Northern Ireland and the Divided World The Northern Ireland Conflict and the Good Friday Agreement in Comparative Perspective Edited by JOHN MCGARRY 1 CONTENTS List of Figures xi List of Tables xii List of Abbreviations xiii List of Contributors xv 1. Introduction: The Comparable Northern Ireland John McGarry 1 Part I. General and Theoretical Perspectives 2. Northern Ireland: Consociation or Social Transformation? Rupert Taylor 36 3. Comparative Political Science and the British–Irish Agreement Brendan O’Leary 53 4. The Northern Ireland Agreement: Clear, Consociational, and Risky Donald L. Horowitz 89 5. Northern Ireland, Civic Nationalism, and the Good Friday Agreement John McGarry 109 6. Unsung Heroes? The Role of Peace and Conflict Resolution Organizations in the Northern Ireland Conflict Feargal Cochrane 137 Part II. Comparative Case-Studies 7. From Conflict to Agreement in Northern Ireland: Lessons from Europe Antony Alcock 159 8. Northern Ireland and the Basque Country Michael Keating 181 x Contents 9. Making the Transition from Hegemonic Regime to Power-Sharing: Northern Ireland and Canada in Historical Perspective S. J. R. Noel 209 10. Northern Ireland and Island Status Adrian Guelke 228 11. Taking the Gun out of Politics: Conflict Transformation in Northern Ireland and Lebanon Kirsten E. Schulze 253 12. Northern Ireland and South Africa: ‘Hope and History at a Crossroads’ Padraig O’Malley 276 13. The Tenability of Partition as a Mode of Conflict Regulation: Comparing Ireland with Palestine–Land of Israel Sammy Smooha 309 Index 337 1 Introduction: The Comparable Northern Ireland JOHN MCGARRY Northern Ireland is truly a place apart (editorial, Belfast Telegraph, 5 April 2000) For 30 years the politicians . of Northern Ireland have insisted their conflict cannot be compared to others (Kevin Cullen, journalist, Irish Times, 13 May 2000) ‘Ulster’, the world’s best laager! (sign in David Trimble’s Westminster office) We tried to answer, spoke of Arab, Jew, of Turk and Greek in Cyprus, Pakistan and India, but no sense flickered through that offered reason to a modern man why Europeans, Christians, working-class should thresh and struggle in that old morass (John Hewitt, Ulster poet)1 Say it once, Say it loud, I’m Black an’ I’m proud . The Irish are the niggers of Europe, lads. (Roddy Doyle, The Commitments)2 For many people, like the editorialists of the Belfast Telegraph or the audi- ence of John Hewitt’s poem, Northern Ireland is a place apart, its conflict the result of some unique pathology. This view was particularly dominant from the outbreak of the troubles until the early 1990s, although it is still subscribed to. Northern Ireland has been seen, variously, as a ‘sui generis, untypical and even anachronistic phenomenon’,3 a ‘peculiarly local conflict’,4 an ‘outlandish exception to all the rules’,5 or as possessing a ‘peculiar intractability’.6 However, many people, not just John Hewitt and Roddy Doyle, reject the idea that Northern Ireland is incomparable. Political partisans, contrary to 2 John McGarry Kevin Cullen’s insight, have been drawing parallels between Northern Ireland and other divided societies since at least the nineteenth century. Some of the best academic work on the Northern Ireland conflict, written by leading scholars from both outside and inside Northern Ireland, is com- parative in focus.7 The scope for comparative analysis has increased in recent years. As a result of better international communications, it has become easier for those inside and outside Northern Ireland to compare its conflict with others. With outside governments, particularly the United States, and non- governmental organizations playing an increasingly prominent role in Northern Ireland, there are more incentives for the region’s partisans to seek to influence external opinion through the drawing of appropriate parallels. There also appear to be more conflicts with which Northern Ireland can be compared: the end of the cold war has been followed by a series of confrontations in south-eastern Europe and the Caucasus, and has made it possible to focus more on other ongoing violent intra-state conflicts, in Spain, Indonesia, Sri Lanka, and Cyprus, as well as the non- violent dispute between Quebec and the rest of Canada. It has also ushered in peace processes in South Africa and Israel–Palestine that have been the focus of global attention. Finally, the process of European integration led some scholars to examine the possibilities it offers for different national minorities, including those in Northern Ireland, the Basque Country, and South Tyrol. This collection was assembled in part to allow leading comparativists to discuss Northern Ireland in light of these broad developments. Northern Ireland is compared with a significant number of the