing and mediating diverse voices?
  • Have victims been silenced or had their voices co-opted by others?
  • How well or otherwise are victims’ voices represented by the media, or by politicians?
  • What mobilisation strategies do victims groups use? How have these changed over time?
  • What local or international networks do victims groups use?
  • Do mobilisation strategies involving working with those viewed as ‘the other’? How do these strategies impact upon experiences of victimhood?
  • What role does blame play in how victimhood is understood in Northern Ireland?
  • Is there a hierarchy of victimhood in Northern Ireland? How does the notion of hierarchy map onto levels of blame and blamelessness?
  • What role do victims and victims groups play in the construction of imagined political communities?
  • How do claims to legitimacy and imagined political communities shape broader political and public debates about, for example, the definition of a victim or ways of dealing with the past?