Chapter 7
Northern Ireland under British Rule

By 1972 the three pillars of settler rule in Northern Ireland had collapsed. The British metropole had concluded that the Unionist Government's grip on state power and handling of matters of law and order were altogether divisive and destabilizing. The settler regime was presiding over a crisis of authority among Protestants and Catholics alike. Political violence and public disorder had risen sharply, and coercive resources were stretched to the breaking point. Unrest of this magnitude had not occurred in Northern Ireland since the stormy birth of the state in 1921.

Although London had used the threat of direct rule to temper earlier Unionist recalcitrance, it viewed this option as the last resort. Faced with a steadily deteriorating security situation and pressure from army chiefs, the British Cabinet decided on 22 March 1972 to assume full control of law and order.^[1] Stormont found this action unacceptable; in Prime Minister Brian Faulkner's words, it would irreparably undermine the Government's "powers, authority and standing ... without justification" and would give the impression that "violence does pay." Refusing to share power with the metropole, the Unionist Cabinet abruptly resigned and London assumed full political control over the troubled province. Direct rule was not envisaged as a final solution to the Ulster problem but as a temporary expedient awaiting a more lasting political

[1] Peter Jenkins, "Ulster: A Kind of Victory," Guardian, 17 January 1972.

settlement. It remains in place today and a political solution to the conflict appears more elusive than ever.^[2]

If Catholics initially saw direct rule as a partial victory over the Unionists, Protestants saw it as an act of betrayal and appeasement to Ulster's enemies. On March 27, Faulkner bitterly declared, "Northern Ireland is not a coconut colony";^[3] the Home Affairs minister accused Britain of using double standards: "Majority rule in Rhodesia, minority rule in Ulster." ^[4] Even though London never entertained the notion of minority rule in Ulster, it had begun to reassess the appropriateness of Westminster-style majoritarianism to this divided society. By 1973 it considered that "the Executive itself can no longer be solely based upon any single party, if that party draws its support ... virtually entirely from only one section of a divided community." ^[5] In a nutshell, "simple majority rule would (as in the past) leave the minority in perpetual and ineffectual opposition." ^[6]

The advent of direct rule seemed to offer an unprecedented opportunity to break what Harold Wilson called "fifty years of unimaginative inertia and repression" under Unionist rule; in 1972 direct rule itself signaled the most significant change in political and security structures since partition. In one sweep, London dissolved the Northern Ireland executive, suspended the Stormont Parliament, and assumed full control over security. Settler rule came to an abrupt end.

In reference to the Protestants' intractability and residual influence, an editorial in the London Sunday Times of 10 April 1988 observed, "The harsh fact is that Ulster is a 'settler' problem." Yet few studies have examined Northern Ireland within the settler/postsettler paradigm.^[7]

In sharp contrast to Zimbabwe, postsettler Northern Ireland has featured significant but partial liberalization of the settler-created internal security apparatus. This modernization within limits can be understood

[2] An attempt at power sharing interrupted direct rule for five months in 1974 but set off a massive strike by Protestant workers and paramilitary groups (see Robert Fisk, The Point of No Return: The Strike Which Broke the British in Ulster [London: Andre Deutsch, 1975]).

[3] Brian Faulkner, Memoirs of a Statesman (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1978), p. 157.

[4] Newsletter, 25 March 1972.

[5] Northern Ireland: Constitutional Proposals, Cmnd. 5259 (London: HMSO, 1973), p. 13.

[6] Northern Ireland: A Framework for Devolution, Cmnd. 8541 (London: HMSO, 1982), p. 5.

[7] Another study that analyzes Northern Ireland as a settler state highlights continuities and unfortunately ignores important changes under British rule (Michael MacDonald, Children of Wrath: Political Violence in Northern Ireland [New York: Blackwell, 1986]).

with the help of our explanatory model, which highlights (1) the values embedded in the political culture; (2) the interests and demands of major forces in civil society; (3) the independent power and organizational predilections of security agencies; and (4) the commitments and capacities of the new regime. As in Zimbabwe, the fourth factor has the greatest power in explaining the character and degree of liberalization in Ulster, but the first and second variables are also crucial. Ulster's polarized political culture and intense communal loyalties and rivalries present major obstacles to democratic political development and the building of universalistic institutions. Throughout civil society, opposing Protestant and Catholic forces are extremely active (unlike the situation in Zimbabwe); their demands on the state often neutralize one another, maintaining the status quo and retarding political progress and communal accommodation.

This raises the issue of the basic dimensions of Ulster's divided social order. Historically deep cleavages between Protestants and Catholics are sustained today by structures of differential communal socialization and institutional insulation: high degrees of communal endogamy; residential, educational, and recreational segregation; sectarian socialization in the family and neighborhood; conflicts between communally-rooted churches and political parties; frequent provocative, triumphalist marches that celebrate ancient victories of one side over the other; and violence by Republican and Loyalist insurgents and the security forces.^[8]

Although these divisions are sufficiently deep to justify the use of the term communally divided society, they should not be exaggerated or considered absolute. First, class is an important qualifying variable. Divisions are sharpest between working-class Catholics and Protestants, more muted within the middle class. Second, Northern Ireland is less thoroughly divided than societies with a history of minority domination or those where extreme economic exploitation or fidelity to a caste etiquette in interpersonal relations typifies intercommunal relations. Yet Ulster's divisions are sufficient to sustain mutually exclusive political aspirations and fears, intercommunal hostilities, and two decades of political violence. Communal cleavages mar efforts to create integrative institutions and values. (One of the few nonsectarian bodies, the Alliance party, has the support of only 5 to 10 percent of the electorate.) The uncompromising character of Ulster politics subjects Catholic and

[8] See John Whyte, "How Is the Boundary Maintained between the Two Communities in Northern Ireland?" Ethnic and Racial Studies 9, no. 2 (April 1986): 219–34.

Protestant leaders who seek accommodation to excommunication from their host community.

Views on the organization and operation of Northern Ireland's security institutions are intimately connected to communally entrenched political positions and aspirations. Security, like politics, tends to be a zero-sum matter. What one side demands or supports, the other rejects; concessions to one side risk alienating the other. For most Catholics liberalization has not gone far enough to attract enthusiastic support (there are still too many incidents of repression); for most Protestants, reforms have already gone much too far (demonstrably undermining law and order). In this highly charged polity, changes in security arrangements alone are unlikely to have much positive impact on nation building.

British Rule: Enlightened Colonialism?

At least three alternative views have been advanced regarding the British state's overall objectives in contemporary Northern Ireland. The first portrays British rule as a classic case of imperialist domination. This is the position of the Irish Republican Army (IRA) and its political wing, Sinn Fein.

