Unionism and the Belfast Agreement

Abstract

Since the IRA called a ceasefire in 1994, the language of the peace process has been one dominated by the twin ideas of ‘change’ and ‘progress’. At most points in this process it has seemed that unionists have been the obstacles to both ‘change’ and ‘progress’. Sometimes this has been justified, while at other times this has been the result of ‘spinning’ by Sinn Féin, as it was easy to fit this interpretation into well-worn frameworks of analysis of unionists as obstinate and bigoted. This has meant that it seemed more of an intellectual puzzle when the Ulster Unionist Party (UUP) engaged with a peace process and agreed to a peace agreement than when the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) and United Kingdom Unionist Party (UKUP) stayed away from the process and opposed it. This chapter seeks to explain these variations in unionist responses to the peace process and show how the politics of unionism intersected with the politics of the peace process to produce inertia in the process of implementation. It will first examine questions of ideology and strategy in the period before the Belfast Agreement. It will then examine the varying unionist responses to the Agreement before seeking to use this analysis to understand the dynamics of the implementation of the Agreement.