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Ulster Unionist Dimension in the Usa 2004 ULSTER UNIONIST DIMENSION IN THE USA Prioritising Neutrality or Leverage, Third Party mediation with a reluctant actor: The U.S. government and Ulster Unionists as a case study By Elodie Aviotte PhD 2004 ULSTER UNIONIST DIMENSION IN THE USA Prioritising Neutrality or Leverage, Third Party mediation with a reluctant actor: The U.S. government and Ulster Unionists as a case study By Elodie Aviotte, DEUG, Licence, Maîtrise For the Degree of PhD Dublin City University School of Law and Government Supervisor: Dr. John Doyle October 2004 I hereby certify that this material, which I now submit for assessment on the programme of study leading to the award of a Ph.D. is entirely my own work and has not been taken from the work of others save and to the extent that such work has been cited and acknowledged within the text of my work. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS In memory of Alain Janey, my grand-father, without whom, all of this would never have been possible. To my family and friends who constantly supported me. This thesis is theirs as without them, the road to achievement would have been considerably more difficult. I would like to thank Dr. John Doyle, my Ph.D. supervisor, for his guidance and hard work during all those years. I would also like to express my deepest gratitude to Prof. David E. Schmitt for showing me the way when I did not know which direction to take. 1 am very grateful to all the people who helped me, all the interviewees and those who contributed to make this thesis feasible by providing crucial material or the right context at the right time. They are too numerous to be quoted but if someday they come across those words they will know that they are in my thoughts. I would to thank DCU Business School and the Irish Council for Research in Humanities and Social Sciences for supporting me financially for my period of research and Robert Elgie, Head of the School of Law and Government. iv ULSTER UNIONIST DIMENSION IN THE USA Prioritising Neutrality or Leverage, Third Party mediation with a reluctant actor: The U.S. government and Ulster Unionists as a case study CONTENTS Abstract...................................................................................................................p.vi Outline of Abbreviated Terms...........................................................................p.vii Introduction.............................................................................................................p.l Ch.l-Contextualising Unionist engagement with US Mediation.................... p.5 Ch.2-Methodological Approach and Historical Foundation.........................p.55 Ch.3-Clinton First Term: Analysis of Unionist Initial Reaction to US Involvement..............................................................................................p.106 Ch.4-Clinton First Term: The Impact of Trimble’s Election on UUP Strategy towards US Involvement...,..................................................p.164 Ch.5-Clinton Second Term: UUP-US Relationship in the Context of Mediation.................................................................................................. p.204 Ch. 6-Conclusion.................................................................................................. p.279 Appendix List of Interviews................................................................................................. p.305 Bibliography..........................................................................................................p.310 ELODIE AVIOTTE ULSTER UNIONIST DIMENSION IN THE USA Prioritising Neutrality or Leverage, Third Party mediation with a reluctant actor: U.S. government and Ulster Unionists as a case study This thesis looks at the evolution of the interaction between the Ulster Unionist Party and the US government during the peace process that led to the signing of the Good Friday Agreement and its implementation. It uses mediation in ethnic conflict resolution as a theoretical framework as it defines the role that the US played in the peace process, presenting itself as an honest broker. This thesis contributes, firstly, to the gap in the literature on the unionist perception of the US involvement and provides new insight into the peace process. Secondly, it contributes to the wider debate in international mediation using Ulster Unionists-US relationship as a case study, in order to define to what extent leverage guarantees a long-term success. If the US mediation in Northern Ireland has been fruitful in that it contributed to the signing of the agreement, and somehow established links with the most hostile actors, its long-term success is still questionable. It actually operated in relation to the Unionists who had not clearly perceived any kind of hurting stalemate and whose internal division caused a serious threat to peace. The monitoring of the implementation of the agreement revealed that the majority of the Unionist community remained very hostile towards it. Thus, despite David Trimble’s pragmatic approach to reform Unionist strategy, he did not convince his electorate of the quality of the agreement. The primary cause for this is the lack of internal motivation within Unionism to support the agreement. Therefore, this study teaches us that even if leverage is an essential parameter in mediation, it cannot overcome the lack of internal driving force. OUTLINE OF ABBREVIATED TERMS AIA: Anglo-Irish Agreement AN1A: Americans for a New Ireland Agenda BIS: British Information Service DUP: Democratic Unionist Party GFA: Good Friday Agreement IAFCG: Irish-Americans for Clinton/Gore IICD: International Independent Commission in Decommissioning INC: Irish National Caucus IRA: Irish Republican Army LVF: Loyalist Volunteer Force NIO: Northern Ireland Office NORAID: Irish Northern Aid NSC: National Security Council PUP: Progressive Unionist Party UDA: Ulster Defence Association UDP: Ulster Democratic Party UNSC: United Nations Security Council UUP: Ulster Unionist Party INTRODUCTION The involvement of the US administration under President Clinton in the attempted resolution of the Northern Ireland conflict is one of the most significant aspects of the recent peace process. This represented a significant shift in US engagement with Northern Ireland, reversing the hands off approach, which had dominated since Sinn Féin attempted to get recognition for an Irish Republic in 1919 (Cronin, 1987). The involvement of the Clinton administration has encouraged a significant literature examining the motivation behind this decision and the impact it had on the peace process (e.g. Wilson, 1996, O’Clery, 1996, Cox, 2000, Arthur, 2000). Most of the general literature on the peace process has also devoted attention to this aspect dedicating a chapter or a substantial passage to this topic (e.g. Todd and Ruane, 1996, Cox, Guelke & Steven, 2000). However very little of this literature addresses the attitude of unionist political parties in Northern Ireland towards US involvement, their reaction to this development, their capacity to engage with it or the impact such engagement may have had on the wider political strategies of Ulster Unionism. This dissertation proposes to address that missing dimension. The election of President Clinton saw the elevation of this regional conflict on the international agenda. For eight years, Northern Ireland became one of the major foreign policy issues for the most powerful country in the world. The Unionists were forced to change their strategy, because US involvement in the conflict became inevitable. 1 This thesis draws on theoretical approaches in ethnic conflict resolution that focus on mediation by external actors, in particular the works of Bercovitch (1996), Rubin (1981) and Kriegsberg (1991). Changes in international context, such as the collapse of the USSR, indirectly aided efforts at developing a new peace process in Northern Ireland. The post World War II international order was based on the legal principle of non-intervention. Thus, the international system along with the Anglo-American special relationship favoured the United Kingdom and the Unionist pro-status quo position. But in the post-cold war era, the disequilibrium of strength between the US, being the only remaining super­ power, and the UK transformed the situation into one where a US intervention became possible. The development for the first time in Northern Ireland of a serious external intervention at least created the possibility of a new dynamic in the conflict. Given its novelty in the Northern Ireland context, the wider international literature on external mediation provides a good context for this research. In turn, this thesis adds a new case study to the international debates on external mediation. In particular, because the intervention came from the US and was generally seen to have played a positive role despite Unionists’ initial hostility to it. Therefore, this dynamic in the Northern Ireland case adds to our understanding of the often-competing pressures between neutrality and leverage in international mediation. Clearly, a more “neutral” mediator from a unionist perspective could have been found. However, this thesis, in analysing the reaction of Ulster Unionists, looks at whether the strong leverage brought by the US was ultimately more important. 2 The reluctance by Ulster Unionists to accept any US intervention at the beginning of Clinton’s first presidency appears to have progressively vanished and been replaced by a real attempt to create a relationship between the Unionists
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