Violence in Ireland has its roots in the conquest of Ireland by Britain. The conquest has lasted through several stages for many centuries and ... it has used violence, coercion, sectarianism, and terrorism as its methods and has had power as its objective.^[9]

This argument by the leader of Sinn Fein is taken as axiomatic in some scholarly writing as well. Farrell, for example, flatly asserts that "since Britain was and is an imperialist power it is evident that the existence of the [Northern Ireland] statelet has served the interests of imperialism" ^[10] The logic behind these claims is suspect; the Crown's historical political subjugation and economic exploitation of Ireland does not automatically characterize the contemporary period. Today the costs of continued British rule far outweigh any benefits to the metropole. Some four hundred British soldiers have been killed in Ulster since 1971; the prov-

[9] Gerry Adams, The Politics of Irish Freedom (Dingle, Ireland: Brandon, 1986), p. 62.

[10] Michael Farrell, "Northern Ireland: An Anti-Imperialist Struggle," in The Socialist Register, ed. R. Miliband and J. Saville (London: Merlin Press, 1977), p. 72; D. R. O'Connor Lysaght, "British Imperialism in Ireland," in Ireland: Divided Nation, Divided Class, ed. A. Morgan and B. Purdie (London: Ink Links, 1980); Alfred McClung Lee, "Imperialism, Class, and Northern Ireland's Civil War," Crime and Social Justice, no. 8 (Fall-Winter 1977).

ince is a political liability, an international embarrassment, and an economic drain for Britain;^[11] it offers little compensation in return (e.g., cheap labor, a market for exports, counterinsurgency lessons).^[12]

A second perspective depicts British rule as an instrument or guardian of Protestant interests, consistently favoring their constitutional preferences, socioeconomic supremacy, and demands for sectarian control of Catholics. Northern Ireland's Social Democratic and Labour party (SDLP) maintains that "the British government's role in Northern Ireland is not as 'honest broker' or 'peacemaker,' but as a crutch for the loyalist majority." ^[13] Sinn Fein holds a similar position.^[14] Farrell argued in 1976 that Britain was "fast becoming the servant of the Ulster Loyalists." ^[15] Ten years later MacDonald claims that "Britain tacitly and actively backs Protestant domination.... For once Britain allows Protestants to block unification [with the Irish Republic] it ends up preserving Protestant hegemony." ^[16] This argument mistakenly equates the maintenance of partition—the core Protestant demand—with internal hegemony and supremacy over Catholics. MacDonald also insists that the Protestants "manipulate" and "use Britain to uphold their domination over Catholics";^[17] he presents no evidence of either manipulation or domination. In his view, the transfer of power in 1972 simply marked a transition from indirect to direct British support for Protestant domination: "Sixty-five years after Northern Ireland was created and 17 years after it erupted in violence, British policy remains much the same as always: it maintains Protestant hegemony militarily, politically, and economically." The only difference is that Britain is now "actively and directly" involved in "maintaining a status quo biased in favor of Protes-

[11] Britain's 1989–1990 subvention to Ulster—the difference between public spending and revenues raised in taxes and levies—was over £1.6 billion.

[12] Anders Boserup, "Contradictions and Struggles in Northern Ireland," in The Socialist Register, ed. R. Miliband and J. Saville (London: Merlin Press, 1972). On counterinsurgency lessons, see Carol Ackroyd, Karen Margolis, Jonathan Rosenhead, and Tim Shallice, The Technology of Political Control (London: Pluto, 1980).

[13] Social Democratic and Labour Party, "Justice" in Northern Ireland (Belfast: SDLP, 1985), p. 9. Since the 1985 Anglo-Irish Agreement (discussed below) the SDLP has modified its views, seeing Britain as more neutral, and stated that Britain's only interest in Ireland was to see that "violence or the threat of violence shall not succeed" (quoted in "The Nationalist Divide," Belfast Telegraph, 5 September 1988).

[14] Adams, Freedom, p. 89.

[15] Michael Farrell, Northern Ireland: The Orange State (London: Pluto Press, 1976), p. 331.

[16] MacDonald, Children of Wrath, pp. 102, 150.

[17] Ibid., pp. 121, 150.

tants." Disregarding the evidence (discussed below), MacDonald contends that the British Government has "entertained but rarely implemented reforms." ^[18]

A final approach sees Britain as a third party acting as a neutral umpire, arbitrating between and seeking the consent of both sides, balancing their divergent interests in the decision-making process, and impartially maintaining order. Not surprisingly, this is the official position of the British Government. One former British Secretary of State for Ulster declared that "the security forces are not there to protect some Protestant ascendancy or colonial rule, but the basic right to live in peace";^[19] other ministers consistently characterize British rule as mediating between the "tribalism" of Protestant and Catholic forces. This perspective neglects three important considerations: the British Government's pivotal role in determining Ulster's constitutional status; the extent to which its specific actions and presence in Ulster fuel communal hostilities, however unwittingly; and its lack of moral authority and leverage over the principal antagonists, based partly on the public perception that official policies consistently favor one side.

None of these perspectives satisfactorily captures the reality of British intervention in contemporary Northern Ireland. The first two fall victim to the fallacy of historical continuity: the assumption that historical patterns accurately characterize contemporary arrangements, when the facts contradict this continuity. Notwithstanding the objections of the preceding paragraph, the third approach provides the best point of departure for the present investigation. Contemporary British rule in Ulster approximates an enlightened colonialism, insofar as the metropole has imposed its rule on Ulster in a rather dictatorial (colonial) fashion with the (enlightened) goal of promoting democratic political development and liberalizing the apparatus of control. Compared to postsettler Zimbabwe and Liberia, Ulster has had a significant measure of success in its modernization under British tutelage.

The argument that British rule has contributed to systemic reform as well as overall progress in human rights in Northern Ireland should not be exaggerated. First, the process has not been uniform: some agencies have only slightly improved and others appear to have regressed. Second, the coercive system has been fortified: it receives far greater re-

[18] Ibid., p. 149.

[19] Douglas Hurd, quoted in "Reports on NI Policy Dismissed by Hurd," Irish Times (Dublin), 4 April 1985.

sources and commands a more formidable technology of surveillance and control than under settler rule. Third, practice frequently departs from the ideal of neutrality. In a number of areas discussed below, the routine operations of the security and criminal justice systems violate the logic of liberalization. Finally, the maintenance of law and order is confounded by enduring societal problems: political progress and economic development have been stalled for decades and working-class people—especially Catholics—still experience high levels of socioeconomic deprivation.

