IRELAND: A SHORT HISTORY

Joseph Coohill

Chapter 8: Troubles and Triumphs, 1966-2000 (Extract)

The second half of the twentieth century saw great troubles in Ireland, as well as economic and cultural triumphs. Sectarian violence in Northern Ireland reached a peak in the late 1960s and early 1970s, the Northern Ireland parliament was suspended and direct rule from London reimposed. The Republic entered the European Monetary System in 1979, and enjoyed a crescendo of prosperity in the 1990s. These decades also saw the export of Irish culture and music throughout the west, and Irish artists became some of the best known in the world.

The Republic of Ireland, 1966--82

Economic change continued to be the preoccupation of the Republic during this period. Sean Lemass had resigned as taoiseach in November 1966, and was succeeded by Jack Lynch (1917-99). The economic plans that had been put in place in the earlier 1960s had to be abandoned or reformed. Several times during these two decades, the Republic's economy went through serious difficulty, such as in 1974-5, when the oil crisis and other worldwide economic problems hit small countries like Ireland very hard. The recession of the late 1970s and early 1980s had similar effects, one of which was increased emigration. But there seemed to be a fundamental stability in the Republic's economy though it might not have been very noticeable during each crisis. Average growth during this period remained steady. The work of the Industrial Development Authority in attracting new industries seemed to have diversified the Republic's economy. Lynch and Fianna Fail won the 1969 general election, and began working for Ireland's introduction into the European Community. Fianna Fail ran into difficulty, however, when two of its important ministers, Charles Haughey (1925- ) and Neal Blaney (1922- ), were implicated in an IRA arms-smuggling operation in 1970. Lynch removed them from the government, and they were arrested on these charges, but they were acquitted in October. All this showed that difficulties in Northern Ireland continued to impinge on politics in the Republic.

A new focus emerged in the life of the Republic when it became a member of the European Community on 1 January 1973 (along with Britain and Denmark). This brought immediate benefits, especially for farmers (who received nearly half of their income from European and government subsidies). In the late 1970s, Ireland was receiving over £400 million from the EEC, while contributing just over £40 million. The net gain from the EEC climbed even higher by the mid-1980s, to over £500 million. This meant that farming would remain a large part of the economy, and that farming incomes rose dramatically. But the economic benefits of EEC membership that were to become so apparent in later decades could not help the Republic during the economic slump of the early 1970s. The oil crises of the 1970s hit the Republic's economy hard, but the responses of the various governments probably did not help. Having seen the benefits that expansion and government borrowing had brought during the 1960s, they pursued more or less the same policies. Budget deficits were allowed to rise out of control, and governments seemed to think they could spend their way out of the problems of the 1970s. Inflation and unemployment were two important reasons for the rejection of Fianna Fail at the 1973 election. A Fine Gael-Labour coalition came into power under Liam Cosgrave (1920- ). One of the most important things that the new government did was to declare a state of emergency during the revival of IRA terrorism in Britain and Northern Ireland. Police and the military were given increased powers to arrest and detain suspected terrorists, and many militant republican organizations were banned.

The election of 1977 proved to be a Fianna Fail victory. Fine Gael had spent a lot of time between 1973 and 1977 improving their electoral and political organizations, and were widely expected to win the 1977 election, but the election result showed that there was little perception of ideological difference between the two parties, and often very minor issues (such as certain types of property and vehicle taxes in 1977) could sway the electorate. Jack Lynch became taoiseach again, but many of his own supporters disagreed with his moderate stance towards unionists in Northern Ireland. Further, there were sharp economic difficulties in the immediate aftermath of the Republic joining the European Monetary System in late 1978 and early 1979. This broke the market connection between the Irish pound and the British pound, and tied the value of the Irish pound to other European currencies. As with the Republic's entry into the European Community, the idea behind the move to the European Monetary System was to free the Irish economy from the overwhelming influence of the British economy. This would reduce the Republic's dependency on British markets, and open up more markets in Europe. Initially, however, the move to the European Monetary System caused the value of the Irish pound to fall dramatically. Trade union problems also plagued the country (the postal service was on strike for nearly six months in 1979), and fuel shortages were severe in the wake of another international oil crisis. Also, by the end of the 1970s, the degree of European support for agriculture reduced significantly, and prices fell sharply. The late 1970s and early 1980s were characterized by massive public debts, and failed attempts to solve the problems that they created.

