More flexible forms of devolved government in the North must be found; expecting polar opposites to form stable governments has proved unrealistic, writes Graham Gudgin
Northern Ireland Secretary Peter Hain described the recent Belfast riots as "a spasm from a dark past". His hope is that they are an isolated problem on the road to peace. Although the riots are the latest in a summer of almost continual disturbances and sectarian attacks by loyalists, September 10th was different in being much more organised. Paramilitary units assembled en masse from many parts of Belfast and further afield. The riots were co-ordinated and widespread. One eminent historian describes the riots in previously quiet Ballyclare as the first since 1798. The general feel was more of insurrection as in 1969, than of the "recreational" rioting to which we have become accustomed.
Mr Hain's remark reflects his administration's lack of any policy towards unionists other than allowing the police to deal with incidents on a case-by-case basis. His approach reminds one of the old Stormont regime with its insistence that disturbances were purely a security concern. Like the Government of the Republic, the Northern Ireland administration remains fixated upon the IRA and its forthcoming decommissioning and has little time for unionist concerns.
The approach of both governments has been to first deal with the IRA and then to persuade the DUP back into government with Sinn Féin. Hey Presto the Belfast Agreement will have been restored and all will be well. The problem with this benign scenario is that every DUP spokesperson makes it crystal clear that a long quarantine period will be required before any move back into government is contemplated. Optimists talk of two years, others of 10 years.
The DUP's attitude reflects the long deterioration in unionist confidence in the British government and increasing resentment at the continual flow of concessions to the IRA, which they see as an unrepentant and still well organised terrorist and criminal organisation. The situation has slowly come to resemble the political conditions of the 1960s with ebbing confidence in government shading into persistent violence. In the 1960s the apparent issue was civil rights, now it is the right to march. The real issue in both cases was and is the existence of Northern Ireland itself.
Although it is far from the clear that the loyalist riots will continue to escalate in the same way as the riots of the 1960s, it has been obvious that unionist disaffection has been building for some time. The problem set in immediately after the referendum result on the Belfast Agreement in 1998, but reached a peak in the general election earlier this year when the DUP swept all before it. Significantly, the DUP began to attract middle-class support from those who could not previously have imagined themselves voting for the Rev Ian Paisley.
It is staggering that seven years into the agreement attitudes have deteriorated so badly. There is now a strong need for both governments to reflect vigorously on what has gone wrong, but little hope that they are capable of doing so. For the British government everything rides on saving the agreement through getting the IRA to the end of their long journey. The Republic's Government is even more intent on holding on to every comma of the agreement and is fixated with the historic nature of the last IRA statement.
To unionists much of this looks irrelevant. Many now prefer direct rule to any devolved assembly with Sinn Féin ministers. Any desire for devolution is felt more strongly by professional politicians than by their electorates. IRA statements and even the reality of decommissioning attract less interest than elsewhere, and in truth will not make much difference to people's lives. There is little expectation that criminality will end, nor murders of people like Robert McCartney.
The deeper reality is that sectarian violence from loyalists will continue for the same reasons as it has since the 1840s. Electoral reform in the early 19th century first made Irish nationalism a credible threat to Protestants' position in the UK. This threat has remained ever since and will get worse as the Catholic proportion of the Northern electorate creeps towards 50 per cent in coming decades. As it increases we can expect communal divisions to widen. The panoply of cross-community measures and integrated education will count for little.
Government efforts to deal with mutually antagonistic allegiances have always been defective. Partition was badly mishandled in the 1920s under pressure from those who wanted no Border. The Belfast Agreement lost its moral bearings in a brave effort to stop the violence, and failed in its efforts to develop institutional arrangements that could build reconciliation.
We remain in a world in which few are willing to relax the pressures that have lasted since the 1840s. Emboldened by the agreement, Northern nationalists have strengthened the priority they give to Irish unity as a political aim. In the South the expression of the aspiration to unity is universally regarded as a birthright. Even Michael McDowell, greatly esteemed by unionists for his stand against IRA criminality, feels the need to describe himself as a republican who aims to "make partition history".
Few nationalists are able to see their aspiration as divisive, and none perceive how they feed loyalist paranoia and increase the need for the Orange Order and others to mark out their territory and proclaim their presence and their strength. The stronger security measures and more responsible political leadership that nationalists call for to deal with loyalist violence will be as ineffective as they were in the 1960s. It is time to deal with the fundamentals.
The two governments need to give thought to more flexible forms of devolved government in Northern Ireland. The sharp sectarian split built into the rules for the Assembly has not worked. Expecting polar opposites to form stable governments has proved unrealistic, and will become more so now that the DUP has replaced the UUP.
More pressing is the need for an end to divisive parades and the dismantling of loyalist paramilitary organisations, along with their paraphernalia of flags and symbols. However, this is only likely to happen when both the Orange Order and the loyalist people who support the paramilitaries perceive an end to the threat to their British identity. To achieve this, a starting point would be direct talks between Orange and loyalists, on the one hand, and the Irish Government and the SDLP on the other. The nationalists need to persuade the unionists that they present no real threat to their British identity. At present there is little sign that even moderate nationalists North or South are willing to do this, but a start could be made.
Dr Graham Gudgin was special adviser to First Minister David Trimble during 1998-2002