Colonial Rule

The most significant changes in Ulster's political institutions occurred at the moment settler rule was terminated. Since 1972 the British Government has had responsibility for Northern Ireland's executive and legislative functions (except for the power-sharing executive of 1974). In practice London devolves considerable responsibility to the adjunct administration at the Northern Ireland Office (NIO) in Belfast. The NIO formulates policy under the general guidance of Westminster and Whitehall; it coordinates the state's administrative departments (some inherited, some new) and is responsible for security policy, criminal law and procedure, the judiciary, prisons, police, and public prosecutions. At the NIO, a Secretary of State for Northern Ireland and three junior ministers (all British) perform the duties of former Unionist ministers, assisted by civil servants from both Northern Ireland and Britain.^[20] Although the British Foreign Office and the Ministry of Defense are involved in Ulster—and have a substantial voice in Cabinet decisions regarding the province—the NIO is the primus inter pares.^[21]

In practice, the NIO is largely free from parliamentary scrutiny. Legislation at Westminster concerning Ulster takes the form of Orders-inCouncil presented to Parliament for its approval (but not amendment).^[22]

[20] Approximately two-thirds of NIO civil servants come from Britain and the balance from Ulster, although some departments at NIO, like the Police Division, are entirely from Northern Ireland (NIO official, interview with author, 17 July 1986). As of January 1985, 13 percent of the civil servants at NIO were Catholic, compared to 33 percent for the Northern Ireland civil service as a whole (Belfast Telegraph, 22 July 1986, p. 4).

[21] John S. Ditch, "Direct Rule and Northern Ireland Administration," Administration 25, no. 3 (Autumn 1977): 336; Edward Moxon-Browne, Nation, Class, and Creed in Northern Ireland (Aldershot: Gower, 1983), p. 47.

[22] One Secretary of State justified Orders-in-Council on the grounds that legislation by conventional bills would place "an intolerable burden on Parliament" (Great Britain, House of Commons Debates, vol. 19, 5 March 1982, col. 250).

This system allows Northern Ireland MPs no effective role in the legislation affecting the province.^[23]

Like Parliament, successive British Cabinets give low priority to Northern Ireland's affairs unless some crisis demands immediate attention.^[24] One former Secretary of State for Ulster, Merlyn Rees, concluded: "Except in times of crisis Northern Ireland does not loom large in [Cabinet] considerations.... In practice, the responsibility falls almost completely to the Secretary of State allied closely with the Secretary of State for Defense." ^[25]

Decision making on most security matters is confined to the Secretary of State, the Chief Constable, and the army commander, who meet monthly in a Security and Policy Committee. Since the signing of the Anglo-Irish Agreement on 15 November 1985, the Government of the Republic of Ireland has had an unusual consultative role in policy discussions in the north;^[26] in their Inter-Governmental Conference meetings Irish and British officials discuss matters of law and order, including policing, the courts, and cross-border cooperation on security. Although the Government is under no obligation to accept the Republic of Ireland's specific recommendations, the agreement has added an important element to the calculus on security issues.

Direct rule in effect installed a system of colonial rule—an act of recolonization unprecedented in twentieth-century settler societies.^[27] The new regime in Northern Ireland, unlike that in Zimbabwe, has no roots in civil society and has precarious authority at best. As in other colonial

[23] Paul Maguire, "Parliament and the Direct Rule of Northern Ireland," Irish Jurist 10 (Summer 1975): 88.

[24] G. Bell, Troublesome Business, p. 106.

[25] Belfast Telegraph, 12 March 1980.

[26] Unable to secure a settlement within Ulster, the British Government sought external support for its position in the province; the Anglo-Irish Agreement appears to have lessened international pressure on Britain (Adrian Guelke, "The Political Impasse in South Africa and Northern Ireland" [Paper presented at the American Political Science Association meeting, Washington, D.C., September 1988]).

[27] The British Government sees direct rule as neither colonial nor undemocratic; it defines the province as an integral part of the United Kingdom. Northern Ireland sends seventeen MPs to Westminster; the Secretary of State and his junior ministers are elected (albeit not by Ulster's citizens). Yet Northern Ireland has acquired the essential features of a colony or an "internal colony," which Hechter defines as a region politically dominated and materially exploited by the core region but having greater administrative-legal integration, formal citizenship and rights, and geographical contiguity with the core than a conventional colony (Michael Hechter, Internal Colonialism: The Celtic Fringe in British National Development, 1536–1966 [Berkeley: University of California Press, 1975], p. 349). These criteria seem to fit Ulster, except that the core no longer exploits economically but instead materially supports the province.

states, the British administration is superimposed on society and institutionally detached from local social forces. This detachment renders the local acceptability of regime-initiated changes problematic.

Although the 1973 Northern Ireland Constitution Act and various official pronouncements affirm the principle of self-determination, the Government has narrowly construed the pledge as respecting the desire of the majority to remain within or exit the United Kingdom. In the meantime, few formal channels exist for democratic participation. A local but purely advisory Northern Ireland Assembly existed from 1982 to 1986; Northern Ireland sends 17 MPs to the British House of Commons (which has 635 members); and Ulster's citizens elect their own city councillors. Devolving control over national affairs to local actors London sees as premature and apt to degenerate into a tyranny of the Protestant majority or incessant altercations between Protestant and Catholic leaders.

Symptomatic of the domestic political vacuum, several major policy shifts have been imposed from London with little or no input from interested local forces. One such change was the "Ulsterization" of security in 1976 (discussed below), which put the police in the front line of counterinsurgency. Another is the Anglo-Irish accord, which is designed to promote the interests of both sides. In drawing up the agreement, London and Dublin consulted the Social Democratic and Labour party but neither of the Unionist parties; during three years of operation the InterGovernmental Conference has allowed no direct involvement by local parties.

The lack of democracy is a common grievance across the spectrum of political opinion in Ulster, although there is little consensus on the preferred direction of democratic development. Protestants and Catholics equally and almost unanimously oppose the continuation of direct British rule. Both sides view the British administration as morally bankrupt; their estrangement affects the regime's efforts to build new political institutions. At the same time, the constitutional options receiving the strongest support from one side meet almost unanimous opposition from the other (see Table 5). Protestants flatly reject a united or federal Ireland and joint British-Irish sovereignty; Catholics dismiss independence, full integration into the United Kingdom, and majority rule. It is noteworthy, however, that only a small proportion of Protestants continue their allegiance to the principle of majority rule. Most Protestants realize that London would not countenance a return to this system. Even

the paramilitary Protestant organization, the Ulster Defense Association, recognizes that "majority rule in deeply divided societies" is "profoundly undemocratic." ^[28] On the Catholic side, despite the common claim that a united Ireland is a "natural" aspiration of Catholics, only about 25 percent consider it the best political scenario.

Whether there is consensus on an alternative to direct rule depends on the question posed. When asked in 1988 if they agreed in principle with the notion of power sharing between Ulster's political parties, 76 percent of Catholics and 62 percent of Protestants said yes.^[29] Yet this approval is more shallow than it appears. On the issue of the "best" form of government, power sharing receives much less cross-community support, as Table 5 shows. It is still the most popular option for Catholics. For Protestants, power sharing ranks lower because they believe full integration with the United Kingdom would best protect their interests or because they see power sharing as a means whereby Catholics could subvert the state from within.

