Northern Ireland's strange peace

[Hannah Bell]

THERE IS an establishment myth that there is peace in Northern Ireland...Since 2006, Sinn Fein, which used to be described as the political wing of the IRA, and Ian Paisley's Democratic Unionist Party have collaborated in a Northern Ireland Executive with limited power...

Yet today, there are daily attacks on the security forces--the police, British army and even the British intelligence service MI5...Conflicts between Catholic and Protestant working-class people have only gotten worse. Protestant and Catholic young people are clashing regularly at the interfaces between their neighborhoods. Families--mainly, but not exclusively Catholic--are being burned out of their homes.

In mid-July, there were three days of rioting throughout Northern Ireland...Still, the majority of people in both communities at least passively support the Good Friday Agreement... But substantial minorities in both communities are alienated from the political status quo. UNDERLYING THIS alienation is poverty and deprivation in both working class communities...Thirty one percent of the working-age population has no paid work...

But worse is coming. The British government is slashing Northern Ireland's budget by £521 million (approximately $781 million). This represents nearly 5 percent of the total budget...

http://socialistworker.org/2010/07/29/northern-irelands-strange-peace

[Ken Burch]

1. This is the most hopeful part of the story, at least to me:

"The People Before Profit Alliance is trying to build a united working class movement. In Derry, Northern Ireland's second largest city, the alliance has, at times, been able to bring Catholics and Protestants together to fight program closings. Eamonn McCann, who was the People Before Profit candidate in the recent parliamentary elections, says:

With People Before Profit, you get what it says on the label. Our program is based entirely on raising the interests of the people left behind by the peace process above the interests of the profiteers who dominate our society.
'
Both Unionist and Nationalist parties accept the communal divide as the axis of politics. In fact, they are products of the divide. But none of them pursue policies to advance the position of people at the bottom of either community.

Of course, an Irish working class movement can't be built in the North alone. People Before Profit is organizing throughout the country and has already elected five councilors in the south of Ireland. There is no guarantee that it will succeed. But anything else will be a disaster for Irish working people--Protestant and Catholic, North and South."

That is the alternative that Northern Ireland needs-the end of the sectarian divide and the unity of the working people of the Six Counties. Perhaps now, it could happen.

Saoirse!

[SoxFan]

2. Sod off

Northern Ireland has come too far over the last decade and a half to let dimestore radicals fuck it up. Save your overheated nonsense.

Oh, and before you get on the high-horse, my grandfather was imprisoned by the British during the 1920s for subversive activities; the other grandfather worked with Michael Collins' flying column in Cork.