Reflections on policy, global affairs, and life.

Historical Analysis: Northern Ireland

Soldiers in Nothern Ireland

Political Conflict & Competition

The political parties of Northern Ireland have always been marked by the divide between Nationalists and Unionists, but over the past twenty years, the divide has become increasingly polarized as moderate parties have shrunk year-over-year and their more extreme counterparts have grown. As it stands today, the largest Nationalist party is Sinn Féin, the party of the IRA and the original resistance movement of Ireland in the early 20th century. They hold 27 seats in the current Northern Ireland Assembly as of 2017, a historical high. The second-largest Nationalist party, with 12 seats in the Assembly, is the Social Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP), who support the reunification of Ireland, but do not support the means of violence to do so. The largest Unionist party is the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), which holds 28 seats in the Assembly, followed by the smaller Ulster Unionist Party (UUP), which holds 10 seats. The fifth-largest party is the Alliance party, which does not identify with either Nationalist or Unionist values, and holds 8 seats in the Assembly.

The current state of Northern Irish politics is extremely contentious, as the Northern Ireland Assembly has failed to form a functioning Executive since the resignation of Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness of Sinn Féin on January 9th, 2017. The cause of McGuinness' resignation was a scandal involving the Renewable Heat Incentive (RHI), a program which aimed to encourage the transition from fossil fuels to renewable fuel sources, and was overseen exclusively by then First Minister Arlene Foster of the DUP. But the RHI had a fatal flaw: the main source of renewable energy was in the form of wood pellets, but the subsidy for burning renewable fuel sources was greater than the cost of purchasing wood pellets. This led business owners to burn as much wood as they could get their hands on, generating profit from government subsidies, and putting the program £480 million in the hole. The intersection of these factors lent the program a new name: "Cash For Ash." When details of the RHI scandal emerged, McGuinness sought an independent investigation but First Minister Foster refused. In light of this, McGuinness resigned out of protest and Sinn Féin refused to nominate a replacement Deputy First Minister. Due to the structure of the Northern Ireland Executive, the office can only operate if both Ministers occupy their positions, so without her counterpart, Arlene Foster lost her position and the Executive branch collapsed.

In response, the Secretary of State called new elections for the Assembly, but this only resulted in the Nationalists gaining more seats, placing the balance of the Assembly at an equal 40 Nationalists, 40 Unionists, and 10 unaffiliated. To restore the Executive, Sinn Féin and the DUP had to come to terms, but due to several key issues — notably, Sinn Féin's proposed Irish Language Act, which would give Gaelic equal parity with English as the national language of Northern Ireland, and the DUP's insistence that same-sex marriage remain illegal — this has not yet happened. If the parties cannot resolve their conflicts, Northern Ireland may be placed under direct rule by the United Kingdom for the first time since the Good Friday Agreement. However, this solution is undesirable to all entities involved. Direct rule is bad for the DUP because same-sex marriage and abortion rights are guaranteed in the UK, and the DUP wants to retain bargaining power on these issues. It is also bad for Sinn Féin because direct rule could prevent measures such as the Irish Language Act from passing and stifle their steadily growing influence in the region.

Foreign Relations & the World

Northern Ireland's contentious relationship with surrounding states is drawn stark against the contemporary backdrop of Brexit negotiations. The leading issue of this intranational shift relates to the reemergence of a hard border between the Republic of Ireland (which fully intends to remain a member of the European Union) and its estranged neighbor, Northern Ireland. One of the topics which propelled the Belfast Agreement of early 1998 forward was the declaration of an open border between the sister regions, essentially quelling secessionist demands from Irish national organizations such as Sinn Féin by allowing Northern Ireland to continue operating under an open model which gave way to much-needed economic integration and the opportunity for Irish citizenry to more easily connect with their own culture.

Now, with the 2020 end of Brexit's transitional period looming, Ireland's north-south separation has become a staple in the struggle to negotiate this already complicated geopolitical issue. Much of Northern Ireland's citizenry depends on being able to live on one side of the border while still working and making purchases on the other. Closing the border would end this way of life and potentially reignite nationalist terrorism. In a November 2017 interview, former President of the Association of Chief Police Officers, Sir Hugh Orde, indicated a hard border "would be a target for dissident paramilitaries." Extremism aside, these moves aimed at regional stability have already resulted in strong resistance from Brexit advocates on account that the United Kingdom's framing lacks specific language for terms at the time of separation, instead opting to punt more difficult challenges such as Northern Ireland down the road — all this while broadening the scope of their haggling over the region to encompass all EU-UK relations. This widening of terms has created a distrustful pro-Brexit population who feel that the Ireland issue is something of a Trojan Horse to create overall more favorable trade conditions which would weaken the nature of Brexit. However, this can't be the case, given that even if the United Kingdom wanted to keep trade barriers low on their side, the World Trade Organization would likely penalize such behavior on account of the General Agreement on Tariffs & Trade non-discrimination rule.

Caught in the middle of these negotiations, the strains Northern Ireland is currently facing underscore the precarious nature of the current system. The European Commission has already released a draft Withdrawal Agreement which would, in essence, make Northern Ireland more a member of the EU than the UK, requiring customs and regulatory checks between Great Britain and Northern Ireland rather than between Northern Ireland and all other EU states. During an early 2018 session of Parliament, then-Prime Minister Theresa May stated that the agreement in its current form would "undermine the UK common market and threaten the constitutional integrity of the UK."

The history of Brexit negotiations does not give rise to much optimism. The Unionist DUP (who backed Theresa May) don't want to see Northern Ireland experience an exclusive backstop deal where they remain in the EU while the UK's other member countries withdraw, considering it a threat to the stability of the union. However, this position puts them in a tight spot given their matched unwillingness to welcome direct rule from the UK given their concern that it could undesirably reshape their policy landscape. Without regional support for the exclusive backstop deal, former Prime Minister May alternatively suggested a UK-wide backstop, which would greatly soften the nature of the United Kingdom's departure from the EU, but this iteration was voted down three times, ultimately leading to her resignation. In late 2019, Prime Minister Boris Johnson proposed a model for the UK's departure from the EU which splits the difference between the former two contenders. He would see all of Ireland become a "single regulatory zone," allowing Northern Ireland to continue following EU rules on animal health, food safety, and manufactured goods, but it would also necessitate the breaking of Northern Ireland from the EU customs union which negotiates trade deals with external actors. Still unresolved, though, is what border checks on people and goods leaving and entering Northern Ireland will look like. Johnson has proposed the placement of regulatory controls at ports along the Irish Sea, even suggesting that some checks may be avoided by leveraging technology-based solutions such as GPS tracking to locate some checks on location for certain companies.

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