Enlightened Rule

London's central objectives in Northern Ireland are as follows.^[30] Relative stability—or the containment of disorder within manageable bounds—is the chief immediate priority. Institutional transfer and cultural convergence with the metropole are more long-term goals and means whereby a permanent settlement might be reached. The end result would be a political order based on power sharing among moderate leaders of the majority and minority, impartial administration, and the growth of accommodationist values; and a system of law and order that is politically neutral, acceptable to both communities, and committed to the ideal of justice. Once these conditions have been fulfilled, Britain claims that it will leave Northern Ireland once and for all. In short, London's grand design is to remake Ulster in conformity with British political norms—to the extent that this reconstruction is possible in a divided so-

[28] Ulster Defense Association, Common Sense (Belfast: Ulster Political Research Center, 1987), p. 1.

[29] Coopers and Lybrand poll, Belfast Telegraph, 5 October 1988. Thirty-nine percent of Catholics and 37 percent of Protestants thought the parties involved should have the power to make laws; 23 percent of Catholics and 43 percent of Protestants thought they should only administer laws created by Westminster.

[30] The aims motivating government elites' policies and actions are difficult to document but may be inferred from official pledges and programs, and from relatively consistent patterns of action.

ciety.^[31] The qualification is crucial, since Ulster's divided social order is a principal impediment to political development and reform of the system of law and order.

In the meantime, the British administration attempts to govern the province without becoming tarnished by identification with either side. Hence it places a premium on state autonomy, particularly in internal security affairs: divorced from partisan interests and managing political disputes from above rather than becoming an arena of struggle between contending social forces. Like the classic Bonapartist state, the British administration stands above and even "against civil society." While attempting to elicit consent from Protestants and Catholics for its political innovations, the regime has distanced itself from those groups. This posture is both colonial and enlightened: colonial because the regime dictates policies without consulting local forces, enlightened because this detached rule helps to shield the regime from sectarian influences.

Parameters of Political Violence

Since 1976, the number of incidents and fatalities resulting from political violence has remained well below the level of 1971 through 1976 (see Table 6). Judging by these indicators, the security situation has improved considerably since the final years of settler rule and the first years of British rule. Yet political violence continues to dominate communal relations and political life in the province.

Qualitative changes in political violence are also evident. First, the sectarian attacks by Protestant or Catholic mobs in the early 1970s declined sharply after the mid-1970s, with a corresponding reduction in the proportion of civilian fatalities: from 74 percent of those killed in 1972–1977 to 59 percent in 1982–1987. Second, the IRA became more selective in its targets, attacking a greater proportion of security personnel. Between 1972 and 1976, 24 percent of all those killed were members of the security forces; between 1984 and 1988, the figure had risen to 40 percent.

Table 7 lists the deaths caused by political violence from 1969 through 1988. Republican insurgents have been responsible for 57.6 percent of all deaths, Loyalist insurgents 24.8 percent, and the security

[31] Full integration with the U.K. might promote thoroughgoing modernization, but Britain opposes this solution because of its expected political costs. Acting as a neutral modernizer while pressing Ulsterization allows London to distance itself from the Ulster imbroglio.

forces 12 percent. Republicans and Loyalists have been responsible for roughly equal numbers of civilian fatalities, 38.7 percent and 40.5 percent respectively; the security forces were responsible for 11.8 percent. However, civilian casualties caused by Republican insurgents often appear accidental; members of the security forces are their main targets (52.4 percent of deaths caused by Republicans). Loyalist insurgents have more intentionally trained their sights on Catholic civilians (72.8 percent of deaths caused by Loyalists), often in revenge for Republican attacks on security personnel. According to McKeown, from 1969 to 1980 most of the civilians killed by the security forces "were at the time of death engaged in totally legitimate activities." ^[32] But the same verdict applies to civilians killed by Catholic and Protestant insurgents.

The Security Forces

One of the few growth industries in Northern Ireland is that of law and order, with expenditures skyrocketing since the beginning of British rule. Net expenditure on the Royal Ulster Constabulary jumped from £15.8 million in 1971–1972 to £361 million in 1987–1988; the proportion of public spending committed to policing grew from 2.5 percent to 6.5 percent from 1971 to 1985.^[33] This growth came largely from pay increases for officers, more sophisticated police equipment, and the construction and fortification of police stations. The extra cost of maintaining the British army in Ulster (above the cost of stationing it in Europe) was £14 million in 1971–1972 and £143 million in 1982–1983.^[34] Between 1969 and 1982 the indirect economic and direct exchequer costs of Ulster's violence totaled £8.9 billion, including £4.2 billion in extra security costs alone.^[35]

The British Army

From 1969 to 1976, the British army was in the forefront of the internal security enterprise. It served as the de facto police force in Catholic

[32] Michael McKeown, "Chronicles: A Register of Northern Ireland's Casualties, 1969–1980," Crane Bag 4, no. 2 (1980–1981): 3.

[33] Expenditure figures provided by RUC Headquarters, Belfast; proportions cited in John Brewer, Adrian Guelke, Ian Hume, Edward Moxon-Browne, and Rick Wilford, The Police, Public Order, and the State (New York: St. Martin's, 1988), p. 58.

[34] New Ireland Forum, The Cost of Violence Arising from the Northern Ireland Crisis since 1969 (Dublin: Government Stationary Office, 1983), p. 10.

[35] Ibid., pp. 10, 25–26. These figures do not include the cost of political administration of the province.

working-class areas, patrolling streets, searching houses, controlling demonstrations and riots, and implementing internment. The police focused primarily on the safer Protestant areas, where they investigated specific offenses and brought suspects to court. This differential deployment in the two communities produced what Boyle, Hadden, and Hillyard call a "military security" approach in Catholic areas and a "police prosecution" approach in Protestant areas.^[36]

Under the British Conservative Government of 1970–1974, a military victory over Republican insurgency was assumed to be possible, and soldiers were given a relatively free hand to deal with suspected troublemakers and uncooperative citizens.^[37] Soldiers' frustration with the security situation encouraged indiscriminate violence, and harassment of the civilian population became a feature of everyday life—during street checks, interrogations, raids, and general house searches. In the words of a former officer, the army did not "have hang-ups about using force of the most vicious kind whenever possible," and civilians often supplied "the excuse for a bit of physical intimidation."^[38] Burton's field study of Belfast during the mid-1970s graphically illustrates the traumatic repercussions of Catholic encounters with aggressive British soldiers.^[39]

Internment without trial of political suspects, which began in 1971 as mainly an army operation, was a costly mistake. It threw into question the Government's fidelity to the rule of law and was a boon to the IRA, which portrayed its detained members as political prisoners suffering summary punishment. For these reasons, the Gardiner Committee recommended in 1975 the phasing out of internment and of "specialcategory" privileges for convicted political offenders, as well as a fundamental reappraisal of security policy.^[40] The Labour Government (1974–1979) recognized the failure of internment and abandoned the view that terrorism could be defeated by military means. It hoped instead that conspicuous reliance on the law—with its presumed "higher

[36] Kevin Boyle, Tom Hadden, and Paddy Hillyard, Law and State: The Case of Northern Ireland (Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1975), pp. 42–47.

