The Northern Ireland Question Also by Brian Barton

BROOKEBOROUGH, THE MAKING OF A PRIME MINISTER

FROM BEHIND A CLOSED DOOR: Secret Court Martial Records of the 1916 Easter Rising

NORTHERN IRELAND IN THE SECOND WORLD WAR

THE BLITZ: Belfast in the War Years

THE EASTER RISING (co-author with Michael Foy)

THE NORTHERN IRELAND QUESTION: Myth and Reality (co-editor with Patrick J. Roche)

THE NORTHERN IRELAND QUESTION: Perspectives and Policies (co-editor with Patrick J. Roche)

THE NORTHERN IRELAND QUESTION: Unionism, Nationalism, and Partition (co-editor with Patrick J. Roche) The Northern Ireland Question The Peace Process and the Belfast Agreement

Edited by

Brian Barton Tutor, Department of History The Open University, UK and

Patrick J. Roche Former Member of the Northern Ireland Assembly Northern Ireland Editorial matter, selection, introduction and conclusion © Brian Barton and Patrick J. Roche 2009 All remaining chapters © respective authors 2009 Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 2009 978-0-230-20380-8 All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this publication may be made without written permission. No portion of this publication may be reproduced, copied or transmitted save with written permission or in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, or under the terms of any licence permitting limited copying issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency, Saffron House, 6-10 Kirby Street, London EC1N 8TS. Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages. The authors have asserted their rights to be identified as the authors of this work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. First published 2009 by PALGRAVE MACMILLAN Palgrave Macmillan in the UK is an imprint of Macmillan Publishers Limited, registered in England, company number 785998, of Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS. Palgrave Macmillan in the US is a division of St Martin's Press LLC, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010. Palgrave Macmillan is the global academic imprint of the above companies and has companies and representatives throughout the world. Palgrave® and Macmillan® are registered trademarks in the United States, the United Kingdom, Europe and other countries. ISBN 978-1-349-30153-9 ISBN 978-0-230-59480-7 (eBook) DOI 10.1057/9780230594807 This book is printed on paper suitable for recycling and made from fully managed and sustained forest sources. Logging, pulping and manufacturing processes are expected to conform to the environmental regulations of the country of origin. A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data The Northern Ireland question : the peace process and the Belfast Agreement / Brian Barton, Patrick J. Roche. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index.

1. Northern Ireland – Politics and government – 1994– 2. Great Britain. Treaties, etc. Ireland, 1998 Apr. 10. 3. Northern Ireland – Relations – Great Britain. 4. Great Britain – Relations – Northern Ireland. 5. Peace Movements – Northern Ireland. I. Barton, Brian, 1944– II. Roche, Patrick J., 1940– DA990.U46N6736 2009 941.60824—dc22 2008034978 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 18 17 16 15 14 13 12 11 10 09 Contents

List of Illustrations vii List of Abbreviations viii Notes on Contributors x

Introduction 1 Brian Barton and Patrick J. Roche

1 The Historical Background to the Belfast Agreement 12 Brian Barton 2 Negotiating the Belfast Agreement 38 Thomas Hennessey 3 Implementing Devolved Government 1998–2002 57 Graham Gudgin 4 The Belfast Agreement and the Constitutional Status of Northern Ireland 84 Austen Morgan 5 The Electoral Dynamics of the Belfast Agreement 105 Sydney Elliott 6 Unionism and the Belfast Agreement 131 Christopher Farrington 7 Northern Nationalism and the Belfast Agreement 147 Cillian McGrattan 8 Republican Paramilitaries and the Peace Process 165 Jonathan Tonge 9 Loyalist Paramilitaries and the Peace Process 181 Ian Wood 10 The Belfast Agreement and Southern Irish Politics 205 Catherine O’Donnell 11 The United States and the Peace Process 222 Adrian Guelke

v vi Contents

12 The Triumph of the Belfast Agreement 238 Paul Bew 13 The Case against the Belfast Agreement 246 Dennis Kennedy Conclusion 265 Brian Barton and Patrick J. Roche

