THE BELFAST AGREEMENT OF 1998: from ethnic democracy to a multicultural consociational settlement?

Paul Bew

Under the new situation it will be a matter of British legislation that Northern Ireland remains part of the UK for so long as the majority there supports the Union. Thus in Annex A, Section 1, paragraph 1 of the Agreement the following is affirmed:

It is hereby declared that Northern Ireland in its entirety remains part of the United Kingdom and shall not cease to be so without the consent of a majority of the people of Northern Ireland voting in a poll held for the purposes of this section in accordance with

Schedule 1 (8) This is, in short, a continuation of the present realist as most people in Northern Ireland understand it. The Belfast Agreement (Strand 1, para 33) contains a formal and explicit reiteration of British sovereignty.

But what about the changes which, as part of the deal, are to be made to the Irish constitution?

At present these state:

Article 2: The national territory consists of the whole island of Ireland, its islands and territorial seas.

Article 3: Pending the re-integration of the national territory, and without prejudice to the right of the Parliament and Government established by this Constitution to exercise jurisdiction over the whole of that territory, the laws enacted by that Parliament shall have the like area and extent of applications as the laws ofSaorstat Eireann (the Irish state).

Increasingly, in private discussions between the two governments the British began to challenge these Articles - and increasingly so after March 1990.