Population Distribution by Religious Affiliation: Terrorist Activity in Northern Ireland

The districts of Northern Ireland are well defined in identifying where people live according to their religious affiliation. Patterns emerge which enable generalizations to be made about where people reside depending upon whether they are classified as Protestant or Catholic. The purpose of this research is to ascertain how terrorist incidents are associated with population distribution by religious affiliation for the past two decades on a district by district basis. It is the general contention that terrorist activity occurs where there is a mixture of Catholics and Protestants. Shifts in population distribution correspond to changes in the spatial distribution of terrorist activities. Results indicate that terrorist activities, like the Catholic distribution, has shifted to the rural border areas of Northern Ireland. Associating the variables of population distribution and religious preference to terrorist activity demonstrates that human patterns can be classified and predicted even though the spatial behavior is not totally understood.