Jack Lynch resigned unexpectedly as taoiseach in December 1979, and was replaced by Charles Haughey. Haughey's priorities were to improve the economy and to tackle Northern Irish and British relations. Agreements were reached with trade unions and others in October 1980, which ended many disputes and meant that services were renewed. Haughey met with the new British Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher (1925- ), on 21 May 1980, and held discussions on Northern Ireland. Although no agreements were reached (none had been proposed at this stage), the meeting was said to be friendly. They met again in December, and took the step of agreeing to an examination of the `totality of the relationship within these islands'. Some unionists in Northern Ireland expressed alarm at this statement, and Thatcher was forced to state publicly that the British government would never force Northern Ireland to unite with the Republic if a majority of the people did not wish it. The strength of this statement caused many nationalists in the south to withdraw their support for Haughey. This, combined with the stubborn recession, led to Haughey losing the 1981 election, and a Fine Gael-Labour coalition coming in under Garrett FitzGerald (1926-). FitzGerald had productive meetings with Thatcher (they set up the Anglo-Irish Intergovernmental Council to discuss common concerns), and he brought up the subject of amending the Irish constitution to make it less objectionable to Northern Ireland unionists (which faced serious opposition in the Dail). But FitzGerald's remedy for the economy was strict, and his austere budget of January 1982 was rejected by one vote in the Dail. He called an election in February 1982. This time, Haughey and Fianna Fail were more successful in building a coalition.

Haughey's previous good relations with Thatcher were highly strained when he rejected the idea of a devolved assembly for Northern Ireland (which he thought would not provide security for Catholics) and he asked the UN Security Council to intervene in the Falklands war between Britain and Argentina. But Haughey's government was plagued by administrative scandals, and the continued recession did much to bite into his government's acceptability in the country. He lost a no-confidence vote on 4 November 1982, and had to call another general election (the third in an eighteen-month period). The Haughey-Fitzgerald see-saw swung back in favour of FitzGerald, who put together another Fine Gael-Labour coalition in early December. From 1982 onwards, the pace of dialogue between Dublin and London increased dramatically, and social issues in the Republic again became prominent.

In addition to these rapid-fire political changes, there were also important social and economic changes during this period. The population of the Republic grew dramatically. It increased by over half a million between 1961 and 1981 (from 2,818,000 to 3,440,000). Other social factors changed. Marriage age fell, but married couples were having fewer and fewer children. The population became younger, a fact that was exploited in the Republic's advertisements to attract industry and development from abroad during the 1980s - `We're the Young Europeans'. Emigration to countries on the European continent increased, providing an alternative to the traditional patterns of leaving Ireland for the USA, Britain and Australia. Educational reforms were sweeping. Many smaller schools were closed or amalgamated with larger ones nearby. Provision for equipment was improved, and secondary schools became free for most students, which, among other things, improved retention. Universities were given funds to expand, and technical and vocational colleges spread. Censorship of what had been considered indecent or obscene books and magazines was relaxed in 1966. Contraception, long banned in the Republic, was permitted (with certain restrictions) in 1979. By the mid-1980s, however, this policy was seen to have many difficulties, and in 1985 condoms were made legal for all those over eighteen. And the bans on divorce and abortion were coming under criticism. Women's groups formed and pushed for greater equality, and equal pay and equal opportunity legislation was passed in this period.

The Catholic Church tried to make itself `more relevant to modern times' during the 1960s and 1970s. Dictates from the Second Vatican Council, which contained many liberalizing measures, meant that Irish Catholicism could not continue to be as inward-looking as it had been. There was also a gradual relaxation of censorship. Religion still retained a strong hold on Irish life, however. More than ninety per cent of Catholics described themselves as `practising' (that is, they attended mass at least once per week) in the early 1970s. There was some evidence, and fear, that young Catholics were not as devout as older generations, and that this might cause a decline in religious practice in later decades (which turned out to be true).

Northern Ireland and the Troubles, 1966-82

There were two major, and opposing, new forces in Northern Ireland in the mid-1960s. The first was the extremist, the Revd Ian Paisley, who had emerged as the spokesman for many hard-line unionists in the late 1950s and early 1960s. The second was the Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association, which was founded in Belfast in 1967 to press for reforms in local government, the removal of the extra vote for business property, equality of housing and equal civil rights for everyone in Northern Ireland. Although the Association was intended to appeal to all religions and traditions in the north, it soon had a Catholic majority, and, in fact, most of the things it opposed were essentially restrictions (formal and informal) on Catholics in the province. The crucial difference between the Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association and other organizations that proposed to support the Catholic minority was that the Association did not question the political existence of Northern Ireland. Their concern was to press for equality in housing, employment and elections. Following an investigation into severe housing discrimination in County Tyrone in 1968, the Association held protest marches throughout Northern Ireland in late 1968 and early 1969. A Derry protest on 5 October 1968 was a violently suppressed by the police. This was captured on news cameras, and much of the world became shocked at the brutality of the police action. The police force, the Royal Ulster Constabulary, soon lost credibility with Northern Irish Catholics.

