Making Sense of a United Ireland: Should it happen? How might it happen?

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Wallace Thompson, a founding member of the DUP, raised eyebrows this month by declaring Unionism was “probably always in many ways doomed”. Ulster unionists had made a solemn covenant on ‘Ulster Day’ in September 1912. In it, they pledged loyalty to their brothers and sisters throughout Ulster. The covenant was signed by more than 235,000 men, with a matching declaration signed by nearly the same number of women. The three counties of Donegal, Cavan, and Monaghan, however, had large Catholic and nationalist majorities. A nine-county Ulster would have meant, according to the census of 1911, a Protestant-to-Catholic ratio of 57 to 43 rather than the 66-to-34 ratio of what became Northern Ireland. The UUP leadership’s ‘inner circle’ effectively surrendered the unionists of Donegal, Cavan, and Monaghan to what became the Irish Free State. In competition with this model, O’Leary poses what he calls an “integrated Ireland” — a more drastic process whereby Northern Ireland would be absorbed into a unitary Irish state. At present, the devolved model seems the most tolerable option for cultural Protestants, while nationalists and republicans will naturally prefer full integration. O’Leary argues, however, that “a future convergence” of the two models could develop, with devolutionary structures in a united Ireland “as a transitional arrangement, provided that it is fully intended to lead to an integrated Ireland.” If there was going to be a united Ireland tomorrow, would I be still here fighting tomorrow?” asks Doug Beattie.

One does not have to believe that all economic growth since the 1980s was a mirage to recognize that tax-dodging strategies adopted by companies like Apple have massively inflated the headline figures for Irish GDP. In 2015, for example, the official figures purported to show GDP growth of 26 percent. Since O’Leary repeatedly cites figures for GDP per capita, his failure to discuss this phenomenon in a serious way leaves a major hole in his argument. Fables of Social DemocracyThere have, however, been several unionist surrenders—as well as British betrayals. Ulster unionists parted with their southern counterparts, who wanted all of Ireland to remain in the United Kingdom, or in the British empire or in the British Commonwealth. Southern unionists would have settled for “dominion status” for the entire island in 1917–18 so that they would have been part of a larger minority rather than the small one they became. They feared an Irish Republic, but they did not want partition. Ulster unionists preferred to leave southern unionists behind rather than bolster them in a sovereign united Ireland. As retreating generals do, they cut their losses. Explaining Northern Ireland devoted two of its chapters to these competing and irreconcilable Marxist schools of thought, from the “Green” or anti-imperialist Marxism represented by the group People’s Democracy to the “revisionist” Marxism of the British and Irish Communist Organization and the Workers’ Party. The book’s treatment of figures such as Michael Farrell, Eamonn McCann, Paul Bew, and Henry Patterson, whose writings were highly influential in shaping perceptions of Northern Ireland, was tinged with sympathy — unsurprisingly so, given O’Leary’s past identifications with the Left. That said, the authors viewed revolutionary theories of change with barely concealed contempt. A Guide to Action The ultra-conservative stance of some DUP members on issues like marriage equality is also problematic for young voters, while unionists feel that the Brexit deal, which leaves Northern Ireland effectively part of the EU single market, threatens their British identity. Although he doesn’t say so explicitly, O’Leary’s view of reunification as a reset — defined by “renewal of our institutions, our relationships, our policies, our international alliances, our economic, cultural and social policies, our freedoms, and our rights” — looks very much like absorption of the North into the South with a face-lift for the latter. What is his preferred approach to reunification — a paradigm shift, or an enlarged and superficially edited version of the existing southern state, with the same neoliberal economic model? O’Leary gestures to the former but his analysis points us to the latter. A Song for Europe