Bibliography 270 Index 277 Illustrations

Tables

5.1 Northern Ireland Assembly election, 25 June 1998 108 5.2 European Parliament election, 10 June 1999: Northern Ireland 110 5.3 UK General election in Northern Ireland, 7 June 2001 111 5.4 District council elections results, 7 June 2001 112 5.5 Northern Ireland Assembly election, 2 November 2003 113 5.6 European Parliament election, 10 June 2004: Northern Ireland 114 5.7 UK general election in Northern Ireland, 5 May 2005 117 5.8 District council elections results of 5 May 2005 118 5.9 Northern Ireland Assembly election, 7 March 2007 120 5.10 Northern Ireland Assembly 2003 intermediate transfers: Party and community voting cohesion 127 5.11 Northern Ireland Assembly 2003: Terminal party transfers from the four main political parties 128 5.12 Northern Ireland Assembly: Cross-community transfers: 2003 and 1998 128 5.13 Northern Ireland Assembly 2007: Terminal party transfers from the four main political parties 129

Figures

5.1 SDLP versus Sinn Féin, 1992–2007 121 5.2 UUP versus DUP, 1992–2007 121

vii Abbreviations

ANIA Americans for a New Irish Agenda AP Alliance Party CP Conservative Party BBC British Broadcasting Corporation DUP Democratic Unionist Party EU European Union GP Green Party IICD Independent International Commission on Decommissioning IMC International Monitoring Commission INC Irish National Caucus IND LAB Independent Labour IND N Independent Nationalist IND Independent INLA Irish National Liberation Army IRA/PIRA Irish Republican Army/Provisional IRA LAB Labour Party LVF Loyalist Volunteer Force MEP Member of the European Parliament MLA Member of the Legislative Assembly NILP Northern Ireland Labour Party NIUP Northern Ireland Unionist Party NIWC Northern Ireland Women’s Coalition NORAID Irish Northern Aid NSPCC National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children PR Proportional Representation PSNI Police Service of Northern Ireland PUP Progressive Unionist Party RUC Royal Ulster Constabulary SDLP Social Democratic and Labour Party SF Sinn Féin SP Socialist Party STV Single Transferable Vote TUC Trades Union Congress UDA Ulster Defence Association UDP Ulster Democratic Party UIM Ulster Independence Movement

viii Abbreviations ix

UK United Kingdom UKUP United Kingdom Unionist Party US United States UUP Ulster Unionist Party UUC Ulster Unionist Council UVF Ulster Volunteer Force UWC Ulster Workers Council WP Workers Party Contributors

Brian Barton has tutored in history with the Open University since 1995 and has authored or edited 11 books on Irish history and politics. His publications include, From behind a Closed Door; Secret Court Martial Records of the 1916 Easter Risingg, The History Press, 2008 and (co-authored with Michael Foy) The Easter Rising, Sutton Publishing, 1999 and he contributed chapters on Northern Ireland to A New History of Ireland, Vol. 8, produced by the Royal Irish Academy and published in 2000 by Clarenden Press.

Lord Bew is Professor of Politics in the School of Politics, International Studies and Philosophy at Queen’s University, Belfast. He has published extensively on Irish history and politics and his most recent publications are Ireland: The Politics of Enmity, 1789–2006, Oxford University Press, 2007 and The Making and Remaking of the Good Friday Agreementt, Liffey Press, 2007.

Sydney Elliott is Senior Lecturer in politics in the School of Politics, International Studies and Philosophy at Queen’s University, Belfast. He has published extensively on electoral issues relating to Northern Ireland and is author of Northern Ireland: A Political Directory, 1968–1998, Blackwell Press, 1999.

Christopher Farrington is Government of Ireland Postdoctoral Fellow in the School of Politics and International Relations, University College, Dublin. His most recent publication is Ulster Unionism and the Peace Process in Northern Ireland, Palgrave, 2006.

