The US and Brokering Republican Moderation

This chapter argues that in order for moderation through institutional inclusion to take full hold, it was necessary for the US to act as a powerful external broker throughout the negotiations of the Belfast Agreement and during the consolidation of republican moderation. This brokering was short and targeted, not of relevance in the early stages of republican moderation and only mattered during the formal peace process phase and its implementation. The US provided a series of credible guarantees to republicans that their interests would be protected and given fair representation when entering a bargain with the more powerful British state. It also provided a series of incentives (funding, investment, access to powerful allies) and disincentives (the threat of removing the incentives, political marginalisation) that encouraged republicans to increase their engagement. This was important not only in persuading republicans to sign the Belfast Agreement in 1998 but also in persuading the IRA to eventually decommission its weapons some seven years later.

Introduction

This chapter establishes the main issues to be explored in this book, including the dramatic transformation that Sinn Féin and the IRA underwent. It provides a critique of existing explanations, arguing that they mistakenly assume the politics of Sinn Féin is driven primarily by the military capacity of the IRA. Existing explanations also assume that interplay between the British state and Irish republicans led to their moderation, but these explanations neglect the wider institutional context in which republicans chose to change their strategy. In contrast, this chapter sets out the argument that sustained contact with, and inclusion in, key political processes, namely party politics and a consolidated framework of democratic institutions, extracted moderate concessions from republicans in a gradual and path-dependent process.

Electoral Participation and Republican Moderation

This chapter traces how electoral participation contributed to the moderation of republicanism. It argues that liberal democratic elections simply do not allow for revolution. The decision by Irish republicans to participate in elections in 1981 was a critical juncture. The path it chose pushed the movement in an increasingly moderate direction, moving away from parallel states and outright rejection in favour of ambivalent electoral participation. Once this path was chosen republicans became locked-in, resulting in republicans fractionalising their long-term goal into short-term aims, courting voters beyond their core supporters, increasing engagement with ruling institutions, and using the existing system rather than trying to overthrow it. This electoral direction was later reinforced by the power-sharing arrangements which brought republicans into government. Moderation occurred in spite of republicans rejecting the legitimacy of the electoral institutions in which they were now competing. Electoral participation was a rational choice by republicans to pursue their goals through a new means in the hope of avoiding marginalisation.

Radicalism and Moderation in the History of Irish Republicanism

This chapter examines the meaning of radicalism and moderation within Irish republicanism by undertaking a comparison of the transformation of the anti-Treaty side in the Irish civil war into Fianna Fáil in the 1920s and the transformation of Provisional Sinn Féin and the Provisional IRA 70 years later. It argues that in both instances moderation was a strategic decision undertaken to advance the goals of the movements. Both Fianna Fáil in the 1920s and Sinn Féin today agreed to participate in the hope of dismantling the system of rule from within and replacing it with a more preferable outcome. The transformations were concerned with redefining republicans’ relationships with institutions and violence, while at the same time remaining committed to their ideological goals. Strategies and tactics changed, but their values and ambitions remained the same.

British Policy Towards Irish Republicanism

This chapter examines the role of British state policy in extracting republican moderation. It argues against studies that assume British policy had a clear goal of co-opting republicans and sucking them into mainstream politics. Instead a better understanding is to appreciate how British policy enabled republican moderation through two key conditions. Firstly it created a credible institutional framework for political competition in Northern Ireland that reduced the risks of participation for all sides. Secondly it was tolerant of the emergence of republicanism as a political force and did not suppress it, even while imposing robust anti-terrorist legislation against the IRA. These factors allowed republicans to commit to a moderate path knowing that the institutional framework offered a genuine opportunity to exercise power without inherently favouring one side over the other. Yet it would be a mistake to think British policy was always the product of a clear plan. It was often messy and contradictory. However, with the signing of the Anglo-Irish Agreement in 1985, successive British and Irish governments began to cohere around a shared position which ultimately enabled republican moderation.

Democratisation and Reining in Radical Republicanism

Radical groups often agree to trade in their revolutionary ways in return for democratic reforms which give them a greater stake in power or increased opportunities to gain power. As part of the peace process, republicans engaged in democratic bargaining over the design of new institutions to govern Northern Ireland. In this process it is possible to identify clear stages in republican strategy that entailed extensive moderation in return for what republicans perceived as the democratisation of political opportunities for nationalists. This process brought republicans into increasing contact with mainstream nationalism and republicans agreed to make themselves ‘coalitionable’ to build an alliances with these groups. During the negotiations republicans compromised their revolutionary positions and use of violence in return for institutional and credible guarantees that their goals could be pursued through political channels. Republicans aspired to use the peace process to transition to a united Ireland and the implementation phase was about trying to balance accepting the new power-sharing institutions as providing a system of political order but limiting their permanence and only accepting them on condition that they allowed for an opportunity to transition to a united Ireland.

Conclusion

This chapter provides a summary of the main arguments and empirical evidence of the book. It re-emphasizes the argument that inclusion drove the process of moderation in a gradual and path dependent process. It also argues that moderation was strategic and involved extensive movement away from revolutionary violence towards working through the existing system and accepting reformism. However, it did not entail core value change or the abandonment of core goals. It provides an assessment of how republicans are pursuing their goal of a united Ireland in a post-peace process era, arguing that republicans have been largely ineffective in their efforts and are instead now relying on exogenous factors to advance their cause. It concludes by considering the implications of Irish republicanism for other cases of separatist conflict and for comparative peace processes. It argues that the pathway to moderation offered here highlights that moderation can occur when internal change within a movement is met with tolerance from the ruling state to allow that movement to politicise without abandoning core goals.