Prisoners of History? British-Irish Relations and the Conflict in Northern Ireland

Is the Northern Ireland problem still “... but Anglo-Irish relations writ small”, as Paul Arthur wrote in 2000? Would a solution to the conflict in Northern Ireland usher a complete “normalisation” of British-Irish relations? This article looks at how the management of the situation in Northern Ireland by the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland has evolved over recent decades, and argues that it is the way in which the two states have been brought to cooperate that has allowed them to go beyond the remnants of colonialism. Northern Ireland has admittedly remained for a long time the main element structuring relations between the UK and the Republic of Ireland. In that sense, it has been both a problem and a solution: it is a problem because many considered it to be a leftover from the colonial period that has to be resolved, but it also calls for a closer cooperation between the two states, which has entailed renegotiating their relations as a whole. In this perspective, we look at how Northern Ireland went from being the main consideration to one of the subjects of British-Irish relations, thus allowing both states to loosen the grip of history.