Beginning of the End of Northern Ireland?

[LabourJersey]

As someone who hasn't followed the politics of the British Isles closely, would it be possible for NI to leave the UK without Irish reunification? I.e. Northern Ireland would become an independent state. It would be a small state, but far from the smallest, and independence could allow a slow evolution over time from the status quo toward eventual reunification (or not).

In theory yes, but the only thing keeping NI economy from turning into Greece are transfer payments from the rest of the UK. Historically, there was also the small matter that the only thing keeping the place from descending into a civil f****** war was the presence of British Army and London government being there to intervene (indeed, ruling NI directly) in case the Unionist majority decided to go full on fascist. That might seem irrelevant today, but sectarian resentments plus an economy in the gutter is not a good combination.

This is the point people always seem to ignore. Unionists entire identity is about not being Irish, they will never accept being part of Ireland anymore than Sinn Fein supporters ever accepted being part of Britain. Unionist paramilitaries still have an awful lot of guns even post GFA..

This is true, but the difference is that when the Republicans make a big statement Dublin takes notice. Historically when Unionists protest and commit acts of violence, Westminster at best doesn't take notice, or otherwise actively condemns then. Like something like 100k marched against the Anglo-Irish agreement...UK gov didn't give a sh**t and now they give even less of a sh**t. They'd rather these guys didn't exist. They are very tolerant to extremist Loyalist compared to dissident Republicans, but the dissident Republicans have had far more political capital (that will increase with the Sinn Fein surge south of the border) that Loyalists with Westminster.

While true, that doesn't really solve the problem. Not having allies in London would only make the unionist paramilitaries more desperate, not less.

And I certainly don't have a solution for what to do with Unionists. the IRA always seemed to think they would just...leave, basically. Which, for one thing, ignores the fact that the most violent UDA types are also from the some of the poorest areas of NI, so they're the least likely to emigrate.

I guess after a few years it's possible unionist terrorists would give up, realizing that there's no hope of re-joining the UK, but I wouldn't bet on it.

[CumbrianLefty]

Well the alternative scenario is that they actually come to see that *some* sort of united Ireland is a "historic inevitability", so to speak. Which would mean their strategy (and that of the "legitimate" NI unionist parties, of course) switching to exacting as high a price as possible from Dublin - which in practice would surely mean a high degree of continued autonomy.

But no, I'm not holding my breath for this to happen any time soon either.

[LabourJersey]

Well the alternative scenario is that they actually come to see that *some* sort of united Ireland is a "historic inevitability", so to speak. Which would mean their strategy (and that of the "legitimate" NI unionist parties, of course) switching to exacting as high a price as possible from Dublin - which in practice would surely mean a high degree of continued autonomy.

But no, I'm not holding my breath for this to happen any time soon either.

Good point. Though I always felt that a key part of a united Ireland plan would be some kind of autonomy for NI, or even a federalized system (which may not be a terrible idea, given how dominant Dublin is politically & economically). But I don't know if people in the ROI would want that

[Filuwaúrdjan]

It would mean the end of the Republic as presently constituted, which is yet another excellent reason to maintain some form of the present arrangement.

[Estrella]

As someone who hasn't followed the politics of the British Isles closely, would it be possible for NI to leave the UK without Irish reunification? I.e. Northern Ireland would become an independent state. It would be a small state, but far from the smallest, and independence could allow a slow evolution over time from the status quo toward eventual reunification (or not).

I’m pretty sure the Catholic majority border areas (Fermanagh, Tyrone, Derry City, South Armagh, South Down) would just jump ship to the RoI in that event leaving NI a rump state.

Hacking off some but not all of NI would create more problems than it would solve. Majority Catholic ≠ no Protestants.

(Arlene Foster is actually from Fermanagh btw)

[Zinneke]

It would mean the end of the Republic as presently constituted, which is yet another excellent reason to maintain some form of the present arrangement.

Do you include the power sharing principle as part of the present arrangement? Because while its a good stop-gap eventually it leads to decay and clientelism. You said so yourself in a similar thread : Sinn Fein and the DUP are purely in power to serve narrow clientelist interests. They know they can only be outflanked by more extreme forces if they fear their positions within the Executive. That is in no way shape or form a healthy direction for Northern Irish politics.

It will take a radical movement that actively bans the denomination of sectarian parties. This might be idealistic, it might dismissed by those such as yourself that preach status quo political reasoning but the polling of the Alliance is a glimmer of something beyond the institutional debate. I also remember Mike Nesbitt, one of the few brave and forward-thinking Unionists, saying in the Assembly election after the RHI scandal, that this was the opportunity to move beyond the sectarian cleavage, and actually have a vote based on the record of the executive, calling his own voters to put SDLP as second choice.

