Analysis
Hate expression: graffiti and signage (Part One)
Shannon Doherty sets out recent changes in the PSNI’s policy on removing hate expression and how these may play out in future.
Hate expression: graffiti and signage (Introduction)
A 'reluctance to intervene' has long marked official responses to hate expression. How likely is this to change?
The NI Policing Board: Structure, Powers and Public Accountability
How does the Policing Board work in practice, and how can the public use its mechanisms?
When Do Words Become Hate Speech in NI?
Explainer: The key legal difference between a hate crime and a hate speech offence, and why a powerful 1987 law is rarely used.
What Exactly Does NI Law Say About Hate Crime?
Here we provide an account of the confusing legal landscape of hate crime in NI, from victim perception to a system that limits the hate motive to sentencing.
More Than an Assault: When is a Crime a Hate Crime
The law focuses on the crime, not the hate. We examine the proposed "aggravation" model for justice.
What Factors Correlate With Higher Hate Crime Rates?
Data analysis reveals racist hate crime is not random, but intensely concentrated in specific urban wards, and often downgraded by police.
The Data Behind the Map: Sources, Gaps, and Access
We map the data, but significant gaps remain: under-reporting, PSNI refusals to share recent data, and pre-release access for officials.
Why We Built a Tool to Map Racist Hate in NI
Transparency is the first line of defence. If authorities will not be open about the threats they recognise in private, we will build public accountability ourselves.
Responding to Pogroms, Arson and other Racist Violence in Northern Ireland
In June 2025, I was engaged in field work in Belfast, Northern Ireland, working with women refugees and asylum seekers to better understand how they deal with crises affecting their communities...
Belfast City Council is failing businesses destroyed in racist attacks
A timeline chronicling racist attacks on businesses in Belfast and the ongoing failure of the City Council to support victims.
What is ‘Heatmapping’?
Analysing the methodology use to select areas where people seeking international protection are housed during their asylum claims.
Racism in Belfast: What do we know? And how are we using it to combat racist violence?
We have enabled our institutions to facilitate a ‘whites-only’ agenda as a legitimate community concern.
Racism in Belfast: ‘Compensation? Don’t they have insurance?’
Before the latest spate of organised racist violence, PPR spent some time supporting victims of last August’s racially motivated attacks.
Racism in Belfast: 'Local shops and businesses only'
Almost a year on from a series of racially motivated attacks in south Belfast that have endangered people's lives, health and livelihoods, PPR takes a look at whether anything has really changed.
Racism in Belfast: A Timeline and Media Resource
In 2023/24, the PSNI reported logging 1,353 ‘race incidents’ across the north – the highest yearly total since it began collecting this data in 2004/05.
UN Refugee Agency Examines UK Processes for ‘Moving People On’ from Asylum Support
Last summer, in an effort to meet the Prime Minister’s aim of ‘clearing the asylum backlog’ by end 2023, the Home Office issued an unprecedented number of asylum decisions over a short time.
A closer look at efforts to tackle paramilitarism
The Independent Monitoring Commission expresses concern about the involvement of paramilitaries in racist attacks.
Home Office sacks its own watchdog and ‘cancels’ its own expert committee's findings
Recent Home Office interventions raise serious concerns about its relationship with bodies responsible for oversight of its work.