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(Continued from page 59)
Yet the fact remains that the agreement has provoked remarkably little reflection on the nature of unionism within nationalist Ireland. Again and again, an exaggerated emphasis on the role of pressure from Tony Blair has substituted for more serious thought. In particular, the question is not asked: if unionism is simply a creed of irrational supremacism, why did a slender majority of unionists support the agreement.
equality agenda included, in the referendum?
The British government is signalling that a great deal now depends on the Irish Government's dialogue with republicanism in the North. Bertie Ahern has indicated his distaste for the rhetoric of "not a single bullet". With the completion of the December package, the republican movement is tantalisingly close to a place in the government of the North. Its electoral mandate gives Sinn Fein every right to such a place: only the refusal to do anything about the polities of latent threat is a barrier.
Seventy live years ago, republicans blew up the Dublin house of Stephen Gwynn, the former Galway nationalist MP. His 'crime' had been to write articles which showed a degree of sympathy for unionism. Gwynn reacted philosophically: he described one of the republicans who had helped his daughter remove some items of sentimental value from the house as "probably a decent little boy who is ordered to do dirty jobs". Gwynn even took the loss of his library in his stride:
"Books suffer very little". The attack did not stop his writing: he continued to insist that scrupulous respect for the rights of minorities in both parts of Ireland was the only way forward. After a long delay, for which unionists in significant measure must share the blame, we have the chance in 1999 to renew such a project.
Paul Bew is Professor of Irish politics at Queen's University Belfast.
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