History of the Irish Conflict

Internal Affairs in Northern Ireland

        The two most pervasive problems of the new state of Northern Ireland were the continuing polarization of the nationalist and unionist communities which occasionally flared into violence, and relations with its two closest neighbors, Britain and the southern Ireland.

        The state of Northern Ireland was born amid bloodshed and communal disorder. J C Beckett's judgement that "between the early 1920s and the late 1960s Ireland enjoyed a longer period of freedom from major internal disturbance than it had known since the first half of the eighteenth century" is invalid if confined to the Northern state.

        The nationalist minority refused to recognize the new state. At the time when the institutions of the new state were being established, a considerable number of its citizens refused to participate on committees or to perform any action, which would lend support to the state's authority.

        As time passed and the state remained, most nationalists decided on a reluctant acceptance of the need to come to some accommodation. In many cases, they found that the state institutions, which had been established were arranged to exclude Catholics from power. For example, the local government franchise reflected property and not population, excluding non-ratepayers and awarding many people with more than one property multiple votes. Housing allocation and the manipulation of constituency boundaries were actively used in many cases to maintain Unionist majorities.

        Education too was an area where Catholics felt bitterly that the system established by the Education Act NI of 1930 had been tailored by Protestant pressure, producing a state education system, which was in fact Protestant, and forcing Catholic schools to find 50% of the cost of education. In the administration of justice, Catholics have alleged that the Special Powers Act, was designed exclusively against the nationalist majority. Allegations were vindicated by the Cameron Report in 1969 about discrimination against Catholics in public employment. The most serious allegation in this field was that the Northern Irish government operated a policy of deliberate discrimination in counties Tyrone, Derry and Fermanagh, creating conditions which encouraged emigration to counter the higher Catholic birth rates in these areas.

        The familiar relationship between economic recession and inter communal strife was bloodily revived in the depression of the 1930s. The dependency of Northern Ireland on exports made the state particularly vulnerable to world trends. The linen trade was severely restricted; in 1933 no ships were launched from Belfast shipyards for the first time in over 100 years. Between 1930 and 1939 the unemployment rates never fell below 25%. The bitter competition for too few jobs inevitably took a sectarian turn, which was exacerbated by worsening relations between the United Kingdom and the Irish Free State.

        The formation of the Ulster Protestant League in 1931 encouraged Protestants to employ other Protestants exclusively. The early 1930s were nervous and vituperative years. Widespread riots happened in 1931, some of which involved the IRA: Belfast, Larne, Portadown and Ballymena. The troubles peaked in 1935 when twelve people were killed and six hundred wounded. The frequency of sectarian violence gradually faded as the employment situation improved but few believed that it had retreated far below the surface.

        The comparative peacefulness of the next twenty years set the scene for the important changes, which appeared to be taking place in the 1950s and 1960s. This period of communal peace, or rather absence of overt conflict, coincided with a growing and deliberate emphasis on economic expansion in Northern Ireland. Shipbuilding, engineering and aircraft production boomed; agricultural production increased and the economic expectations of the people rose accordingly.

        The post-war years saw a determined attempt by the Northern Ireland government to attract foreign capital and industry, and its success was considerable. Many of the new industries were branches of international companies which offered employment and sometimes promotion to middle class Catholics who had formerly found promotion prospects restricted.

        An improvement in the prospects and conditions of Catholics was evident elsewhere. The Education Act in 1947 opened doors of educational opportunity by introducing free secondary education and the remarkable rise in the number of Catholics attending university was one measure of its impact. Although the extent of these changes is often debated, during the 1950s there was a growing tendency among Catholics to see their future in a Northern Ireland context rather than in an All Ireland state.

        In 1959 the republican party, Sinn Féin, lost its two seats at Westminster, their percentage of the vote decreasing from 26 to 14. Just as significant was the attempt by some leading Unionists to suggest that Catholics might be permitted to join the party. The attempt was thwarted by the bigoted obduracy of the Orange Order, but that it had been made at all was seen as a sign of the changing times.

Back to Home