Disorder in Northern Ireland became rife. A new organization, the People's Democracy, rose after the October confrontation between the Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association and the police. Led by Bernadette Devlin (1948- ) and others, the People's Democracy was a more radical group than the Association, and it attracted severe criticism from some unionist groups and from Northern Ireland's Prime Minister, Terence O'Neill. They led various civil rights marches, including a famous one from Derry to Belfast in early January 1969. Although the People's Democracy gradually faded by the early 1970s, Bernadette Devlin was elected to the British House of Commons in April 1969. Continuing sectarian violence between Catholics and Protestants and between nationalists and unionists sparked widespread concern in Ireland and Britain. O'Neill came under heavy criticism from all sides for the government's handling of the situation. He called a general election on 24 February 1969, and lost unionist support in many important constituencies, although he remained in government. This election was important because it saw a rise in support for Ian Paisley. Also, on the nationalist side, the Nationalist Party's leader, Eddie McAteer (1914-86), lost his seat to John Hume (1937- ), who would come to lead the non-militant nationalist campaign for the rest of the century. O'Neill ended the multiple vote system (whereby business owners, mainly unionists, got an extra vote for owning business property) and introduced `one person, one vote'. The negative reaction from his own party was so great that he resigned on 28 April. His successor was Major James Chichester-Clark (1923- ). But Chichester-Clark was unable to calm the situation, and in August 1969, his government asked the British government to send in troops to restore order. In many Catholic areas of Belfast and Derry, the British troops were welcomed as protectors from the police and unionist extremists. The British government, under Prime Minister Harold Wilson (1916-95), insisted on a number of reforms from the Northern Ireland government. Public housing was to be allocated by a non-partisan body, electoral gerrymandering was to end and discrimination in employment was made illegal. On 19 August 1969, the British government issued the `Downing Street Declaration', which said that every person in Northern Ireland was `entitled to the same equality of treatment and freedom from discrimination as obtains in the rest of the United Kingdom'. Although welcomed by the minority community, these reforms and the Declaration were seen as coming a little late. They were also bitterly resented by many unionists, and some militant groups saw an increase in membership and financing.

In the Catholic streets of Derry and Belfast, the initial goodwill that the British troops had enjoyed in late 1969 was lost quickly during arms searches of Catholic homes. Many Catholics found this insulting, and the harsh behaviour of the soldiers during these searches turned Catholic opinion against them. This was a highly significant moment, because much of nationalist and Catholic opinion had seen the British government as a protector of the minority against the unionist and Protestant majority in Northern Ireland. These months were also crucial for the IRA. Although it had largely been militarily inactive since 1962, it had retained its structural organization and membership. The movement became interested in issues broader than the national question and began to embrace Marxist socialism as a cure for Ireland's ills (north and south). But when hostilities began to mount in Northern Ireland, two opposing camps in the IRA began to emerge. Those in the north thought that the idea of a socialist Ireland would have to be put on hold until the Catholics and nationalists had been protected, and the national question had been settled in the north. The southern command of the IRA stuck to its plan to agitate for a socialist republic. The northern IRA finally split from the southern IRA on 11 January 1970. The militants became known as the Provisional IRA, and the socialists as the Official IRA. The IRA members who would make up the Provisionals had essentially reactivated their military campaign in 1969, in reaction to the attacks on civil rights marchers and the arms searches in Derry and Belfast. They declared war on the British army in late 1969. The Official IRA ceased to be a significant force in Irish politics, north and south, and the term IRA now generally refers to the Provisionals, as it will throughout the rest of this book.