There is absolutely no way forward for Northern Ireland as a country (which is what it is) as long as the sectarian divide dominates its politics. The status quo and "present arrangement" is in no way sustainable.

[IceAgeComing]

And what that led to was the UUP losing a seat notionally; the SDLP only gaining one notionally, with Sinn Fein being the big gainers of the election.  Nesbitt immediately resigned as Ulster Unionist leader and the leadership they've had since is very much not of that view.  I think broadly people look at that campaign as being something bold, but very unsuccessful for the UUP - less so for the SDLP who did a lot better than I think people were expecting them to simply by holding on to their seats.

The structure of power sharing is hardly perfect for anyone but that's why it works: its designed to prevent anyone from holding on to all of the power.  You have to consider the legacy of majority rule in Northern Ireland: when they had full control from 1921 to 1972 the Unionists completely disempowered the Catholic minority by moving from STV to highly gerrymandered FPTP constituencies that they promptly never changed since they entrenched a particular type of Unionist in positions of power, they retained property requirements to vote in Local Government elections to ensure Unionist government in majority-Catholic areas and used those positions of power to discriminate significantly against the Catholic populations of those areas.  The reason why the RUC was seen as being systematically biased against Catholics was because it was: and that was a legacy of that period that lasted for decades after the Parliament was abolished and they started to attempt power sharing.  Everyone in Northern Ireland knows this is what happened and that's why neither side, no matter what they say publicly, wants to return to that sort of politics: not only because it could mean their community being disempowered (and that's what Unionists fear most); but also because the perception of that happening would lead to an increase in political violence and no one wants that.

Northern Ireland is a unique place: I'm still a young person but I can remember stories about violence in Northern Ireland airing on the TV news seemingly every night when I was a kid and I grew up in the late 90s-early 2000s so that's the tail end of the troubles: things were worse in prior decades.  And while if you look at it from purely an academic basis the current system might not seem optimal: its a lot better than militants assassinating people on the streets for the crime of having the wrong religion, or trying to bomb crowded places.

To address the "end sectarianism" point: how do you do that?  If there was a viable way for that to happen then don't you think past UK governments would have tried?  You are reliant on the people to vote for non-sectarian parties to do that and based on recent election results while the Brexit issue seems to have galvanised some Unionist support for the Alliance and they seem to be on the up; there's limited evidence that is going to lead to a nation-wide surge for other cross-community parties.  And in this case the institutional change has to follow the people changing since if it doesn't the risk of political violence dramatically increases.

[Former President tack50]

This is going to be a hugely hot and controversial take, but in a way I think that the Good Friday Agreement was a mistake. You do not negotiate with terrorists. It would have been vastly preferrable for the IRA to have been utterly crushed than for the GFA to happen.

Spain was able to fully and thoroughly crush the Basque terrorists and terrorism in the region; and this is in spite of Basque nationalists being clearly a majority! (unlike NI where Irish nationalsits only make up like 35-40%) What is the UK's excuse?

In fact, I'd have gone a step further and banned all parties with terrorist or paramilitary links. That of course means Sinn Fein would not exist, but also parties like the Ulster Democratic Party. The DUP would have also been banned (indeed the only "legal parties in NI would be the reasonable parties of UUP, SDLP and Alliance pretty much)

And yes, I know the UK government supported the unionist terrorists sometimes. That was wrong and 100% condemnable; but it also happened here (see: GAL and various other similar groups) and we still crushed terrorism thoroughly. What is the UK's excuse for having to sell out to the IRA instead of forcing them to wave the white flag?

[Zinneke]

The structure of power sharing is what maintains the more extreme elements grip on some of the power structures in the first place. DUP have engaged in a consistent strategy of pointing towards the threat of SF to win votes, never based on their own competence (god forbid).

And yes, I'm fully aware of what majority rule in Ulster entails. I also think you can still have a democracy where incumbents can lose, whilst still having alarm bell procedures for minorities in the country. The current system favours those who declare themselves as sectarian parties and the electoral system creates essentially favours an ethnic head count. In what way does this help inter-community relations?

The "end sectarianism" agenda starts with ending the segregation of schools and the role of religion in public life in the province, and eventually ends with the withering away of sectarian-denominated parties. The only way that can happen is with a grassroots political movement that is non-sectarian and able to totally dismantle the power structures - within society as much as within Stormont - that create the SF-DUP criminal duopoly.

