The GFA ‘s paradoxical outcome

Whilst the Good Friday Agreement seems to have been a success from an outsider’s perspective, those closely attached to events in the province may view it differently. Essential reading for any students of the politics of Northern Ireland

This week’s Bagehot article takes an incisive look at events in Northern Ireland a decade after the historic settlement that brought power sharing to the area.

The long war may have been followed by concerted attempts by a host of groups to bring a long peace to the people of the province, but many are unhappy with their lot. Those who feel that they have lost most are drawn from the community that has essentially dominated life in Northern Ireland for as long as anyone cares to rememeber..

According to the Economist:

“The most vociferously disgruntled group are the Protestant unionists, for whom the sight of Mr McGuinness in a ministerial chair is morally repugnant. That basic unpalatability wrecked the career of David Trimble, who with the nationalist leader John Hume made the agreement possible; a settlement built by moderates ended up empowering Sinn Fein and the hitherto vituperative, medieval Mr Paisley. But the old unionist pessimism—a sense of being surrounded and imperilled—lives on. So does the atavistic fear of betrayal by the British government: no unionist politician of any stripe seems to have a kind word to say about Mr Blair. “We always knew the British were treacherous,” says one, “and we weren’t disappointed.”

Outside the political class, there is a similar feeling of “being on the losing side”, as a community worker from the Shankill Road, an infamous Protestant enclave adorned with garish murals of masked loyalist commandos, puts it. In places they regard as part of their patrimony, ordinary Protestants now encounter Catholics in Gaelic football shirts. Meanwhile the Belfast shipyards, once a staple employer of Protestants, have withered (the city, one local joke runs, should put up a monument to the Unknown British Taxpayer, who continues to provide whopping subsidies to the province, its relative prosperity notwithstanding). The perception is that the Catholics have done better. In a place where old triumphs or injustices, whether inflicted ten years ago or 300, are the stuff of politics and worse, this sense of a Catholic victory is dangerous.”

Consider:
What other evidence is there that politics in Northern Ireland is not running smoothly?
How and why was devolution delivered differently in Northern Ireland compared to Scotland and Wales?