Meanwhile, the nationalist Social Democratic Labour Party (SDLP) was founded in August 1970 to provide a party and forum for non-militant nationalists, civil rights campaigners and trade unionists. It quickly grew in popularity under its leaders, one of whom was John Hume. Northern Ireland governments (under Chichester-Clark until March 1971, and under Brian Faulkner until March 1972) put in place some of the reforms that had been announced in the Downing Street Declaration in 1969. But the government soon put reforms on hold, and concentrated on destroying the IRA. The IRA had begun its campaign in earnest in early 1971. The first British soldier was killed on 6 February. Bombing campaigns began throughout the province. Faulkner (1921-77) responded by introducing `internment' for suspected IRA members in August 1971. Internment was imprisonment without trial or charge until the violence ceased, but it was not a new idea. It had been used both in the Free State and in Northern Ireland in 1922, 1939 and 1956. Initially, internment in 1971 only targeted republicans, over three hundred of whom were arrested (many of these had to be released because they were not connected with the IRA). Internment seemed like the action of a police state, and many people (nationalists and Catholics, as well as moderates) were strongly opposed to it. Internment, however, only helped the IRA. Many nationalists who had been unwilling to commit themselves to militancy joined the organization in 1971 and 1972 in reaction to what they saw as repression. Violence increased dramatically, with twice as many bombings between August and December 1971 as there had been between January and July. There were demonstrations against internment almost immediately after it was imposed; the most notorious of these was in Derry on 30 January 1972. On this `Bloody Sunday', thirteen civilians were shot dead by British Army paratroopers during a banned civil rights demonstration. Massive protests against these killings were held across Ireland, and the British Embassy in Dublin was burned down on 2 February.

Faulkner was summoned to London to meet with Conservative British Prime Minister Edward Heath (1916- ). Faulkner was warned that if the Northern Ireland government could not contain the political violence, direct rule would be implemented from London and the Northern Ireland parliament would be suspended. But the violence continued at alarmingly high levels (some of it at military bases in England) and on 24 March 1972, the London government took political control of Northern Ireland, and the Northern Ireland parliament at Stormont was suspended `temporarily'. A new British cabinet office, the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, was created and William Whitelaw (1918-99) was appointed. 1972 continued to see horrific violence in Northern Ireland. Although there was a very brief truce between the IRA and the British army from 26 June until 9 July, its breakdown prompted even more violence. In response to IRA action, unionist and Protestant militant groups, such as the Ulster Volunteer Force, were revived, and new groups, such as the Ulster Defence Association, were founded. Even though violence declined in late 1972, the death toll by the end of the year was 474.

The next few years saw many attempts at constitutional settlements to the divisiveness in Northern Ireland. The first was the creation of a Northern Ireland Assembly. William Whitelaw tried to bring the non-militant parties together in an effort to create a new governing body for Northern Ireland. Unionists were promised that Northern Ireland would remain part of the United Kingdom as long as a majority of its residents desired it. Nationalists, represented in this instance by the SDLP, were promised a share in the executive power in the new assembly. This was agreed to in December 1973, and the British government met with the government of the Irish Republic at a conference at Sunningdale in Berkshire to discuss the founding of a Council of Ireland. This Council was to be made up of representatives from the Republic and from Northern Ireland, and was to discuss and manage issues of common concern to both governments. The new Northern Ireland Assembly met during the first week of 1974, but many hard-line unionists refused to accept the Council of Ireland agreement that Faulkner had signed at Sunningdale, and they withdrew from the Assembly. Faulkner then had to deal with a massive strike against the Sunningdale agreement by the Ulster Workers' Council, called on 14 May. Over the next two weeks, the strike gradually gained support, bringing most of Northern Ireland to a standstill. This was the last straw, and Faulkner and his party members resigned from the executive of the Assembly on 28 May 1974. The executive then broke down, and any hope of an effective assembly was gone.

In 1975, another attempt was made at restoring government to Northern Ireland. A Convention was set up, and seventy-eight members elected in May, with the intention of putting forward proposals for governing the province. But no agreement could be reached on how to balance majority power with minority rights, and the Convention was eventually dissolved in March 1976. Internment was ended on 5 December 1975, but violence in Northern Ireland continued. Other groups tried to bring about a peaceful solution. The Peace Movement (also known as the Peace People) was founded in 1976 by Mairead Corrigan (1944- ) and Betty Williams (1943- ), after political violence had taken the lives of many children in Northern Ireland. They organized huge demonstrations and, in the short term, seemed to gain a lot of attention and to question some fundamental aspects of the divide in Northern Ireland. Although the Movement did not last much past the mid-1970s, Corrigan and Williams were awarded the 1977 Nobel Peace Prize for their work.

