Despite seemingly disparate subjects, the books under review arguably make a good trio for analytical purposes. Together, they shed considerable light on the conflict in Northern Ireland, especially as viewed from Great Britain, at grassroots and elite levels. Optimists will see in them the potential for positive change; pessimists, the enduring nature of old enmities and the unwelcome return of unenlightened attitudes. These studies demonstrate the centrality of Northern Ireland to British political, social and cultural life over many decades (even when this was neither fully recognised nor appreciated). Above all, they show that Northern Ireland is a place from which many lessons can be learned. Lessons, sadly, that appear lost on many contemporary policymakers and commentators.
Margaret Scull's study explores the role of the Catholic church in mediating the conflict in Northern Ireland. Her findings are based on a panoply of previously unexplored, or under-utilised, archival sources, such as papers in diocesan archives in Ireland, England and Wales. The English and Welsh material provides a broader understanding of the way the church responded to the Northern Ireland conflict, in different geographical (and political) contexts.
The book claims to employ a ‘mixed method approach’ (p. 7). However, only qualitative research methods (for example, interviews and documentary analysis) appear to have been applied. It is argued that the church's response to the conflict ‘must be viewed as an entangled history’. Entangled history is incredibly difficult, not least because reflexivity is an integral part of the research process. The resulting analysis, therefore, more closely resembles a comparative than an entangled history. Scull's comparative focus usefully illuminates the challenges posed by the Northern Ireland conflict for both the respective hierarchies and the wider community of the faithful across the islands.
While the book is a study of a particular institution, the role of individual clerics, and the parts that they played in the search for a resolution to the conflict, or not, is integral to the analysis. One of the book's strongest features is a fascinating exploration of the ideological differences between successive primates of all-Ireland, Cardinals William Conway, Tomás Ó Fiaich and Cahal Daly. Tumultuous events for the nationalist and Catholic communities – such as internment and Bloody Sunday – receive prominent treatment in the book, and we see interesting comparisons in the reactions to them from the clergy and hierarchy at local, regional and international levels.
The series of prison protests by the Provisional I.R.A. and Irish National Liberation Army between 1976 and 1981, and how the church and its clerics responded to them, receive detailed coverage. The 1981 hunger strikes, which saw the deaths of ten republican prisoners, divided opinion within the clergy and hierarchy. Scull's discussion usefully demonstrates the extent to which the Catholic church was not an organisation with singular agency, and, much like the community it served, contained a multiplicity of voices and perspectives on the conflict, including some sympathetic to the physical force tradition.
What is perhaps most striking in this part of the book was the prescience of the observation by Cardinal Tomás Ó Fiaich, who, in a 1977 interview, commented on the question of Irish unity: ‘In the long run it is the people of the North who will be in charge. It doesn't matter what London or Dublin say. Basically, it has to be solved here’ (pp 91–2). A far cry from the republican orthodoxy of the hunger strikers, this remark shared more with the analysis of the Social Democratic and Labour Party (S.D.L.P.).
As the conflict matured, and tentative steps were taken towards peace, the statements of the hierarchy continued to condemn both the Provisional I.R.A. and loyalist violence. Unsurprisingly, the reactions of individual clerics differed, and tensions occurred over how to handle matters such as requiem masses for deceased paramilitaries. Cahal Daly made clear that such occasions were not to be vehicles for republican propaganda, an edict, perhaps, honoured as much in the breach as the observance.
The final part of the book explores the peace process, especially the role of Fr. Alec Reid, a prominent interlocutor with the republican movement. Reading Scull's study, the reader is struck by the manner in which the fates of the Catholic church and the S.D.L.P. have mirrored each other, with both suffering a considerable loss of influence and support over time. Sinn Féin (after it had committed to the peace process) replaced the S.D.L.P. as the party of choice for Catholics, just as the growth of secularism has presented the church with an increasing challenge to stay relevant.
The book's conclusion, where Scull highlights the work of clerics from both communities who seek to foster good relations among their respective flocks, suggests that there are those within the Catholic church who could yet play an important role in post-conflict reconciliation at a more local, grassroots level.