I understand you feel close to it (nor should you assume I am not). And my remarks are no way a criticism of the peace process. Good Friday and St Andrews were not selling out anybody, they were genuine successes in peace building. But the idea that the political system as it exists in Northern Ireland is in any way sustainable over the long term has no basis in reality - it will just lead to outflanking to get better terms for your own community within the Stormont system, with the lingering threat of breaking it down, the same that we saw happen to UUP-SDLP after the GFA (which could easily happen to DUP-SF, and is in the former's case with the TUV). There is no horizon for progress in those terms.

edit : and I in no way think tack's solution is feasible either.

[CumbrianLefty]

This is going to be a hugely hot and controversial take, but in a way I think that the Good Friday Agreement was a mistake. You do not negotiate with terrorists. It would have been vastly preferrable for the IRA to have been utterly crushed than for the GFA to happen.

We tried "crushing" the IRA for long enough, and for a while (until the late 1960s) it even worked to a degree. There are plenty in the British establishment who would have continued to pursue it were it a viable prospect, which in itself strongly suggests that it actually was not.

[Former President tack50]

This is going to be a hugely hot and controversial take, but in a way I think that the Good Friday Agreement was a mistake. You do not negotiate with terrorists. It would have been vastly preferrable for the IRA to have been utterly crushed than for the GFA to happen.

We tried "crushing" the IRA for long enough, and for a while (until the late 1960s) it even worked to a degree. There are plenty in the British establishment who would have continued to pursue it were it a viable prospect, which in itself strongly suggests that it actually was not.

There are still lots of avenues that were never tried though? First and foremost of course, Sinn Fein should have been made illegal.

Still, even if completely crushing the IRA was impossible, the question then is why did the UK lose "the war" and have to get a negotiated settlement. A settlement that includes the fact that if NI wants they can have a referendum on joining Ireland! (which would never ever happen here, though Scotland shows the UK is way more permissive on that regard)

[Estrella]

This is going to be a hugely hot and controversial take, but in a way I think that the Good Friday Agreement was a mistake. You do not negotiate with terrorists. It would have been vastly preferrable for the IRA to have been utterly crushed than for the GFA to happen.

We tried "crushing" the IRA for long enough, and for a while (until the late 1960s) it even worked to a degree. There are plenty in the British establishment who would have continued to pursue it were it a viable prospect, which in itself strongly suggests that it actually was not.

There are still lots of avenues that were never tried though? First and foremost of course, Sinn Fein should have been made illegal.

Still, even if completely crushing the IRA was impossible, the question then is why did the UK lose "the war" and have to get a negotiated settlement. A settlement that includes the fact that if NI wants they can have a referendum on joining Ireland! (which would never ever happen here, though Scotland shows the UK is way more permissive on that regard)

The reason for that is the existence of Irish Sea. More specifically, the physical separation of Northern Ireland from the rest of the country meant that London politicians of all stripes treated it as a quasi-colony where involvement should be kept to a minimum. Yes, they could have banned Sinn Féin (and guess DUP as well while they were at it) and it could have been a better solution, but who wants to deal with that? A typical Westminster politician (really, a typical Briton) cares about Belfast as much as about sheep rustling in Mongolia.

[CumbrianLefty]

It "could" have been a better solution, but there's a very good chance it wouldn't have been.

[Estrella]

It "could" have been a better solution, but there's a very good chance it wouldn't have been.

Yeah, I agree. It would only lead to more violence and it wouldn't have achieved anything. When Spain tried this in Euskadi, all they accomplished was wasting everyone's time with that pointless game of partisan whackamole - EH Bildu are still basically the same people they'd be if they weren't banned a hundred times previously.

Though it did give us some pretty funny election results, like when these guys got 12% back in 2005:

[Velasco]

This is going to be a hugely hot and controversial take, but in a way I think that the Good Friday Agreement was a mistake. You do not negotiate with terrorists. It would have been vastly preferrable for the IRA to have been utterly crushed than for the GFA to happen.

Spain was able to fully and thoroughly crush the Basque terrorists and terrorism in the region; and this is in spite of Basque nationalists being clearly a majority! (unlike NI where Irish nationalsits only make up like 35-40%) What is the UK's excuse?

In fact, I'd have gone a step further and banned all parties with terrorist or paramilitary links. That of course means Sinn Fein would not exist, but also parties like the Ulster Democratic Party. The DUP would have also been banned (indeed the only "legal parties in NI would be the reasonable parties of UUP, SDLP and Alliance pretty much)

And yes, I know the UK government supported the unionist terrorists sometimes. That was wrong and 100% condemnable; but it also happened here (see: GAL and various other similar groups) and we still crushed terrorism thoroughly. What is the UK's excuse for having to sell out to the IRA instead of forcing them to wave the white flag?