Further proposals to devolve power to Northern Ireland in 1977 and 1979 failed to satisfy nationalists or unionists, and the continued stalemate seemed to entrench the different parties in their positions. The decade of the 1970s was undoubtedly the worst that Northern Ireland had lived through in the twentieth century, but the 1980s saw only limited progress towards greater understanding. 1980 and 1981 were the years of hunger strikes. In late 1980, republican prisoners (including women) in various Northern Ireland prisons went on hunger strike for nearly two months. 1981 saw more severe hunger strikes, led by Bobby Sands, who initially protested against treatment in the Maze prison. Sands began his hunger strike on 1 March, and was soon joined by fellow republicans. This strike attracted worldwide attention, and Sands was even elected a Sinn Fein MP for the British parliament at a by-election on 20 April. The British government refused to give in to the strikers' demands to be treated as political prisoners, and Sands and nine other hunger strikers died in early May.

The next year, the British Conservative government under Margaret Thatcher made another attempt at setting up a Northern Ireland Assembly, and elections were held in October. This time, however, nationalists refused to take their seats in protest at what had gone on in the late 1970s and early 1980s. The plan for the Assembly then collapsed. Attempts at co-operation between the British and Irish governments were also troubled during this period. Thatcher had met with Charles Haughey, the Irish taoiseach, in December 1980, with the intention of examining the `totality of relationships' between Ireland and Britain, and an Anglo-Irish Council was set up in November 1981. But this progress stopped completely and quickly in 1982, partly over the Irish government's refusal to support Britain's war in the Falkland islands, and partly because of Conservative pressure on Thatcher to support Northern Ireland unionists. Politically, Northern Ireland began this period with an awakening of minority consciousness of their rights and powers of protest and disturbance. But the period ended in entrenched stalemate.

Economically, important changes had taken place, even in the midst of violence and instability. While the Northern Irish economy had expanded until 1973, it began to contract and decline in 1974. This was partly due to general British economic woes, as well as political violence frightening off potential investors. All this led to the `de-industrialization' of Northern Ireland, where the manufacturing sector dropped to less than a quarter of the whole economy. Unemployment became intractable, reaching twenty per cent in 1982. Overall, Northern Ireland became a `kept province' in that the British government was sending much more money to Northern Ireland than it was receiving from the province in taxes. Even though there had been some growth in the Northern Ireland economy during the 1960s, the problems with the drastic decline of the shipbuilding industry and the slow pace of industrial and commercial modernization meant that living standards were not as high as they were in the rest of the United Kingdom (although they were still higher than in the Irish Republic). These economic problems, and slow growth, meant that Northern Ireland's economy was not strong enough to handle the shock that the Troubles brought. It struggled throughout the 1970s, 1980s and early 1990s, although it was always heavily subsidized by the British treasury which ensured its viability.

Ireland, 1982-2000

The last two decades of the twentieth century saw the solidification of the idea of co-operation between Dublin and London in bringing about a solution to the problems in Northern Ireland. The 1990s saw the start of the `peace process', but the 1980s started with what looked like a continuation of opposing attitudes in Northern Ireland, the Republic and Britain. The British Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher, said in July 1982 that her government had no reason to consult with the Irish Republic over affairs in Northern Ireland. The idea of an assembly for Northern Ireland was revived in 1982, however, and the Assembly election showed an increase in political support for Sinn Fein in October. This caused some concern amongst nationalists because the moderate SDLP gained only slightly, and many nationalists wondered if Sinn Fein would eventually become the dominant nationalist party. This concern grew when the new leader of Sinn Fein, Gerry Adams (1948- ), was elected to the British parliament as MP for West Belfast in June 1983. Adams refused to take his seat in protest at the British presence in Northern Ireland.