Neale Richmond, a Fine Gael member of the Irish parliament, believes that Brexit has brought the prospect of a unified Ireland closer, but says the rights of those who identify as British must be respected. “The challenge for those who believe in unity is to reach out to the unionists and other communities to convince and reassure. We need a new Ireland that is genuinely inclusive of a minority British population, one whose identity will be respected and who will see no diminution of their rights.” Then-Taoiseach and Fianna Fail leader Bertie Ahern with Senator George Mitchell and then-British Prime Minister Tony Blair, after they signed the Good Friday Agreement. Unionists have lived a large part of their lives fearing constitutional change, by virtue of the fact that we had very brutal terrorist campaigns towards that end,” he said in his office in Ballymena, approximately a 40-minute drive from Belfast. That includes Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael, Sinn Féin, the SDLP, the Irish Labour Party, the Greens, People Before Profit, and others. However admirable this vision may be, many observers have rightly questioned the idea that European institutions are reformable in this way, and O’Leary himself recognizes that neoliberalism was hardwired into the EU’s treaties. The idea that Germany might one day submit to the sovereignty of the EU’s many smaller member states is quixotic. Yet in this analysis, O’Leary rejected the idea of radical change, favoring instead a tempering of capitalism by the forces of “social democracy, social liberalism, environmentalism, and feminism.” “Seeing Is Believing”As Allen notes, the upper professionals who constitute the social base of this political tendency often occupy “important positions within the UK state and its local iteration in Northern Ireland and their expertise and occupational culture are derived from a familiarity with that state.” Will the promise of what O’Leary calls “reunification two” — the North returning to Europe after Brexit — be enough to win this cohort over? Two Models Irish reunification was long deemed impossible. For many it still is, especially because of the long conflict—or war or “Troubles”—between 1966 and 2005, or 1968 and 1998. The dates and names are contested. Yet reunification is now certainly possible, indeed highly probable, though not inevitable—at least, not yet. This striking demographic development was confirmed in the 2019 UK elections, where in Northern Ireland, nationalists won nine of the eighteen seats, while the middle ground Alliance party took North Down, creating the first-ever non-unionist majority delegation from Northern Ireland in the London parliament. (Incidentally, many would argue that now is a good time for Sinn Fein to take its seats in London to demonstrate that change.)

A must-read for anyone who lives in Northern Ireland and thinks seriously about its future. [O'Leary has] thought through the implications of possible unity so deeply it would be foolish for anyone who seeks it or opposes it to ignore his book' Cathal Mac Coille The German case seems more promising as a model, although Making Sense cites the work of Gerhard Albert Ritter, who has argued that unification in 1990 encouraged a neoliberal turn across Germany as a whole in his book The Price of German Unity. O’Leary sounds a warning about following such a path in Ireland “when the average Southerner may well be turning away from an overdose of neo-liberalism.” At no point, however, does he discuss the practicalities of how we might iron out the worst tendencies of Irish neoliberalism through reunification. Their talk of a united Ireland ‘in my lifetime’ is mystical blather,” writes Colm Tóibín. It isn’t – a united Ireland is inevitable. The demographics are moving daily towards it. Catholics are now perhaps in the majority in the province, and most people there favour membership of the European Union over union with Britain. This is the feeling among the better educated – whether Catholic or Protestant, and predominantly among the young. Britain is a declining economy, while the European Union is a world superpower moving onward and upward.The nationalist party, which always opposed violence to gain unity, has been battered at the ballot box after losing swathes of support to Sinn Féin. Although he presents himself as a nonpartisan figure, in ideological terms O’Leary would fit snugly into the now moribund Irish Labour Party — swimming along with the tides of progressive neoliberalism, content with a sort of Fabian incrementalism. It is not that Making Sense offers an ideological roadmap for any reunification project or campaign. Indeed, it is the claim to be without ideology that is likely to presage the tenor of the debate. Pacific Dispositions In a short section on the island’s future, O’Leary identified what he considered to be the dominant “mega-trends” in the world at large that might ensnare Ireland. Those trends included “de-democratization, plutocracy, inequality,” “the erosion of social-democratic and social-liberal parties,” and “the hollowing-out of political parties” in general. This gives us some valuable insight into O’Leary’s thinking on the EU (which is largely absent from Making Sense). The idea that Germany might one day submit to the sovereignty of the EU’s many smaller member states is quixotic.