[37] Paddy Hillyard, "Law and Order," in Northern Ireland: Background to the Conflict, ed. J. Darby (Belfast: Blackstaff, 1983), p. 43. Other observers noted a "continual super-imposition by the security forces of 'executive justice' when decisions of the courts displeased them" (Boyle, Hadden, and Hillyard, Law and State, p. 135).

[38] A. F. N. Clarke, Contact (London: Secker and Warburg, 1983), pp. 53–54.

[39] Frank Burton, The Politics of Legitimacy: Struggles in a Belfast Community (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1978), pp. 106, 87.

[40] [Gardiner Committee] Report of a Committee to Consider, in the Context of Civil Liberties and Human Rights, Measures to Deal with Terrorism in Northern Ireland, Cmnd. 5847 (London: HMSO, January 1975), Lord Gardiner, Chair.

authority"—might succeed where military power had failed and might diminish both domestic and international criticism of British rule.^[41] One minister wrote, "I am certain that in our regular dealings with the United States ... to be able to say we were doing it [maintaining order] within the law was of inestimable value."^[42] Later, Conservative Secretary of State Humphrey Atkins (1979–1981) affirmed: "The aim is to defeat the terrorist by use of the law. Generally it means accepting the law of civilized countries."^[43]

The larger policy reorientation (after 1976) consisted of "Ulsterization" and "criminalization," whose broad objectives were to normalize and legitimize the system of control and to depoliticize Ulster's violence.^[44] Under Ulsterization, British troops gradually disengaged while the local RUC and UDR mobilized to fill the resulting security vacuum. Replacing the army's summary internment of suspects, the police investigated greater numbers of political offenses, which the courts adjudicated. Insurgent violence was officially shorn of its political dimension and defined as strictly criminal activity. In prison convicted terrorists were treated like ordinary prisoners. (Ten men died during the hunger strike of 1981 at the Maze prison—in which Republican prisoners demanded a set of privileges in accordance with their political status. The strike extracted no concessions from the Thatcher Government but revived waning popular support for the IRA, led to rioting in response to the deaths, and produced an upsurge in casualties from political violence for the year.)

Criminalization refers to the use of the criminal law and criminal justice system to depoliticize and delegitimate insurgent activity. In Ulster, criminalization is diluted by the authorities' reliance on emergency measures to arrest and charge insurgents, who are tried in special non-jury Diplock courts as terrorists rather than ordinary suspects. Balbus's study of ghetto riots in the United States in the 1960s assumes that criminalization will be successful: it "tends to depoliticize the consciousness of the participants" and "delegitimate their claims and grievances."^[45]

[41] Mike Tomlinson, "Reforming Repression," in Northern Ireland: Between Civil Rights and Civil War, ed. L. O'Dowd, B. Rolston, and M. Tomlinson (London: CSE, 1980), p. 191.

[42] William van Straubenzee, "International Law and International Terrorism," in Ten Years of Terrorism, ed. J. Shaw (London: Royal United Services Institute for Defense Studies, 1979), p. 157.

[43] Belfast Telegraph, 26 September 1979.

[44] See Tomlinson, "Reforming Repression."

[45] Isaac Balbus, The Dialectics of Legal Repression: Black Rebels before the American Criminal Courts (New Brunswick, N.J.: Transaction, 1977), p. 13.

Northern Ireland does not conform to these predictions, at least not in Catholic working-class areas. And it is doubtful that strict use of ordinary criminal laws and courts—as opposed to exceptional ones—would have the predicted effect. Catholic working-class areas are not so amenable to official constructions of reality. A 1978 poll found that 34.3 percent of Catholics disagreed with the statement that the IRA is made up of "criminals and murderers"; 46.3 percent thought that the IRA consists of "patriots and idealists"; 57 percent said that the authorities should "stop treating people convicted of crimes which they claim were politically motivated, as ordinary prisoners"^[46]

Ulsterization has not spelled the end of military activities but rather a progressive reduction in their scale. The strength of army forces fell from 22,000 in 1972 to 10,123 by May 1988, while the strength of locally recruited forces—UDR and RUC—rose from 15,000 to 19,237 during the same period. The remaining troops have concentrated in areas where Republican insurgents are most active or where criminal investigations are difficult (the southern border, West Belfast). Outside these hot spots the army has reverted to its conventional role of aiding the civil power and providing support to the police, as needed. At the same time the army has increased its involvement in surveillance and covert operations,^[47] which include attacks by the elite Special Air Services (SAS) on suspected insurgents.^[48] Between 1976 and 1988 the SAS was responsible for killing 23 Republican insurgents, some of whom were armed and on active-service missions at the time.^[49]

The narrowing scope of army operations after 1976 resulted in a corresponding reduction in military violence toward civilians. Compared to the public clamor over military brutality from 1969 to 1976, criticism of the army has become more muted; as the UDR and the RUC have grown prominent in the security field, Catholic complaints have centered on these forces. Still, 34 percent of Catholics and 5 percent of Protestants in 1979 wanted the army withdrawn.^[50]

[46] Edward Moxon-Browne, "The Water and the Fish: Public Opinion and the Provisional IRA in Northern Ireland," Terrorism 5, no. 1–2 (1981): 41–72.

[47] Incidents of army involvement in kidnapping, assassination, death threats, and sabotage are described by former Army Intelligence Officer Fred Holroyd in Duncan Campbell, "Victims of the Dirty War," New Statesman, 4, 11, and 18 May 1984.

[48] The SAS was deployed in 1976 apparently to placate the Protestant community: "When the murder of a number of loyalists brought indignation to the boiling point, it was as a political device that the SAS was sent to Ulster" (Tony Geraghty, Who Dares Wins: The Story of the SAS [London: Fontana, 1981], p. 182).

[49] Times, 1 September 1988. Such shoot-to-kill operations by the SAS have generated less controversy than similar actions by the RUC's Special Branch.

[50] Opinion Research Centre poll, New Society, 6 September 1979.

The Ulster Defense Regiment

This regiment now provides the first line of military support for the police in 85 percent of the province. Although the regiment's absolute strength has declined along with that of the regular army, its proportion of the total military presence grew from 30 percent in 1972 to 42 percent in 1986. Each battalion serves under a regular British army commanding officer, but the force has more autonomy from central control than other military regiments.