One figure who could scarcely be accused of seeking to foster community relations is the subject of the second book under review, John Enoch Powell. In Enoch Powell: politics and ideas in modern Britain, Paul Corthorn approaches his subject through an exploration of five key areas of his political life and thought: foreign policy; economics; immigration; Europe; and, perhaps most pertinently for readers of this journal, Northern Ireland. The cross-cutting theme is that of (relative) British decline, and how Powell, the milieux in which he circulated, and wider society responded to it. Though well-told by Corthorn, it is not often a happy tale. That said, some of Powell's political views may be surprising to those who know him primarily through his divisive ‘rivers of blood’ speech.
In foreign policy, Powell complained of the treatment of Mau Mau prisoners in Kenya – not due to any sentiment for those interned, but on account of the damage to Britain's international reputation. He also privately opposed intervention in the Suez crisis on the grounds that it would be ineffective. Elsewhere, Powell took positions in foreign policy that would not be out-of-place among the hard left. For instance, he was of the view that Russian concerns had to be considered, and promoted the idea of an ‘understanding’, if not an overly friendly one, between the U.K. and the U.S.S.R. He opposed the first Gulf War since Iraq was not a threat to British national interests, wryly noting that Saddam Hussein's troops had a long way to go ‘before they come storming up the beaches of Kent or Sussex’ (pp 45–7). Later, Powell took a stridently non-interventionist position on the Yugoslav wars. Given the conflagration that was to unfold, notably in Bosnia and Herzegovina, such self-interest might justifiably be read as callousness on his part.
Subsequent chapters focus on economics, immigration and Europe. On economics, Corthorn neatly summarises the development of the new right in the 1960s and 1970s, which overlapped with Powell's stint as health minister. Despite his right-wing credentials Powell advocated for the N.H.S., to the chagrin of some of his associates in the Institute of Economic Affairs. Here, we are also introduced to Keith Joseph, doyen of the British new right, and at one time considered a rival to Powell for the future Tory leadership, before both came to be viewed as box office poison.
What is absent is the tale of Joseph's downfall: his speech at Edgbaston, Birmingham, where he claimed the ‘human stock was threatened’ by the increasing number of children being born to unmarried mothers, in his view, of ‘low intelligence’. Like Joseph, Powell's political career was defined by a controversial speech delivered in the West Midlands, this time on immigration, explored in the book's third chapter. Whilst Corthorn avoids using the word himself, it is difficult to conclude that Powell, despite his protestations to the contrary, was not a man who held and promoted racist views.
The ‘rivers of blood’ speech is well known, and bears no further repeating. It is worth noting, however, that he supported a scheme of voluntary repatriation, a policy position shared, in more recent times, by the far-right British National Party, and had expressed concern about the potential presence of non-white M.P.s in parliament. Powell's name is invoked to this day by some who express their ‘concerns’ about immigration or multiculturalism. But what perhaps caused Powell even more disquiet than black and minority ethnic communities was the European Economic Community.
As Corthorn persuasively argues, the issue of Europe underscored the inherent tension between Powell's respect for parliamentary sovereignty and what might be termed his more populist impulses. In later years, he endorsed hard Euroscepticism, in the guise of the Anti-Federalist League, the forerunner of the United Kingdom Independence Party. Though, interestingly, we learn that Powell refused to endorse Nigel Farage's candidacy in the Eastleigh by-election in 1994.
The final section of the book, which focuses on Powell and Northern Ireland, is arguably its most impressive. Powell had joined the Ulster Unionist Party (U.U.P.) in 1974, and was an advocate of the complete integration of Northern Ireland with the rest of the U.K. as a means of solving the constitutional question. Powell's internal struggles with the Anglo-Irish Agreement, a traumatic moment for unionists, is covered well here. Despite putting him at odds with most unionists, who overwhelmingly supported devolution, he enjoyed a lengthy career as M.P. for Down South (1974–87). One prominent exception was the U.U.P. leader during Powell's tenure, Jim Molyneaux, who supported an integrationist policy. The relationship between Powell and Molyneaux is sadly left under-explored. The book concludes by observing that the idea of decline was a motif in Powell's political career. He often warned of impending collapse – collapse which never came, yet he continued to signal it. It would be ironic, now, if one of the causes he so championed, independence from Europe, was to make that decline a reality.
