The Irish people have never been united under their rule because of...the British.
To understand better how Northern Ireland and The Republic of Ireland were divided,
we have to go back into the past for almost five centuries.
In 1536, Henry the eight of England conquered Ireland and transformed it into a kingdom
which was under the command of, you guessed it, Henry.
But, although they had control all over the island they had one big issue, and that is...religion.
You see, Britain was mainly Protestant, while the Irish were Catholic and that caused deadly
conflicts between the two sides.
Scottish, English, and Welsh protestants were sent into the counties of Ireland to try and
raise the popularity of the religion, but they didn’t succeed, except in some parts
of the province of Ulster.
Fast forward to the year of 1798, when the people of Ireland started a rebellion against
the British, who at this point, controlled most of the parliament of Ireland.
Being catholic, they wanted independence from the protestant Anglo-Irish man who ruled the
country.
In response to the rebellion, in 1800, the Kingdom of Ireland stopped existing, becoming
part of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland.
No sovereignty, no freedom, this was not what the Irish fought for and they considered it
a failure, as English Families owned most of the lands.
Again, fast forward to 1910, when the Nationalists, who are catholic Irishmen who wanted the independent
Republic of Ireland introduced the Home Rule, which was a movement that campaigned for self-government
for Ireland within the United Kingdom.
However, the northern part of Ulster was mainly populated by Unionists, who were Anglo-Irish
people who were protestant and wanted to be a part of The United Kingdom.
Eventually, the island was split between Northern Ireland and Southern Ireland, which later
became The Republic Of Ireland, an independent country.
The separation between the Unionists and the Nationalists gave hope that the conflicts
would end once and for all...Except, they didn’t.
The problem was that only half of Northern Ireland’s population is Unionists and, the
other half Nationalists.
By the end of the 1960s, things started to get violent between the catholic minority
and the protestant regime.
Extremists groups such as The Irish Republican Army said that Northern Ireland was part of
Ireland and started blowing up towns near the border, while the Unionists forces said
that it was a part of the United Kingdom.
Conflicts lasted for about 30 years and over 3500 people were killed.
In 1998, an agreement between the two sides, called the Good Friday Agreement, was signed,
which stated that Northern Ireland would remain in the UK, and people would have the right
to get both Irish and British citizenship.
The hard border would be removed, people could travel freely between the two countries
and if Northern Ireland wanted in the future to join Ireland, they could through a referendum.
So, the Good Friday Agreement made peace between the Unionists and The Nationalists, who have
conflicted for centuries...
In 2016, the United Kingdom voted to leave the European Union.
Officially, it has entered a transition period on 31st of January 2020, but technically,
they are still in the European Union for now.
You see, The UK left the EU because they wanted more control over their frontiers and to follow
an independent trade policy.
This brings the question...What do we do at the border between Northern Ireland and The
Republic Of Ireland?
A hard boundary wouldn’t work, as the Good Friday Agreement says that people could travel
freely between the 2 countries and it would also divide the nationalists and according
to The Withdrawal Agreement, this is not an option, the border remaining how it is now,
invisible.
Officially, we don't exactly know what will happen there.
Other options would be to that goods from Britain to Northern Ireland would go through
customs, but that would put a border here as well, which will rip apart Northern Ireland
From The UK.
Another alternative would be for the UK to stay in the customs union, but that
wasn't what people voted for when they chose Brexit, so this is not a possibility.
So, then, there is an option respects both the Good Friday Agreement and Brexit,
and that is...the unification of the two Irelands.
After all, the majority of people in Northern Ireland wished to remain within the European
Union, and if the UK takes them out of the union, and takes away their European citizenship,
one way of restoring that would be to become part of Ireland, and therefore part of Europe,
again.
A poll from 2019 said that 51% of people living in Northern Ireland would vote for unification,
98% of them being nationalists.
So the unification is something, as many Irish individuals say, inevitable.
With this being said, what would a united Ireland look like?
Politically and economically, the border between the two Irelands is here, but culturally,
it should be around here, diving the Nationalists and the Unionists.
From a financial point of view, Ireland has a GDP of about $400 billion and a GDP per
capita of $80,000.
On the other end of the spectrum, the North has a GDP ten times smaller, and a GDP per
capita of $30,000.
The big economic difference between the two is caused by, well, religion, because this
is what caused the conflicts from the 1960s to the 1990s in the first place.
The violence scared potential investors, workers were getting hired based on their belief rather
than ability and the disunity of the nation overall placed Northern Ireland behind.
Many people think of this unification as when East Germany joined West Germany, and now,
over 30 years later, the eastern part is still behind the western one, considering that people
from East Germany had the average yearly wage only 1.6 times smaller than the West.
With this being said, if the unification will ever happen, the big economic gap between
the two Irelands will be a massive problem, but this difference is no way near the biggest
issue in case of unification.
In Northern Ireland, things will change drastically.
The Unionists, who are about 900,000, will become a minority in the new country which
will be populated by 5.5 million Nationalists.
Catholicism will be the main religion, the new country will be a republic, the currency
will be the Euro instead of the British Pound, the measurement system will change from imperial
to metric, education qualifications are going to be different, and alignments as well.
Northern Ireland will no longer be a part of NATO but will be a part of the European
Union.
The Republic of Ireland will see little change, where the Northern Part would be completely
different.
Many Unionists do not want this to happen, some of them even prefer a hard border over
this.
This unification might lead again to violent conflicts.
And the UK does not like it as well, because if Northern Ireland will leave the Kingdom
anymore, Scotland might try to get independence as well.
After all, they also didn’t want to leave the European Union and before Brexit even
happened, 45% of the Scottish people wanted Scotland as an independent country.
Brexit was something to make the UK have control over its borders, but could it make The Unite
Kingdom, one of the greatest powers in the world, slowly fall apart and in the end, collapse.l