In the final article in his Emerging Northern Ireland series, Bryan Collmeets figures from the North's political, business and cross-community sectors to gauge their expectations for the future
FOR PROOF that all politics is local, one only need visit the office of Brian Wilson. The constituency headquarters of the only Green Party representative in the Northern Ireland Assembly is unusually busy for a weekday morning. Wilson is in the company of two young advisers, both keen to depart for Stormont where their man is due to greet participants of a charity cycle race.
Constituency office manager Kelly Andrews is manning the phones, fielding calls she says range from planning inquiries to the legal heights of leylandii trees.
Just as Wilson is about to leave for Stormont, his wife Ann arrives with photographs of a newly-erected wind turbine and details of residents' objections. She is soon followed by an elderly gentleman, keen to express his dissatisfaction at the changes made to a bus route.
A few doors down, the Bangor office of the DUP shows little sign of life, save for a notice on the door advertising Union Jacks for sale.
Wilson's election as Green Party MLA for North Down was one of the more unusual footnotes of the 2007 Assembly elections. Along with the victory of the Alliance Party's Chinese candidate Anna Lo in South Belfast, Wilson's victory allowed optimists to suggest that the scope of Northern politics was gradually widening, with new issues, such as the environment, now competing with age-old political allegiances.
Unlike most of his Assembly colleagues, the pro-Belfast Agreement Green Party MLA chose not to declare himself "nationalist" or "unionist" before taking his seat at Stormont. Instead, Wilson's political stance, as well as that of seven Alliance Party MLAs and one Independent, is officially described as "other".
As an outsider on the inside of Northern politics, how does Wilson view the future?
"We have an Executive set up, which is obviously a sign of progress," he says. "But it's still fighting the battles of the 19th and 20th centuries."
Earlier this week, Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness returned from a peace conference in Iraq which saw the unveiling of a set of principles aiming to unite the country's Sunni, Shia and Kurdish communities. The "Helsinki II" principles are the result of two previous meetings which saw South African and Northern Irish politicians sharing their experiences of resolving conflict with their Iraqi counterparts.
Yet as Northern Ireland's political settlement becomes a model for some of the world's bloodiest conflicts, internal observers such as Wilson believe the Executive's foundations are already looking shaky.
"The whole system at present is entirely artificial," says Wilson. "You have two parties - Sinn Féin and the DUP - with totally different political philosophies, trying to agree on a programme for government. It can't last in the long term."
Fuelling Wilson's pessimism is a frustration that parties other than Sinn Féin and the DUP are slowly being elbowed out of Northern politics. Under the current system of political consensus, where four parties hold ministerial posts but do not form a coalition, the lines between government and opposition are blurred.
Wilson, a former economics lecturer, says he voted against the "very right-wing" budget of First Minister Peter Robinson but was surprised to see Sinn Féin support it without great contention. "They would have opposed everything in that budget two or three years ago. But you can't raise objections like that publicly, for fear of rocking the boat."
As for the future of the Assembly, Wilson believes the current political equilibrium in the North could be upset by the challenges of policy-making, especially on contentious issues such as education and the Maze stadium.
"The bigger parties still refer to the big picture: a stable Assembly and not going back to conflict. Policies have to take second place to that." For Wilson, the future success of the North's institutions will be judged by the ability of local politicians to balance the often parochial nature of Northern politics with pressing, international concerns.
He is still reeling from the appointment of the DUP's Sammy Wilson as the North's new Environment Minister. Wilson's namesake is known to be sceptical about climate change and has publicly stated his support for nuclear power.
"I'm extremely worried that we're falling very far behind," says Brian Wilson. "Gordon Brown talks about the biggest crisis the planet has ever faced but our own Environment Minister says climate change doesn't exist."
In the offices of Wombat, a Belfast-based software company, international concerns are, by contrast, firmly at the top of the agenda. The floor of Danny Moore's office is littered with papers, calendars and CD cases; the detritus of a meeting with 30 senior managers from NYSE Euronext, which acquired Wombat for $200 million (€190 million) in March. "Thanks to us, you have an awful lot of executives in London and New York coming to Belfast each quarter," says chief executive Moore. "Most of those people would never have thought of coming here before."
The company, which specialises in software for financial trading markets, was one of the most prominent names to emerge from the recent US-NI Investment conference in Belfast, after it announced the creation of over 70 new jobs to bolster its current local staff of 125.
But, according to Moore, the company has set its sights much higher, aiming to create a software talent pool that will make Northern Ireland a choice location for foreign investors. "Our aim is to be the top employer for high-end talent here," says Moore. "We want to be the Goldman Sachs of Northern Ireland." Like many of his generation, 36-year-old Moore felt he had little choice but to leave home to pursue his chosen career in finance. "What drove me to go to New York was the lack of big opportunities here," he says.
"People from Northern Ireland who worked in the City of London tended to do very well, whereas those that stayed at home hit the glass ceiling in their 20s." Today, over 70 per cent of Wombat's staff members are based in Northern Ireland, a tally that Moore believes would not have been possible had powersharing not been restored.
"There's an awful lot of talent here that was untapped because of the North's poor image abroad," he says. "Five years ago, companies would never have considered coming to Belfast. Today, we're in a tremendously positive place. The key driver is reasonably-priced talent and we have tons of that."
With the wave of a hand, he dismisses the perceived lack of entrepreneurship in the North, which some argue is the legacy of an overdependence on the public sector. "We have no problem finding people who want to work hard to get ahead," he says. "But yes, sometimes it can be difficult to make people full of buzz and excitement when all their friends finish at five."
A 10-minute walk from Wombat's offices, the latest crop of reasonably-priced talent is enjoying strawberries and cream on the lawns of Queen's University.
Gazing out somewhat enviously at the new graduates are Fergus McAleavey and James Murphy. Unlike their fellow final-year students, the two 21 year olds are already back to work, having taken up their new posts in the students' union executive last week.
It would seem a timely moment in which to enter the world of student politics in Belfast. As well as it being the university's centenary year, 2008 also marks the 40th anniversary of the foundation of the Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association; a movement that received some of its strongest support from Queen's students. A forthcoming programme of events organised by the university's history department to mark the anniversary includes public lectures, a film festival and a conference featuring veterans of the civil rights movement.
As vice-president for campaigns, Murphy says he will organise a student activism week to help mark the civil rights anniversary, but insists that the battles being fought inside today's union building have lost much of their political baggage. Recent campaigns have focused on fair trade and the publication dates of examination timetables.
"In the past, the union was seen as catering for just one side of the community", he says. "It's not about the Orange-Green divide any longer. We have students from very different backgrounds now. It's completely changed."
The concerns of today's Queen's students may seem boringly practical by comparison, concedes McAleavey, vice-president for welfare, but they're evidence that the North's post-conflict graduates are simply moving on. "People aren't really concerned about which party you're affiliated to or your background," says McAleavey. "Now, it's about the issues you stand for."
Series concluded.