Why History Matters for Understanding Everyday Conflict and Peace: Reflections from Ireland and Ukraine

Dr Éamonn Ó Ciardha is a Reader in History in the School of Arts and Humanities at Ulster University

E.ociardha@ulster.ac.uk

This INCORE blog is based on an article due to be published in the forthcoming Volume:

Frenk, J., Freier, N., Ó Ciardha, É and Pearson, V. (eds) (2026) Irish Studies in a Changing Europe. Saarbrucken: Saarbrucken University press.

Comparing Ireland and Ukraine may seem unconventional at first, yet placing these two regions side by side reveals patterns that offer valuable insight into how communities today negotiate division and identity. Ireland and Ukraine’s histories remind us that the contemporary society of both places is shaped not only by political agreements but by deep-rooted cultural memories and long-term experiences of historic conflict. These influences continue to shape Ireland’s ongoing peace process and remain ever present in Ukraine, where conflict continues as an everyday reality.

Both Ireland and Ukraine have been imagined, and at times misrepresented, through external narratives. In Ireland’s case, medieval origin legends, in which the island’s people were said to descend from Scythians, were later repurposed by early modern English writers like Edmund Spenser to justify conquest. Ukraine, too, found itself cast as a frontier zone in the imaginations of successive empires. These narratives tell us something important: communities often begin negotiating identity long before modern conflict emerges, and how they are described by outsiders can influence how they are governed, understood and remembered.

The shared experience of empire is central to both stories. Ireland’s Tudor re‑conquest and later incorporation into the British system meant upheaval for Gaelic and Old English lordships, just as the expansion of Russian rule transformed Cossack polities and local governance in Ukraine during the eighteenth century. These processes were not abstract. They reshaped landholding, altered the balance between rural and urban communities, restricted economic autonomy and restructured social hierarchies. Much of the tension we see in both regions today, around authority, belonging and cultural difference, has roots in these earlier transformations.

Famine memory forms another point of comparison. Ireland’s Gorta Mór and Ukraine’s Holodomor were different in origin and intent, yet both left a profound mark on collective memory. In each case, communities developed a narrative of survival that continues to inform how they understand vulnerability, state power and the importance of local support networks. These memories do not simply live in commemorations; they shape everyday attitudes, fears and aspirations. Any contemporary peacebuilding effort must recognise how such emotional histories inform public expectations.

  

Monument "Barrow of Sorrow" in Mhar, Poltava region, Ukraine to the Holodomor 1932—1933 

Attribution Aleksander Kaasik, CC BY-SA 3.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

 

 

Famine memorial, Dublin

Attribution by Gareth James, CC BY-SA 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

Religious and cultural identity also played formative roles. The British confessional state marginalised Irish Catholics for centuries, just as the Russian Empire struggled to integrate religious minorities and uphold cultural diversity. These examples illustrate a wider point: communities often respond to restriction not by abandoning their traditions but by deepening them. Storytelling, song, ritual, and language became quiet forms of resilience in both contexts. They helped people make sense of uncertainty and maintained social cohesion when political structures were unstable.

What is often overlooked, however, is how much cooperation occurred at the level of daily life. Markets, seasonal labour, bilingual communication, and shared customs created opportunities for coexistence even in politically tense times. These practices remind us that peace is rarely constructed solely from above. More often, it is built through informal interactions. These are small, consistent acts of living alongside one another that accumulate into social stability.

There is also a wider intellectual story here. Thinkers such as Engels, Marx and Lenin drew on Ireland to analyse colonial power, class dynamics and cultural suppression, ideas that later resonated with debates in Ukraine. Their interest underscores how these regions, though geographically distant, have long served as case studies for understanding how communities respond to unequal processes of power and seek autonomy. That international attention highlights the broader relevance of their histories beyond national boundaries.

If there is a lesson to draw from these intertwined stories, it is that peace cannot be separated from memory. Communities living with the legacies of conflict bring long historical horizons to their present-day choices. Whether we look at cultural revival, debates about language, or efforts to rebuild trust, the past is never far away. Ireland and Ukraine both demonstrate that while history can be a source of tension, it can also be a resource in  the present. History offers  examples of resilience, creativity and everyday coexistence that continue to shape collective life.

Understanding these patterns does not solve present challenges in either region, but it helps explain them. In the work of peacebuilding, that understanding is often where meaningful progress begins.