Northern Ireland: More Good News Than Bad

In recent days, sectarian violence returned to Northern Ireland. Republican splinter groups killed two soldiers and a policeman in separate attacks. Does this mean the place will sink back into chaos? I don't think so. I'm reminded of what I wrote in Newsweek in August 2001:

Two Northern Irelands were in the news last week. Dominating the front pages: the battered peace process, forever caught in the punch-up between good news and bad. Back on the business pages, a different story unfolded. A luxury Ramada hotel opened its doors in Belfast--part of a sustained construction boom that belies the city's skewed image as a war zone alight with burning police Land Rovers. Real-estate prices continued to climb, well ahead of inflation; retail rents were rising faster in Belfast than anywhere else in Britain except London. A Confederation of British Industry survey found that Northern Ireland was one of only two places in the United Kingdom that would not lose jobs this year.

Pay attention to those business stories. For all the hand-wringing about disarmament and the fate of their elected Assembly, which was temporarily suspended last weekend, the people of Northern Ireland have mostly moved beyond the Troubles that consumed them for nearly three decades. There is enough tension and hatred to bring back the worst of times if enough things go wrong. Yet even Ulster's pessimists don't expect that to happen. The institutions born of the 1998 Good Friday Agreement, like the Assembly, are still young and fragile. The popular desire for peace is not....

Life behind the headlines in Northern Ireland shows a society struggling for normality--and coming reasonably close. Educational standards are higher in Ulster than in the rest of the United Kingdom. Hospital waiting lists are shorter. For its size (1.7 million people), the province enjoys a rich cultural life, from searing political theater to regular concert stops by U2, Sting and Belfast's own Van Morrison. Devolved government, though messy, is universally popular. Gone are the days when Ulster was run by proconsul-like British ministers. Ever since the four-party power-sharing Northern Ireland government was finally formed in November 1999, a dozen ministers have had control of their own budgets, which were purposefully fattened by London to keep everybody happy. Guns and bombs once towered over dialogue and politics in Northern Ireland. They are still a huge factor, but in a crucially different way. IRA guns strengthen the hand of Sinn Fein, its political arm--but only as long as they are not used. And they have not been since the IRA announced a ceasefire four years ago. The 107 deaths since 1997 officially linked to the "security situation" were at the hands of dissident paramilitaries who have no links to mainstream political parties. Many were, in fact, not "political" at all; they were committed by drug traffickers or other organized criminals camouflaging their activities in bogus political rationales.

As the peace process rattles through yet another crisis, it is tempting to sort through the machinations looking for an obstructionist Arafat or an intransigent Sharon to pin the blame on. But Northern Ireland is sui generis, and that uniqueness gives rise to hope. Unlike the Middle East or Macedonia or other hot spots, here no outside powers or interests stand to gain from stirring things up. It's not just the people and politicians of Northern Ireland who have a deeply vested interest in something like peace. Backed by the United States and united on this matter as never before, the British and Irish governments have for a decade worked together to keep the peace process on track. This powerful combination of concerted interests has prevented Northern Ireland from collapsing into chaos before--and probably will do so again.