promoting access to White Rose research papers Universities of Leeds, Sheffield and York http://eprints.whiterose.ac.uk/ This is the author’s post-print version of an article published in Terrorism and Political Violence, 24 (1) White Rose Research Online URL for this paper: http://eprints.whiterose.ac.uk/id/eprint/77668 Published article: Evans, JAJ and Tonge, J (2012) Menace Without Mandate? Is There Any Sympathy for “Dissident” Irish Republicanism in Northern Ireland? Terrorism and Political Violence, 24 (1). 61 - 78. ISSN 0954-6553 http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09546553.2011.608818 White Rose Research Online
[email protected] Menace without Mandate? Is there any sympathy for ‘dissident’ Irish Republicanism in Northern Ireland? Abstract Dissident Irish republicans have increased their violent activities in recent years. These diehard ‘spoilers’ reject the 1998 Good Friday Agreement power-sharing deal between unionist and nationalist traditions in Northern Ireland. Instead dissident IRAs vow to maintain an armed campaign against Britain’s sovereign claim to Northern Ireland and have killed British soldiers, police officers and civilians in recent years. These groups have small political organisations with which they are associated. The assumption across the political spectrum is that, whereas Sinn Fein enjoyed significant electoral backing when linked to the now vanished Provisional IRA, contemporary violent republican ultras and their political associates are utterly bereft of support. Drawing upon new data from the ESRC 2010 Northern Ireland election survey, the first academic study to ask the electorate its views of dissident republicans, this article examines whether there are any clusters of sympathy for these irreconcilables and their modus operandi.