Decline is perhaps an apt segue into the final book under review, Stuart Aveyard's No solution, a study of the Northern Ireland policies of the two Labour governments between 1974 and 1979. The findings are based on a trawl of British state papers and some prominent private collections, notably the papers of Brendan Duddy and Ruairí Ó Brádaigh held at N.U.I. Galway. The book's title leaves little to the imagination: the central argument, in contrast to those of Michael Kerr and Brendan O'Leary, is that the British state lacked the ability and capacity to impose a political settlement in Northern Ireland during the 1970s. Overall, the findings are balanced, credible and fair. The evidence presented in support of this key argument is compelling, particularly regarding the Ulster Workers’ Council (U.W.C.) strike of May 1974.
Archival evidence presented in the book simply does not support the idea that the British Army could have maintained electricity supplies in the event of a walkout by power station workers, since it lacked technical know-how. Sending the army in to break a strike would probably have exacerbated the violence, a point not lost on policymakers and the security forces. Furthermore, even unionists not inclined to support the strike were understandably enraged by prime minister Harold Wilson's speech accusing their community of ‘sponging off Westminster’. Such indignation, Aveyard argues, may have been popular in Great Britain, but would only elicit ‘a hostile response from where it actually mattered’ (p. 37).
The book is often critical of Wilson's interventions, such as they were, seeing them as more hindrance than help. This includes Wilson's so-called ‘doomsday document’ which envisaged, in a worst-case scenario, withdrawal from Northern Ireland and the emergence of an independent state. This document is contextualised, showing that it was never influential upon those actually tasked with making Northern Ireland policy. In these circles, there was an understanding that devolution, involving nationalists and unionists, was necessary. Wilson's dominion status document was a by-product of frustration at the stalemate, but would have led to a bloodbath, and, in policy terms, was always a non-runner, despite being taken seriously in some accounts of the period.
While the broader constitutional policies of Wilson and others are debated, a central focus of the book is the Provisional I.R.A. ceasefire of 1974–5, the role of intermediaries such as the above-mentioned Duddy, and civil-military relations during its uneven observance (some I.R.A. units ignored it altogether). The basic British strategy was to string the I.R.A. along to the point where its military capacity ‘went soggy’, through giving vague impressions that the government might countenance radical solutions, such as eventual withdrawal. This ambiguity kept the I.R.A. in discussions for some time.
Predictably, the ceasefire, such as it was, collapsed in acrimonious circumstances. Both the limited nature of the ceasefire itself, and the government's intentions towards the I.R.A., challenge, in Aveyard's view, the notion that it was a missed opportunity for peace. One of the book's most startling revelations is drawn from the Duddy papers. Duddy, hailed as a ‘secret peacemaker’, recorded in his diaries having advised the I.R.A. to resume the war on a ‘limited basis’ in England and Northern Ireland after the ceasefire, focusing on economic targets and without loss of life.
The Jim Callaghan and Roy Mason era is remembered as one marked by a refusal among unionists to compromise and of deteriorating relations between the S.D.L.P. and the government. Here, Aveyard argues that the Northern Ireland office could have done more to encourage a more balanced approach from Mason, who was more accepting of direct rule than his predecessors, even if his endgame was some manner of devolution.
The book concludes by returning to security policy and exploring the fall of the government, in which Northern Ireland nationalists played a central role. The security strategies put in place during this time remained for the duration of the conflict. These had many shortcomings, not least the removal of special category status in the prisons which had significant ramifications later. The conclusion is a pessimistic one for those who have faith in the capacity of governments to drive political change in challenging circumstances.
Despite its many resources, in the absence of an internal settlement where violence was eschewed, and in which the aspirations of nationalists and unionists were recognised, the state could not solve the seemingly insoluble. Those who argue the contrary, Aveyard insists, ‘utterly fail to understand the context of the 1970s and the present’ (p. 253). Now, as then, it is difficult to disagree. This book, and the others reviewed here, will aid in that understanding.