cases mentioned, including the Åland Island, Cyprus, and South Tyrol (Alcock); the Basque Country (Keating); Canada (Noel); Cyprus, Corsica, East Timor, Puerto Rico, and Sri Lanka (Guelke); Lebanon (Schulze); South Africa (O’Malley); and Israel–Palestine (Smooha). The collection is also a response to the Good Friday Agreement, the landmark settlement reached in April 1998. Contributors were asked to use comparative analysis to evaluate the Agreement and to assess whether it represents the optimal way forward. The judgements are rich and var- ied. Several of the contributions are written from a pro-Agreement per- spective. These include chapters written from a unionist perspective (Alcock), a loyalist perspective (Schulze), and a position that has been associated with that of moderate nationalists (McGarry, O’Leary). Other chapters are critical of the Agreement, including one that appears close to the position of republican rejectionists (Taylor) and another that reflects Introduction 3 concerns held by the Alliance Party (Horowitz). The various contribu- tions offer a wealth of prescriptive suggestions, including advice on how to design institutions for a bi-national society (McGarry, O’Leary); strengthen the Agreement to prevent breakdown (O’Leary); address the vexed question of the decommissioning of paramilitary weapons (Schulze); ensure that negotiations between rival groups succeed (O’Malley); build a multi-ethnic executive coalition that will last (Horowitz, Noel); and construct an integrated society from the grass roots up (Taylor). While a number of academics have examined Northern Ireland comparatively in monographs and journal articles, this is the first collection of essays on the subject. This introductory chapter provides an overview of the use of compara- tive analysis in Northern Ireland. The first section discusses the ways in which nationalist and unionist partisans have drawn links between Northern Ireland and other divided societies since before the conflict began in the late 1960s. The second section examines comparative analysis by academics over this same period. The chapter ends with a brief sum- mary of the various contributions to the collection, and situates these in relation to the existing literature. Partisans and Parallels8 Partisans everywhere draw parallels with other conflicts. Particular paral- lels are selected because they are considered appropriate: the partisans see the two cases as essentially similar. However, comparisons may also be used for their instrumental value. As the parallels invariably portray the group making them in a positive light and depict rivals negatively, they can help to rally one’s domestic constituency and attract sympathy from outsiders.9 Preferred parallels change, depending on circumstances: a comparison with a particular conflict may be dropped if the conflict ends or loses its international salience. There is also some evidence that an ethnic group’s choice of comparison may have real political consequences. If outsiders, including external governments and non-governmental organizations, accept the validity of a parallel between two conflicts, it may lead them to adopt the same approach towards one that they have taken towards the other. If actors in one conflict come to identify sufficiently with the actors in another, the latter’s behaviour may influence the former’s. There is evid- ence of both effects in Northern Ireland. 4 John McGarry During the 1960s Northern Ireland’s nationalists, particularly moderates, identified their plight with that of American blacks struggling for civil rights.10 This had the advantage of identifying Northern Ireland’s unionist regime with the white racist regimes of Alabama, Mississippi, and other parts of the Deep South. The parallel embarrassed Britain on the world stage and encouraged pressure from the United States for the reform of Northern Ireland. Like the US campaign, the appeal for civil rights in Northern Ireland was aimed at metropolitan citizens. The Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association, which began to challenge the unionist regime in 1964, was based on its American counterpart, although it was also inspired by the UK- based National Council for Civil Liberties. Catholics used the same slogans, ‘One man, one vote’ and ‘The world is watching’, and the same song, ‘We shall overcome’, as their American counterparts. More importantly, they employed the same tactics: civil disobedience and peaceful protest marches. It was thought that these tactics would have the same effect in Northern Ireland as they had in the United States, that is, that they would appeal to moderates in the dominant group and expose the intransigence of local chauvinists to liberal metropolitans. This was what happened. Nationalists