The UDR is over 97 percent Protestant; Catholics are dissuaded from joining by threats from the IRA and by popular perception of the regiment as a sectarian reincarnation of the Ulster Special Constabulary. (Approximately 50 percent of its initial recruits were former members of the USC.) In a recent poll, 89 percent of Catholics were opposed to any extension of the unit's role.^[51] The Social Democratic and Labour party, predominantly Catholic, considers that the UDR "has by far the worst record for serious sectarian crimes of any Regiment presently in service with the British Armed Forces"^[52] A number of UDR personnel have engaged in free-lance violence, apparently out of frustration with legal restrictions on counterinsurgency methods or out of sectarian motives. From 1970 to 1985, seventeen UDR soldiers were convicted of murder or manslaughter and ninety-nine of assault; others were charged or convicted of armed robbery, weapons offenses, bombing, intimidation and attacks on Catholics, kidnapping, and membership in the illegal Ulster Volunteer Force (a Protestant vigilante group).^[53] An unknown number belong to the legal but sectarian Ulster Defense Association. Only a small fraction of the 32,000 full-time and part-time soldiers who have passed through the UDR have been involved in crimes, but the proportion appears to be higher than that for regular British troops and the RUC.^[54]

The Government maintains that the regiment has been molded along British military lines and that to paint the UDR as a sectarian force is unfair.^[55] It has rejected pressure to dismantle the force for two reasons:

[51] Ulster Marketing Surveys poll, BBC Spotlight Report: An Opinion Poll (British Broadcasting Corporation, May 1985).

[52] Social Democratic and Labour Party, "Security," Submission to the Secretary of State's Conference in 1980, Belfast, p. 2.

[53] For a list of offenses committed by UDR personnel from 1972 through 1985, see Irish Information Partnership, Agenda: 1985 (London: IIP, 1986).

[54] Hugo Arnold, "Crime, Ulsterization, and the Future of the UDR," Fortnight, no. 226 (1985).

[55] "UDR Backed in Secret MoD File," Belfast Telegraph, 27 March 1986; Defense White Paper, cited in "Boost for UDR," Belfast Telegraph, 12 May 1986.

the expected backlash from Loyalists, who see the UDR as absolutely essential to the stability of the province; and the vacuum left by the departure of several thousand UDR soldiers that regular army troops would have to fill, thus reversing this dimension of Ulsterization.

The Royal Ulster Constabulary

Initially, the British army opposed Ulsterization because it would require the police to take the lead in the security field (which the military considered premature) and because it would place frustrating restraints on army operations.^[56] Likewise, the police were reluctant to assume primary responsibility for security or undergo militarization. Already in 1973 the chair of the Police Federation, Basil Stanage, cited "a simmering fear expressed throughout our ranks that we are being ... manipulated into a security force position again. I am persuaded that this should never be permitted."^[57] After more than a decade of "police primacy," the federation still views police militarization and involvement in counterinsurgency operations as "distinctly unnatural."^[58] In early 1986, the chair of the federation, Alan Wright, created a stir when he questioned official policy: "Fighting a guerrilla war is not a job for an ordinary police officer: it is a job of the military." Later he added, "The primacy of the police is one thing and it is something that we have done very successfully.... All we are saying is don't treat us like soldiers," and "The Government is being totally unrealistic in its policy of putting the emphasis of security on to the police."^[59] Such comments reflect constables' frustrations with their security responsibilities, which have increased their potentially confrontational encounters with citizens and undermined legitimacy among affected sections of the public. These duties also put the police at great risk. With over 260 officers killed and 7,000 injured since 1969, the RUC suffers the highest casualty rate of any police force in the world.^[60]

Even as the Police Federation complains about the RUC's security role, it presses for more extensive powers; both existing exceptional

[56] Desmond Hamill, Pig in the Middle: The Army in Northern Ireland, 1969–1984 (London: Methuen, 1985), chaps. 7, 8.

[57] "Address by the Chairman to the Annual Conference," Constabulary Gazette (October 1973): 7.

[58] Editorial, Police Beat, January 1981.

[59] Editorial, Police Beat, January 1986; Irish Times, 5 February 1986; Belfast Telegraph, 24 January 1986.

[60] Belfast Telegraph, 20 January 1983; Irish Times, 24 June 1985.

powers and police pressure for more extensive ones clearly militate against liberalization. But the logic in RUC circles appears to be that, until Northern Ireland becomes stable and tranquil, the police will require special measures to deal with unrest and political violence. Police forces throughout the world frequently seek broader powers; in Ulster, the use of exceptional powers deepens Catholic alienation and is readily exploitable by insurgent groups who profit by promoting a police-state image of the province.

Changes in policing since the early 1970s have been mixed—including elements of both militarization and liberalization —reflecting the contradictory mandates imposed on the police. Since 1976 the RUC has assumed the preeminent role in internal security, which has driven its steady militarization and technological development. Given the gradual narrowing of the army's role, this militarization has arisen more by default than by design. Today the RUC has specialized antiterrorist squads, operates a complex computer surveillance system, and uses highly advanced equipment. All members of the force receive paramilitary and riot training. Generally speaking, the response to riots has become more graduated and restrained, but incidents of gross overreaction and brutality continue to haunt the force.

Plastic bullets are frequently used to control public disturbances, and are described as safer than alternative techniques. From 1970 to 1989 approximately 110,000 plastic and rubber (now discontinued) bullets were fired by the police and army, resulting in eighteen deaths and hundreds of injuries to protesters and bystanders. This record of casualties may appear mild in contrast to that in other societies where plastic or rubber bullets are a staple of riot control. In little more than a year after the Arab insurrection in Israel's occupied territories began in December 1987, approximately fifty Palestinians had been killed by plastic bullets fired by Israeli soldiers.^[61] The use of plastic bullets in Northern Ireland nevertheless sparks an outcry after each fatality and deepens public resentment of the police.

Covert operations and surveillance absorb a substantial proportion of police time and resources.^[62] Mobile Support Units were formed in 1981–1982 for rapid-strike operations and surveillance. Both the Support Units and the RUC Special Branch have been involved in controversial incidents, including the summary shooting of suspected insurgents.

[61] Bernard Trainor, "Israeli Troops Prove Newcomers to Riot Control," New York Times, 19 February 1989.

[62] Hillyard, "Law and Order," p. 46.

