Robin Wilson: Blair's flawed approach to peace in Northern Ireland
[Robin Wilson founded the Belfast-based think-tank Democratic Dialogue. He now works as an independent researcher.]
From the moment Tony Blair arrived in Northern Ireland to save the talks at Castle Buildings in Easter week 12 years ago—detecting the ‘hand of history’ on his shoulder—it was evident that the political future of the region would play a key part in the history of Blair himself.
As the sheen burnished by Peter Mandelson quickly faded from ‘New’ Labour—more spin than substance was the cry from the disillusioned left-wing comic Ben Elton—Northern Ireland came to represent the Crown jewel in his government’s first term.
In the second terms, as Blair behaved more like an executive president and became mired down in his vainglorious project with George W Bush to topple Saddam Hussein, Northern Ireland if anything became even more critical to his narcissistic concern with image.
He wanted to go down in the history books, like his 19th century predecessor Gladstone, as the prime minister whose mission had been ‘to pacify Ireland’—not as the junior partner in an arguably illegal campaign in Iraq which cost tens or, more probably, hundreds of thousands of civilian lives and saw millions more displaced.
Northern Ireland is, happily, not Iraq—but then as a part of the western democratic world it was never going to be. What is remarkable is not how successful Blair was in resolving the Northern Ireland problem but the uniqueness in western Europe, outside of the Basque country, Corsica and Cyprus, of the region’s intercommunal violence—and, even among those comparisons, how long-lasting it has proved.
With no ‘peace process’ in the Basque country, ETA has been curbed much more seriously than Northern Ireland’s paramilitaries by simple pursuit of the rule of law without depredations of human rights.
In 1997, Northern Ireland was characterised by deep communal division and paramilitary violence at the margin and neutral but remote direct rule from Westminster. In 2010, Northern Ireland is characterised by deep communal division and paramilitary violence at the margin and an accessible but communalised and dysfunctional government at Stormont.
Why has so little changed despite all the hype?..
Read entire article at openDemocracy
From the moment Tony Blair arrived in Northern Ireland to save the talks at Castle Buildings in Easter week 12 years ago—detecting the ‘hand of history’ on his shoulder—it was evident that the political future of the region would play a key part in the history of Blair himself.
As the sheen burnished by Peter Mandelson quickly faded from ‘New’ Labour—more spin than substance was the cry from the disillusioned left-wing comic Ben Elton—Northern Ireland came to represent the Crown jewel in his government’s first term.
In the second terms, as Blair behaved more like an executive president and became mired down in his vainglorious project with George W Bush to topple Saddam Hussein, Northern Ireland if anything became even more critical to his narcissistic concern with image.
He wanted to go down in the history books, like his 19th century predecessor Gladstone, as the prime minister whose mission had been ‘to pacify Ireland’—not as the junior partner in an arguably illegal campaign in Iraq which cost tens or, more probably, hundreds of thousands of civilian lives and saw millions more displaced.
Northern Ireland is, happily, not Iraq—but then as a part of the western democratic world it was never going to be. What is remarkable is not how successful Blair was in resolving the Northern Ireland problem but the uniqueness in western Europe, outside of the Basque country, Corsica and Cyprus, of the region’s intercommunal violence—and, even among those comparisons, how long-lasting it has proved.
With no ‘peace process’ in the Basque country, ETA has been curbed much more seriously than Northern Ireland’s paramilitaries by simple pursuit of the rule of law without depredations of human rights.
In 1997, Northern Ireland was characterised by deep communal division and paramilitary violence at the margin and neutral but remote direct rule from Westminster. In 2010, Northern Ireland is characterised by deep communal division and paramilitary violence at the margin and an accessible but communalised and dysfunctional government at Stormont.
Why has so little changed despite all the hype?..