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ACCOUNT FOR THE FAILURE OF BOTH THE POWER SHARING EXECUTIVE AND THE NORTHERN IRELAND ASSEMBLY

Account for the failure of both the Power Sharing Executive and the Northern Ireland
Assembly
Seminar No.5 
To account for such a failure in the power-sharing executive it is 
necessary for one to look at the structure and the organisation of the 
Assemblies as well as assessing its aims and directives as well as to examine 
the time scale to which this has taken place. My intention is to examine from 
the mid-seventies to the present day and all the questions that these many 
and various initiatives have raised. The power-sharing 
executive was the first and last examples of home rule since the collapse of 
Stormont.
During this last period the establishment of Stormont lasted from 1973 to 
1974. The aim of the British Government was to return the province to an 
eventual devolution. The issue of direct rule was to be only a temporary
measure whilst the relevant sides talked it out at the negotiating table looking 
for a form of political settlement. Essentially the main elements that both
parties were looking for was to guarantee that the province remained a part of 
the United Kingdom as long as the majority deem that wish . Proportional 
Representation was held in order to elect the new seventy-eight Northern 
Irish Assembly. The two most contentious issue of all the issues of were the 
issue of institutionalised power sharing and that of the establishment of the 
Council of Ireland, which had, a direct input into the system of governance as 
well as a probable oversight into linking the whole system into the Irish 
political system, therefore adding an Irish dimension to the proceedings in 
order to placate republican feelings and sentiment.
The executive failed on a series of levels due to the various 
claimed inconsistency by both sides. But one must really accredit claim to 
the Unionists for mobilising the populace with the help of the paramilitaries in 
organising strikes and protest marches in order to discredit the Republican 
gains in the region. Unionist felt that their position was somewhat a breach of 
trust from the then current labour government. Unionist were strongly 
opposed to power sharing or any kind of Home Rule since the Unionists were 
so used to having their own way under the previous Stormont tenures with 
various Unionist majorities that they saw as keeping the Republicans in 
some form of check thus providing them with an opposition that would be of 
no trouble to quell. Another aspect that would provide the Unionist 
ammunition to carry on their concurrent course was that of the British 
Government to bring about a halt to the various strikes and civil disturbances 
caused by the Loyalists and the Protestant populous. As an immediate rise 
to the outrage of this proposed form of government Unionist Politicians 
requested mobilisation of their own religious sectors to rise up against the 
notion of a power-sharing executive and thus conduct a series of strikes to 
bolster their argument. This was also augmented by the Loyalist 
Paramilitary Organisations such as the Ulster Volunteer Force and the Ulster 
Defence Association. These organisations set about intimidating individuals 
and their families in order to attend the current strikes and civil strife that was 
happening during that period of time. The strikes were lead by the mainly 
Protestant ship builders at the Harland and Woolf ship yard in the East of 
Belfast this was to set the course for the duration of the unrest in the 
province, following the lead of the ship builders the electricity workers striked 
as well plunging the region into a virtual blackout for a number of days. This 
was followed up by the use of paramilitary force to drive out police officers 
and attack British soldiers, inciting riots and barricading streets to prevent 
access to the law enforcement authorities, literally establishing no go zones 
to these various agencies. As well as disrupting various essential services 
such as the use of the emergency services and organisations of a similar 
nature. Essentially the power of the majority even exceeded the will of its 
masters in Westminster, from this one could assume that power in Ulster was 
firmly with the Unionist politicians and paramilitaries. This would appear to 
be the case due to the simple fact that the British government did not have 
the will or power to put the strikes down, the Army feared a massive backlash 
if it was seen to attempt to quell the strikes thus putting both them and the 
government in an untenable situation which would almost certainly lead to 
almost certain further deterioration to an already fragile state of affairs. The 
main fear allied to nearly all politicians on the main land was the fear of all 
out civil war. 