The killing of six unarmed men by the Special Branch in separate incidents in 1982 was investigated by John Stalker, at the request of the Government. His findings: elite units had an "inclination" to shoot suspects without attempting to make arrests; evidence of official cover-ups of the circumstances surrounding such shootings; a lack of accountability in the Special Branch; dubious cross-border surveillance operations; mishandling of evidence in cases of police shooting; abuse of the Official Secrets Act to shroud cases of police perjury; and faulty monitoring of the RUC by the Inspectorate of Constabulary at the Home Office. Among more than forty recommendations, his unpublished interim report called for more vigorous investigation of shootings by the police, detailed guidelines for officers engaged in cross-border operations in the Irish Republic, greater control over the handling of informants, and reconsideration of the use of agents provocateurs to ensnare suspects.^[63]

In February 1988 the British Attorney General stated that national security considerations disallowed criminal prosecution of the officers implicated in Stalker's inquiry as well as publication of his report. The Police Authority announced that no disciplinary proceedings would be taken against the Chief Constable and two senior officers. Twenty sergeants and constables were subjected to disciplinary hearings, in camera, for breaches of RUC regulations. After only two days of hearings in March 1989, eighteen men were reprimanded and one cautioned; one case was dismissed. (Reprimands and cautions are the least serious sanctions a disciplinary board can impose.)

This dark side of policing in Northern Ireland coexists with important progressive developments, which can be measured by examination of the RUC's ideology, impartiality, and accountability. As an integral part of the Unionist settler state, the old RUC was a patently sectarian force. This sectarian orientation has been reduced substantially, as reflected in official instructions, organizational ideology, and police practices. Senior officers champion a professional ethos within the force and fiercely resist political interference from outside groups, jealously guarding their independence from Ulster's politicians and Government officials. The emphasis from above on impartial law enforcement seems to have permeated the force. The RUC rank and file, no less than the upper

[63] John Stalker, The Stalker Affair (New York: Viking, 1988). See also "Big Changes Were Sought by Stalker," Times, 21 June 1986; "Stalker: 40 Men Face Charges," Sunday Times, 20 July 1986. After obstruction from Special Branch officers and the Chief Constable throughout his inquiry, Stalker was removed from the investigation shortly before he was to finish, apparently because it was likely to embarrass the RUC as a whole and the Chief Constable in particular.

echelon, have embraced impartial and apolitical ideals. Not surprisingly, this claim to independence has been questioned by interested parties who believe that the RUC either is biased or should be more pliable.

The new official mission of the police is itself a significant advance on the sectarian orientation of the old force. The official ideology, however, does not meet with unanimous approval throughout the force, nor does it automatically translate into practice. Some long-serving officers have strong Unionist sympathies, according to one governmental report.^[64] Police work—particularly that involving internal security problems, public disturbances, and patrolling in neighborhoods most hostile to the police—is likely to involve some measure of bias and tacit instructions that disregard formal norms of minimum force and impartiality.

At the same time, it is clear that some larger patterns of policing practice have improved under direct rule. Both senior officers and the Police Federation have gone to great lengths to distance themselves from pressure groups and political parties, in their efforts to avoid the impression of communal favoritism. Moreover, RUC constables have demonstrated, particularly since the mid-1980s, a willingness to pursue both Catholic and Protestant political offenders.^[65] A confidential report in 1986 by Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Constabulary concluded that the RUC could be counted on to deal impartially with Protestants and Catholics.^[66] And the independent Kilbrandon Inquiry found that the RUC "has become a disciplined and professional force which has been increasingly even-handed in its efforts to eradicate terrorism by paramilitary forces both Republican and Loyalist."^[67] The willingness to pursue Loyalist suspects is supported by figures on Republicans and Loyalists charged with murder, attempted murder, and explosives offenses; in their respective levels of insurgent activity from 1981 to 1988—much higher for Republicans than Loyalists—a significantly higher proportion

[64] Report by Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Constabulary, cited in Chris Ryder, "RUC Will Toe the Line on Ulster, Says Report," Sunday Times, 6 April 1986, p. 2.

[65] The RUC's first highly visible operation against Protestant offenders came in 1977 when it controlled a ten-day Loyalist strike against the Government's alleged "soft" treatment of the IRA; the police dismantled over 700 barricades and charged 124 persons with offenses.

[66] Ryder, "RUC Will Toe the Line."

[67] [Kilbrandon Inquiry] Northern Ireland: Report of an Independent Inquiry (London: British Irish Association, November 1984), p. 39, Lord Kilbrandon, Chair; see also my article, "Policing Northern Ireland Today," Political Quarterly 58, no. 1 (January-March 1987): 88–96.

of Loyalists than Republicans were charged with offenses.^[68] These findings reflect in part the Protestant community's greater willingness to provide information to the police on its Loyalist offenders but also shows police determination to pursue these cases.

Increasingly impartial law enforcement—with other progressive changes in policing—has not greatly enhanced Catholics' confidence in the RUC. It is the working-class Catholic population that remains most alienated from the police because of lingering deep-rooted historical antipathy toward the force as an arm of Unionist domination; the RUC periodically engages in provocative and controversial activities; the police are tainted by their connection to other discredited agencies of the criminal justice system and the state as a whole. However impartial the enforcement of the law and treatment of suspects, they do not translate into public acceptance of the police if the law or the state lacks legitimacy. Such is the perception of a substantial section of the minority community as well as a section of the Protestant population. At the same time, many Catholics seem to have a higher opinion of the RUC than Catholic political leaders claim. In 1985, 38 percent of Catholics approved an increase in the size of the RUC; 47 percent believed the police operated in a fair or very fair manner.^[69]

On the one hand, the RUC has made clear progress since the advent of British rule. Officers are better trained, more impartial and accountable, less politically driven, and more sensitive to their pivotal position in this divided society. On the other hand, further liberalization is limited by the fact that the force remains almost totally Protestant, militarized, heavily armed, and mired in the security business. Incidents of police repression are the logical result of the RUC's position on the cutting edge of the counterinsurgency effort. The tenuous combination of liberalization and militarization creates contradictory imperatives for policing in a society torn by deep communal hostilities and armed insurgency. Progress will be arrested as long as the RUC retains its militarized

[68] From 1986 through 1988, for example, the Chief Constable reported 47 murders attributed to Loyalists and 40 Loyalists charged with murder; 172 murders were attributed to Republicans and 23 Republicans charged with murder (Chief Constable, Chief Constable's Annual Report [Belfast: Police Authority, 1988], pp. 60–61).

[69] These findings are reported, along with Protestant views, in Tables 8 and 9 later in the chapter. In public opinion surveys in England and Ulster, 73 percent of English respondents found the police "approachable" compared to 51 percent of Ulster respondents, who were also much less likely to contact the police in hypothetical situations (British Broadcasting Corporation, "You and Yours: Attitudes towards the Police," September 1987).

style and is saddled with primary responsibility for internal security.^[70] There appears to be no politically acceptable alternative to this state of affairs (e.g., a reversion to military primacy) under present circumstances.