Please do not compare Northern Ireland and Basque Country

I think that you would not use the word "unionist" in a Basque and Catalan context if you knew how Ulster unionists really are.

[Frodo]

To everyone concerned about possible terrorism on the part of desperate Protestant paramilitaries in the event of Irish reunification -how do you feel about having the United Kingdom offering sanctuary (for lack of a better word) in Britain to all Northern Irish Protestants who cannot countenance living under the Irish Republic, especially for those who can't otherwise afford to move?  After all, presumably they are already British citizens, and therefore they don't need visas.  

[CumbrianLefty]

There would almost certainly be significant emigration of NI unionists to Britain in the event of almost any conceivable united Ireland scenario. Of course we would - and should - accept and welcome them.

[Coldstream]

To everyone concerned about possible terrorism on the part of desperate Protestant paramilitaries in the event of Irish reunification -how do you feel about having the United Kingdom offering sanctuary (for lack of a better word) in Britain to all Northern Irish Protestants who cannot countenance living under the Irish Republic, especially for those who can't otherwise afford to move?  After all, presumably they are already British citizens, and therefore they don't need visas.  

Why would they leave? It’s not like the Irish military would actually have a chance at beating them if they chose to make a fight of it. Honestly I’d encourage anyone thinking they’d go peacefully to go and meet Ian Paisley Jr or Sammy Wilson. They are no more going to give up their homes/identities than Sinn Fein or the IRA did after hundreds of years of British rule.

[Zinneke]

Not to mentioned they'll be far more listened to and influential in Dublin than in London, ironically.


(unless Sinn Fein lead the Republic's government during any transition phase).

[ProudModerate2]

It seems that soon, the major chunks of the "United" Kingdom will only be England and Wales.

[EastAnglianLefty]

If you consider the demographics of the unionist hard-core, they're much less likely to emigrate than more moderate unionists. Anecdotally, the Alliance would probably do a lot better if Northern Irish university students at GB universities were more likely to return home after graduating than they are.

[CumbrianLefty]

Tbh we don't know how even the "hardcore" would react to a united Ireland coming into being.

And there is the precedent of significant emigration of the protestant minority after the Free State came into being (both to NI and the British mainland)

[Statilius the Epicurean]

This is going to be a hugely hot and controversial take, but in a way I think that the Good Friday Agreement was a mistake. You do not negotiate with terrorists. It would have been vastly preferrable for the IRA to have been utterly crushed than for the GFA to happen.

Except the GFA was the defeat of the IRA. It was more or less what the UK government had agreed to at Sunningdale in 1973, 25 years previously. The IRA armed campaign during the intervening 25 years was to force a united Ireland by collapsing the British state in Northern Ireland militarily; the reason Adams, McGuinness and co. abandoned the armed campaign was because they saw that was impossible to achieve. So the Provisional IRA decommissioned and went into electoral politics.

[Former President tack50]

This is going to be a hugely hot and controversial take, but in a way I think that the Good Friday Agreement was a mistake. You do not negotiate with terrorists. It would have been vastly preferrable for the IRA to have been utterly crushed than for the GFA to happen.

Except the GFA was the defeat of the IRA. It was more or less what the UK government had agreed to at Sunningdale in 1973, 25 years previously. The IRA armed campaign during the intervening 25 years was to force a united Ireland by collapsing the British state in Northern Ireland militarily; the reason Adams, McGuinness and co. abandoned the armed campaign was because they saw that was impossible to achieve. So the Provisional IRA decommissioned and went into electoral politics.

Ok, I guess I'll slightly change that to "unconditional surrender from the IRA" (as opposed to the "negotiated treaty" that was the GFA)

[Statilius the Epicurean]

This is going to be a hugely hot and controversial take, but in a way I think that the Good Friday Agreement was a mistake. You do not negotiate with terrorists. It would have been vastly preferrable for the IRA to have been utterly crushed than for the GFA to happen.

Except the GFA was the defeat of the IRA. It was more or less what the UK government had agreed to at Sunningdale in 1973, 25 years previously. The IRA armed campaign during the intervening 25 years was to force a united Ireland by collapsing the British state in Northern Ireland militarily; the reason Adams, McGuinness and co. abandoned the armed campaign was because they saw that was impossible to achieve. So the Provisional IRA decommissioned and went into electoral politics.

Ok, I guess I'll slightly change that to "unconditional surrender from the IRA" (as opposed to the "negotiated treaty" that was the GFA)

But my point is that they surrendered in exchange for an agreement that the British government had already made with nationalists and moderate unionists decades ago...