In 1983, the Irish government made an attempt to bring about greater dialogue between the constitutional and non-violent political parties in the Republic and the North. Established as the New Ireland Forum, it was made up of the SDLP from Northern Ireland, and Fianna Fail, Fine Gael and Labour from the Republic. Meeting in May 1983, one of the recommendations that the Forum put forward was that Northern Ireland could be governed jointly by the British and Irish governments. This symbolized a new direction amongst nationalists, a direction which not only recognized the `equal validity' of the unionist tradition in Northern Ireland, but indicated that co-operation between Dublin and London was potentially the most viable way towards a solution to problems in the North. Although the British government's reaction to the Forum's report was lukewarm, a meeting between Margaret Thatcher and the new taoiseach, Garrett FitzGerald, in November 1984, encouraged this sort of thinking when they announced that `the identities of both the majority and the minority communities in Northern Ireland should be recognized and respected and reflected in the structures and processes of Northern Ireland in ways acceptable to both communities.' This was further advanced by the Anglo-Irish Agreement, signed by Thatcher and FitzGerald on 15 November 1985 and approved by both the London and Dublin parliaments. In this agreement, a new, co-operative approach seemed to have been taken. It recognized the right of the majority of the people in Northern Ireland to determine the province's governance, and stated that any change in its status would have to be approved by a majority vote. If a change were ever to be desired by a majority of the people in the north, the Agreement stated, it would be supported by the Dublin and London governments. A British-Irish Intergovernment Conference was set up so that civil servants from Dublin and London could meet to discuss issues of common concern. The reaction to the Agreement was cautious optimism from most moderate and constitutional parties, distrust from militant nationalists and fierce opposition from extreme unionists, who saw this as the first step to a united Ireland. But optimism for a non-violent solution grew when the SDLP gained strength at the 1987 British parliamentary elections, at the expense of Sinn Fein. This optimism was tempered, however, by the spectre of renewed violence in Northern Ireland. In May 1987, the IRA attacked an RUC station in County Armagh, and eight IRA men were killed. During a Remembrance Day ceremony in Enniskillen, County Fermanagh, an IRA bomb killed eleven people. And three unarmed IRA members were killed by British forces in Gibraltar.

The Peace Process

The British government took two further steps towards resolving the Northern Ireland problem when it stated in late 1989 that it would respond positively to an end to IRA violence, and said in late 1990 that Britain had no `strategic or economic interest' in Northern Ireland, which meant that it would only retain the province on the basis that the majority of the people there wished it to. The Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, Peter Brooke (1934- ), also tried to build inter-party co-operation in what came to be known as the Brooke Initiative in early 1990 (which was more or less the start of the peace process). Brooke tried to base this on the idea that the constitutional parties in Northern Ireland had no real barriers to talking to one another, and, hence, moving the 1985 Anglo-Irish Agreement forward. Various proposals for a change in how Northern Ireland was to be governed (by a commission made up of members from Northern Ireland, London, Dublin and the European Community) were put forward by the SDLP, but were rejected by unionists. Although these talks and the issues they raised lasted through 1991 and most of 1992, the problems and disagreements (which included such matters as the venue of the meetings and who would chair them, as well as more long-standing issues) between the various parties caused them to collapse by November 1992.

Throughout the early years of the 1990s, John Hume, the leader of the SDLP, had been holding talks with Gerry Adams from Sinn Fein, attempting to bring Adams's party into the constitutional process of seeking reform in Northern Ireland. The British government, under the new Secretary of State, Patrick Mayhew (1929- ), had publicly stated its willingness to allow Sinn Fein to participate in political talks if they would renounce violence and try to convince other hard-line republicans to do the same. A further sense of Sinn Fein taking a more moderate stand came on 24 April 1993, when Hume and Adams issued a joint statement that the Irish people had a right to self-determination, and, more importantly, that the way this right was to be exercised was `a matter of agreement between the people of Ireland'. This seemed to indicate that Sinn Fein were willing to take the concerns of unionists into account. Mayhew had also publicly stated that, although the identity and aspirations of unionists were safeguarded in national and international law, there was `also the aspiration to a united Ireland, an aspiration that is no less legitimate'. This recognition of nationalist feelings was a major step forward in understanding the different groups in Northern Ireland.

In December 1993, the British Prime Minister, John Major (1943- ), and the Irish taoiseach, Albert Reynolds (1932- ), issued their Joint Declaration that `it is for the people of Ireland alone, by agreement between the two parts respectively, to exercise their right of self-determination on the basis of consent, freely and concurrently given, North and South, to bring about a united Ireland, if that is their wish.' The 1993 Declaration also emphasized the need for all interested parties (including those in Britain and the United States) to have `full respect for the rights and identities of both traditions in Ireland'. This was welcomed by constitutional nationalists, who saw the British withdrawal from specific interest in Northern Ireland as a positive step forward. Militant nationalists, however, resented the renewed emphasis on the separateness of Northern Ireland. Unionists remained worried that the British government was gradually accepting moderate nationalist arguments about the future of Northern Ireland. One of the most important things about the Declaration, however, happened privately. Reynolds made it known to militant republicans that, if the Declaration was not enough to stop the violence, he would continue to work with the British government to bring about peace in the north, even if it meant leaving republican parties such as Sinn Fein out of the negotiations. This seems to have helped bring about the IRA ceasefire of 31 August 1994.