Graham Gudgin is Senior Economic Advisor, Oxford Economics and was Special Advisor to the First Minister of the Northern Ireland Assembly (1998–2002) and Director of the Northern Ireland Economic Research Centre (1985–98). He has published extensively on economic matters relating to Northern Ireland including a contribution to The Northern Ireland Question: Nationalism, Unionism and Partition, Ashgate, 1999.

Adrian Guelke is Professor of International Relations in the School of Politics, International Studies and Philosophy at Queen’s University, Belfast. He has published extensively on Northern Ireland politics including Northern Ireland: The International Perspective, Gill and Macmillan, 1988.

Thomas Hennessey is Reader in History at Canterbury Christ Church University and Fellow of the Royal Historical Society. He has published

x Contributors xi several books on the history and politics of Northern Ireland including, The Evolution of the Troubles, 1970–72, Irish Academic Press, 2007. Dennis Kennedy has worked as a journalist in Northern Ireland, the United States, Ethiopia and the Republic of Ireland and was Deputy Editor of the Irish Times (1982–85). From 1985 to 1991 he was Head of the European Commission Office in Northern Ireland and from 1993 to 2001 lecturer in the Institute of European Studies, Queen’s University, Belfast. He has been a long-term commentator on northern-Irish politics both as a journalist and as an academic and his publications include, The Widening Gulf, Blackstaff Press, 1988 and Living with the European Union: The Northern Ireland Experience, Macmillan, 2000. Cillian McGrattan is currently completing a PhD at the University of Ulster on British government, SDLP and Ulster Unionist Party policy-making. Forthcoming publications include, ‘Dublin, the SDLP and the Sunningdale Agreement: Maximalist Nationalism and Path-Dependency’, Contemporary British Historyy (forthcoming, 2008) and (with Aaron Edwards), The Northern Ireland Conflict, Oneworld Publications, forthcoming 2009. Austen Morgan is a barrister in London and Belfast and has published extensively on legal aspects of the constitutional status of Northern Ireland and is author of The Belfast Agreement: A Practical Legal Analysis, Belfast Press, 2000. Catherine O’Donnell was a post-doctoral fellow at the Humanities Institute of Ireland, University College Dublin, 2005–07. She has published in Irish Political Studies and Contemporary British Historyy and contributed to a collec- tion on the 1966 commemoration of the 1916 Easter Rising edited by Professor Mary E. Daly and Dr Margaret O’Callaghan, 1916 in 1966: Commemorating the Easter Risingg, Royal Irish Academy, Dublin, 2007. Her book, Fianna Fail, Irish Republicanism and the Northern Ireland Troubles, 1968–2005 was published by Irish Academic Press, Dublin, in 2007. Patrick J. Roche was Lecturer in Economics at the University of Ulster (1974–96) and a Member of the Northern Ireland Assembly (1998–2003). His publications on Irish nationalism includes a contribution to Jurgen Elvert (ed.), Northern Ireland: Past and Presentt, Franz Steiner Verlag, 1994 and he is co-editor (with Brian Barton) of three books on the ‘Northern Ireland question’ including, The Northern Ireland Question: Nationalism, Unionism and Partition, Ashgate, 1999. Jonathan Tonge is Professor of Politics in the School of Politics, University of Liverpool and Chair of the Political Studies Association of the United Kingdom. He has published a wide range of journal articles and book xii Contributors chapters on Northern Ireland and his recent books include Northern Ireland, Polity, 2000 and Northern Ireland: Conflict and Change, Pearson, 2002.

Ian Wood was Lecturer at Napier University until 2002 and is currently Tutor with the Open University in European History. He is author of the best-selling, Ireland during the Second World Warr, Caxton Press, 2002 and Churchill, Macmillan Press, 2000 and Churchill, Caxton Press, 2002. He has worked extensively for the media and covered the conflict in Northern Ireland for The Scotsman, Scotland on Sunday, Sunday Times, The Mirror and Sunday World.