The UK-Ireland Border and the Stability of Peace and Security in Northern Ireland, 2017-2019

There are two sets of data exploring people's attitudes in Northern Ireland towards different types of Brexit and their possible consequences on political stability and peace. The survey data is a representative sample of 1,012 people from across Northern Ireland were interviewed by Ipsos-MORI in face-to-face computer-assisted interviews between 9 February and 12 March 2018. A two-stage sampling design was used, with random selection of geographic sampling points and quotas set for each sampling point based on the latest socio-demographic census estimates to ensure that the respondents were statistically representative of the Northern Ireland population regarding traits such as age, gender, religion of origin, geographical location, and social class. The deliberative forum data studies 48 people from across Northern Ireland took part in a deliberative forum in which they received expert presentations and discussed the possible impact on Northern Ireland of the UK’s exit from the EU. This deliberative forum took place on 10 February 2018 at the Clayton Hotel in Belfast. Ipsos MORI recruited the 48 participants to be broadly representative of the Northern Ireland population in their socio-demographic backgrounds and geographic residences. Importantly, the sample was broadly balanced between those who had voted Leave and those who had voted Remain in the 2016 referendum. The participants’ roundtable discussions in the morning and afternoon were recorded and transcribed. Participants also completed questionnaires, from which survey data are provided. A follow up survey experiment was conducted in 2019 to test the effect of imagined dialogue on inter-group attitudes. In the first wave (March-April 2019), the experimental treatment involved participants engaging in an imagined conversation about a controversial political issue with someone holding the opposite view; participants randomly assigned to the control condition were asked to imagine having a conversation about a benign non-political issue with someone holding an opposite political viewpoint. The survey experiment was conducted using representative samples in three political contexts: Northern Ireland (unionists/nationalists; N = 1,263), Great Britain (Remainers/Leavers; N = 1,879), and the USA (pro-life/pro-choice; N = 1,217). A second wave of the experiment (June-July 2019) used the same design but addressed partisan divisions rather than divisions over political issues in Northern Ireland (SF/DUP supporters; N = 806), Great Britain (Conservative/Labour supporters; N = 839) and the USA (Democrats/Republicans; N = 836).