As a result republican politicians reneged on their elected seats 
in the Northern Irish Assembly thus putting a stop to the prospect of a 
Northern Irish Assembly with a shared power base. It is very useful to look 
and assess the various events and processes but the underlying factors can 
provide answers that could explain the various events that could have been 
prevented if these were examined more closely. One is referring to examples 
such as social and class cleavages that are blatantly apparent in a society 
such as Ulster and the lack of input provided by both parties on the ground to 
resolve the crisis and attain some form of resolution to the perceived 
problems. In order to ascertain the problems in Ulster a direct correlation can 
be drawn up from the inequality or lack of homogenous society that is more 
then apparent in province like Northern Ireland. Due to the history and the 
discriminations imposed on the Catholic population of the mainly Protestant 
north it is hardly suprising that a large amount of Catholics feel animosity to 
their Protestant neighbours. 
1975-76: A Constitutional Convention was convened to enable elected 
representatives from Northern Ireland to propose their own solution. The 
majority unionist parties proposed a return to majority rule, modified by a 
committee system with some minority rights inbuilt. It was rejected by both the 
British and the minority SDLP. 
1977-78 and 1980: Two attempts to set up devolved institutions were initiated 
by two Northern Ireland secretaries of state, Roy Mason and Humphrey 
Atkins. Neither got to first base. They were opposed, for different reasons, by 
the SDLP and the UUP, but both simply petered out. As a measure of the 
cultural gap between the two sides, two bars were set up in Stormont during 
the Atkins talks of 1980, one serving only non-alcoholic beverages. Students 
of national stereotyping may guess which bar was designed for which political 
parties. 
1982-84: Rolling Devolution, introduced by James Prior, was perhaps the 
most ingenious proposal, again involving an elected assembly and a 
committee system. This envisaged a gradual return to power by elected 
representatives, but only if the proposed powers had 'Widespread 
acceptance', defined as 70 per cent agreement. In other words, the amount of 
power allowed to local political parties depended on their ability to agree, and 
would roll along at the speed of progress determined by them. It was 
boycotted by the SDLP because it did not guarantee power sharing. 
1991-92: The Brooke-Mayhew initiatives sought to introduce phased talks, 
involving the Northern Irish parties first and the Dublin government at a later 
stage. This initiative followed the introduction of the Anglo-lrish Agreement in 
1985, an agreement signed by the governments of the United Kingdom and 
the Irish Republic, but which did not involve local politicians and has been 
bitterly opposed by unionists. A major survey in 1990 confirmed that, for 
Protestants, the Anglo-lrish Agreement is still perceived to be the biggest 
single obstacle to peace. 
Prior to 1993 Sinn Fein was excluded from all major political talks, mainly 
because unionist parties refused to talk with terrorists. In 1988 and 1993, 
however, those whom they regarded as the leaders of the SDLP and Sinn 
Fein held two series of bilateral talks. The consequences remain to be seen. 
1993: The Downing Street Declaration, jointly announced by the Prime 
Minister of the United Kingdom, John Major, and the Irish Taoiseach, Albert 
Reynolds, introduced for the first time the possibility of Sinn Fein becoming 
involved in talks. The condition was an ending of violence for at least three 
months. In return, the Irish government accepted that any constitutional 
change in the status of Northern Ireland required the support of a majority 
within Northern Ireland. At the time of writing, three months after the 
Declaration, the unionist parties were divided on the initiative and Sinn Fein 
was still considering it. The Declaration offered, for the first time, the 
possibility of addressing the constitutional and security problems together as 
part of a peace package. 
In summary, then, if a broader definition of conflict management or resolution 
is accepted, Northern Ireland has experience of a wide variety of approaches: 
 Majority domination, from 1921 to 1972; 
 Integration, for a three-month period in 1974 when a power-sharing executive was
formed and failed; 
 Administrative reforms, since 1969, when legislative changes covering housing,
employment, social and educational reforms were introduced, with varying results; 
 'Holding the fort' with a standing army, since 1969; 
 Political talks, as detailed above; 
 Superordinate agreement between the two main governments, as with the
Anglo-Irish Agreement in 1985. 
Bibliography
Bibliography
Northern Ireland's Troubles 
Marie-Therese Fay
Pluto Press 1999
The Origins of the Present Troubles in Northern Ireland
Caroline Kennedy-Pipe
Longman 1997
Stormont in Crisis
Ken Bloomfield
Blackstaff Press Ltd 1993
Unionist Politics and the Politics of Unionism Since the Anglo-Irish Agreement
Feargal Cochrane 
Cork University Press 1997
The Anglo-Irish Agreement
Arwel Ellis Owen 
University of Wales Press 1994