THE CONFLICT IN NORTHERN IRELAND

As Cairns and Darby (1998) point out, “The conflict in Northern Ireland is at its most basic a struggle between those who wish to see Northern Ireland remain part of the United Kingdom and those who wish to see the reunification of the island of Ireland” (p.

Cairns and Darby (1998) also state that “years of oppression by the colonists and rebellion by the native Irish culminated in the Treaty of 1921, which parti­tioned the island into two sections: the six predominantly Protestant counties of the North, which remained an integral part of the United Kingdom, and the twenty-six mainly Catholic counties of the South, which separated from the United Kingdom” (p. 755) and ultimately became known as the Republic of Ireland. Despite the partition, significant violence has occurred periodically in Northern Ireland.

The use of the terms Catholic and Protestant to label the conflicting groups is not meant to indicate that the conflict is primarily a religious one, although that is an element. A small sector of the Protestant population is virulently anti­Catholic and fears for its religious freedom if union occurs with the Irish repub­lic, whose population is 98 percent Catholic. The Irish Roman Catholic hierarchy has heavily influenced the laws of the Republic of Ireland in such matters as divorce and birth control.

Other elements come into play. The Catholics mainly consider themselves to be Irish, while the Protestants prefer to be viewed as British. Economic inequality has been an important factor in fueling the conflict: there has been considerably more unemployment, less education, and poorer housing among the Catholics as compared with the Protestants.

Although the costs of the intergroup conflict in Northern Ireland have been relatively small compared to ethnic conflicts in areas such as Rwanda, Lebanon, Bosnia, Sri Lanka, and Kosovo, they have not been insignificant. Taking into account population size, the deaths due to violence in Northern Ireland are equivalent to 500,000 deaths in the United States. There are not only the direct costs of violence in terms of death and injury (about 3,000 killed and 30,000 injured between 1969 and 1994) but also the indirect, harder-to-measure eco­nomic and mental health costs. Some of these costs were borne by England: the economic, psychological, and political toll from seeing some of its soldiers attacked and killed in an attempt to control the violence.

Over the years, various attempts have been made to reduce the explosive­ness of the conflict, including efforts by the Northern Ireland government to improve the economic situation of the Catholics, stimulation of intergroup con­tact under favorable circumstances, conduct of intergroup workshops for influ­ential in both groups, organization of women’s groups that conducted various demonstrations against violence, integration of some of the Catholic and Protes­tant schools, recognition and honoring of the cultural traditions of both groups, and so forth. Many of these efforts were sabotaged by extremist groups on both sides. However, cumulatively they began to create the recognition that peaceful relations might be possible and that continued violence would not lead to vic­tory for either side. Most of the ordinary people on both sides became increas­ingly alienated from the perpetrators of violence.

The conditions for possible successful negotiation of a solution to the con­flict were beginning to develop. The heads of three interested and concerned governments—U.S. President Clinton, Prime Minister Blair of Great Britain, and Prime Minister Ahern of Ireland—played key roles in getting the leaders of the various factions involved in the conflict to the negotiating table. Appointing for­mer U.S. Senator George Mitchell, a highly respected and influential political figure, as a mediator was an important, positive step. He was acceptable to both sides and was a well-practiced, skilled political mediator.

There have been substantial popular votes in Northern Ireland as well as in Ireland in favor of an agreement negotiated among leaders of the main Protes­tant and Catholic factions in Northern Ireland that was hoped would end their protracted, sometimes violent conflict. The agreement was developed with the aid of a skillful mediator and with strong pressures from the leaders of the three interested governments in constant telephone contact with the negotiators dur­ing the difficult phases of the process. In coming to an agreement, each of the conflicting parties had to modify long-held positions, reduce their aspirations, and act with greater civility toward one another as well as bring the extremists in their groups under control. This was difficult to do. The level of distrust among the conflicting groups is still very high despite the agreement. Its suc­cessful implementation over a period of time requires a high level of vigilance among those committed to its successful implementation, to prevent misun­derstandings or the actions of extremists from unraveling it. The agreement itself was a creative attempt to respond to the apprehensions as well as interests of the various participants in the conflict. Its achievement was honored in 1998 by the Nobel Peace Prize, awarded to John Hume and David Trimble, the leading negotiators for the Catholics and Protestants, respectively.

Professor Ed Cairns, a social psychologist at the University of Ulster in North­ern Ireland, e-mailed me on November 5, 2005 with his views of what has hap­pened since the agreement. He indicated that the agreement led to the setting up of a regional parliament known as the Northern Ireland Assembly. This made a good start and included ministers from all parties—even those initially opposed to the agreement. However, the Assembly has had a stop-start exis­tence and has been suspended more often than it has been in action. These sus­pensions came about largely because of Protestant/Unionist perceptions that the IRA was refusing to decommission its weapons as required by the Good Friday Agreement. No weapons were decommissioned until 2001 and the final decommissioning was not announced until 2005. In between, however, there were allegations that the IRA had been involved in espionage, training Colombian guerrillas, and a major bank robbery.

Sinn Fein has also pointed out that Loyalist paramilitaries, which tend to be smaller organizations, have not offered to decommission and are now believed to be involved in racketeering and major crime. Further, although there have been major changes to the policing system, Sinn Fein believed that all the reforms promised in the Agreement have not yet been implemented.

The IRA’s refusal to decommission cost David Trimble (the main Unionist leader at the time of the Agreement and in the Assembly) dearly. He had entered into the government with Sinn Fein—seen by most as the political wing of the IRA. However, Protestants felt that Catholic/Nationalists had most of their demands met—for example, by the release of “political” prisoners and the dis­bandment of the Royal Ulster Constabulary, but had given nothing in return. The result was that in the 2003 elections Trimble lost his seat and his party was virtually wiped out, being replaced by the more radical, anti-Agreement Demo­cratic Unionist Party (DUP) led by Dr. Ian Paisley.

Generally, these electoral moves have been reflected in social surveys in which a majority of Protestants report that today they would be unlikely to vote again for the Agreement had they the opportunity to do so. Demographic trends also suggest a worsening of intergroup relations indicating that Northern Ireland is entering a period of “benign apartheid” with segregation now worse than it was before the “troubles” began in 1968. Observers are in agreement then that one lesson from Northern Ireland is that a peace agreement does not necessar­ily lead straight to a post-conflict era but instead may be followed by a post­agreement phase, which may last a considerable period of time.

Despite mostly gloomy news, the original Good Friday Agreement is still in existence, large-scale violence is unknown, and there is general agreement that no appetite exists among politicians, the people, or indeed the (former) terror­ists for a return to out-and-out violence.