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The Northern Ireland Peace Process and the War against Terrorism: Conflicting Conceptions?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 March 2014

Abstract

Preserving Northern Ireland's peace process in the midst of a war against international terrorism has presented the British government with a series of dilemmas at the level of political rhetoric, policy-making and legislation. The peace process demands adherence to human rights standards to provide a foundation for the new political dispensation, while an implication of the necessity for a war against terrorism is that restrictions on liberty are justifiable in the name of security against the backdrop of the existence of an emergency. These conflicting conceptions for addressing political violence at the national and international level are addressed.

Type
Articles
Copyright
Copyright © Government and Opposition Ltd 2007

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References

2 See, for example, Martin Mansergh, ‘The Background to the Irish Peace Process’, in Michael Cox, Adrian Guelke and Fiona Stephen (eds), A Farewell to Arms?: Beyond the Good Friday Agreement, Manchester, Manchester University Press, 2006, pp. 24–40.Google Scholar

3 On his reply to critics of the view that the end of the Cold War played a role in the peace process, see Michael Cox, ‘Rethinking the International and Northern Ireland: A Defence’, in Cox et al., A Farewell to Arms, pp. 427–42.Google Scholar

4 The typology was first developed by the author for a book on policing and public order. See John D. Brewer, Adrian Guelke, Ian Hume, Edward Moxon-Browne and Rick Wilford, The Police, Public Order and the State, 2nd edn, Basingstoke, Macmillan, 1996, especially pp. 230–4.Google Scholar

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6 This was based on the wartime Defence of the Realm Act 1914.Google Scholar

7 Quoted in Michael Farrell, Northern Ireland: The Orange State, London, Pluto Press, 1980, p. 93.Google Scholar

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14 A contemporary account of this shift emphasized the difference between army and police methods in dealing with political violence. See Kevin Boyle, Tom Hadden and Paddy Hillyard, Ten Years on in Northern Ireland: The Legal Control of Political Violence, London, The Cobden Trust, 1980, pp. 24–36.Google Scholar

15 From the text of the Framework Documents of 22 February 1995, quoted in Cox et al., A Farewell to Arms?, p. 505.Google Scholar

16 From the text of the Belfast Agreement of 10 April 1998, quoted in Cox et al., A Farewell to Arms?, p. 472.Google Scholar

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19 Ibid.Google Scholar

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23 See, for example, Michael Peel, ‘Muslim Officer Warns on Terrorism Curbs’, Financial Times, 8 August 2006.Google Scholar

24 From p. 13 of text of Joint Declaration by the British and Irish Governments: April 2003, accessed at http://cain.ulst.ac.uk/events/peace/docs/bijoint010503.pdf. The text was released in May 2003.Google Scholar

25 The text of the St Andrews Agreement, including its five annexes, can be found at http://www.nio.gov.uk/st_andrews_agreement.pdf.Google Scholar

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27 Transcript of the prime minister's press conference on 26 July 2005, accessed at http://www.number-10.gov.uk.Google Scholar

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