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Parkinson Alan F.. 1972 and the Ulster Troubles: “A very bad year.” Dublin: Four Courts Press, 2010. Pp 400. €35.00 (cloth).
Alan Parkinson has written a useful contextualized history of one of the worst years of violence in Northern Ireland—1972. This was also a year that marked radical political change—a politicization and radicalization of the Northern Catholic community after Bloody Sunday, a polarization of the communities, and the end of Stormont rule. Parkinson deals sure-footedly with the major events. Despite having written this book before the publication of the Saville Report on Bloody Sunday, the author’s judgments are fair, although like many he underestimated how far the report would vindicate the victims and their families.
The main value of the book lies in its contextualization of these events in the everyday...