Security Legislation

From 1969 to 1972 little reform of repressive law took place. In fact, the corpus of such legislation expanded. Only in 1973 was the cornerstone of settler security law, the Special Powers Act, finally abolished. Yet the act was quickly replaced with the 1973 Emergency Provisions Act (EPA) and the 1974 Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA).^[71] Passed in the wake of the worst year of political violence in the province (1972), the EPA applies solely to Northern Ireland. The abrupt enactment of the PTA in one day was precipitated by the bombing of a Birmingham pub in November 1974 that left twenty-one persons dead.

Ostensibly temporary measures, these acts have been renewed annually and biannually by Westminster, often with little debate.^[72] The official rationale for the laws is their absolute necessity to protect the public; the exclusion of Ulster's insurgency from mainland Britain; and the need for an alternative to the restrictions the ordinary criminal law places on the counterinsurgency effort.^[73] That the scope of the security laws might exceed the province's requirements was acknowledged by a former Secretary of State: "I know also that there is a sort of inertia about these matters. It is easier to continue to shelter behind these powers than to determine at a certain point that they are dispensable."^[74]

In some respects the EPA and PTA are reminiscent of the Special Powers Act:

[70] For an elaboration of this argument, see my article, "Policing a Divided Society: Obstacles to Normalization in Northern Ireland," Social Problems 33, no. 1 (October 1985).

[71] The EPA was amended in 1975, 1978, and 1987; the PTA was amended in 1976 and 1984.

[72] Bipartisan support for the acts finally ended in March 1983 when the Labour party voted against renewal of the PTA (which a Labour Government had introduced in 1974). Labour's 1983 election manifesto called for repeal of the PTA and reform of the Diplock courts. In July 1984 Labour voted against the EPA for the first time on the grounds that necessary amendments had not been made.

[73] On the content of the relevant Commons debates, see Matthew Lippman, "The Abrogation of Domestic Human Rights: Northern Ireland and the Rule of British Law," in Terrorism in Europe, ed. Y. Alexander and K. Myers (London: Croom Helm, 1982).

[74] Humphrey Atkins, Great Britain, House of Commons, Debates, vol. 995, 10 December 1980, col. 1030.

• they abolish jury trials in security cases, place the burden of proof on the accused for possession of firearms or explosives, and make bail virtually impossible to obtain;

• extend powers of warrantless search, seizure, arrest, and detention by the army (for up to four hours) and by the police (for up to seven days), and allow security forces to stop and question any individual believed to be connected with "terrorist incidents";

• proscribe organizations "connected with terrorism" and prohibit membership in, recruitment for, and support of such organizations;

• authorize the British Home Secretary and the Northern Ireland Secretary of State to exclude individuals from Britain and Ulster if they are "satisfied" that the person is or may become connected to terrorism.

Until it was amended in 1987, the EPA did not require officers to have "reasonable suspicion" that an offense had been committed to justify arrest, search, or seizure; mere suspicion was sufficient; constables and soldiers did not have to justify their decisions. As Colonel Robin Evelegh revealed, "The vast majority of those arrested by the Army in Northern Ireland were arrested without being suspected of anything except in the most general sense."^[75] This carte blanche allowed authorities to detain, interrogate, and release without charge about 50,000 individuals since 1973. (The proportionate number of the United States' population would be 6.8 million.)

The RUC and army routinely use arrest and interrogation to harass suspects, gather intelligence, and develop informers.^[76] Between 1978 and 1986 only 13.7 percent of those arrested under the EPA were charged with an offense (in Britain, 80 to 90 percent of persons arrested in ordinary criminal cases are charged). The other 86.3 percent were interrogated and released. A study of detentions in 1980 found that interrogators sought information about detainees' movements, political sympathies, associates, and families; only 28 percent of these individuals were questioned about a specific offense.^[77] The study concludes that the powers of arrest and interrogation are used deliberately for "intelligence gathering, surveillance, and harassment": interrogation is designed to generate dossiers on individuals and to deter them from

[75] Robin Evelegh, Peace-Keeping in a Democratic Society: The Lessons of Northern Ireland (Montreal: McGill-Queens University Press, 1978), p. 120.

[76] The last purpose is cited in ibid., p. 75.

[77] Dermot Walsh, The Use and Abuse of Emergency Legislation in Northern Ireland (London: Cobden Trust, 1983), pp. 33, 69.

supporting radical political causes.^[78] The importance of detention and interrogation is evident in the RUC's growing use of the seven-day power under the PTA instead of the three-day power under the EPA.^[79] The lengthier detentions "allow the police to exercise greater pressure on suspects to confess or cooperate"^[80]

Northern Ireland differs from postsettler Zimbabwe and Liberia in that peaceful political opposition is not branded subversive and suppressed. Even groups with connections to insurgent organizations and thus on the borderline of violence—Sinn Fein, Ulster Defense Association—are legal, albeit frequently harassed by the authorities. Groups with an incontrovertible record of violence, however, are proscribed under the security legislation; they include the Irish Republican Army, Irish National Liberation Army, Ulster Volunteer Force, and Ulster Freedom Fighters. The EPA allows the police to arrest anyone suspected of membership or general "involvement" with proscribed organizations.^[81]

Under the EPA, the cases tried in special Diplock courts are those of "scheduled offenses" connected to political crimes; one judge presides without a jury. From 1980 through March 1989, 93 percent of the 5,774 defendants tried in these courts were convicted (82 percent had entered guilty pleas, up from 56 percent in 1973). (Confessions admitted as evidence in Diplock courts need not be corroborated by other evidence.)^[82] Of the cases where defendants pleaded not guilty, 39 percent were acquitted, down from 57 percent in 1973.^[83] The declining acquittal rate may indicate a "hardening" of the judges involved, who hear many

[78] Walsh, Use and Abuse, p. 39; cf. Kevin Boyle, Tom Hadden, and Paddy Hillyard, Ten Years On in Northern Ireland: The Legal Control of Political Violence (London: Cobden Trust, 1980).

[79] The seven-day power was used in 7 percent of the arrests under the two acts in 1979, and approximately 50 percent in 1984.

[80] Steven Greer, Tom Hadden, and Martin O'Hagan, "Arrest and Screening," Fortnight, 18 February 1985, p. 6.

[81] By infringing freedom of association and expression, the banning of organizations arguably goes further than necessary to control the undesirable activities of the members of these groups (see Committee on the Administration of Justice, Emergency Laws: Suggestions for Reform in Northern Ireland, pamphlet no. 5 [Belfast: CAJ, September 1983], p. 10). The British Government has equivocated on the issue of proscribing organizations; in 1974 it lifted the ban on Sinn Fein and the Ulster Volunteer Force, and countenanced the view that individual offenders would be pursued instead of organizations (see the statement by Secretary of State Merlyn Rees, House of Commons, Debates, vol. 871, 4 April 1974, col. 1476).

[82] A recent review of the EPA recommended that confessions be tape-recorded to ensure their voluntary character ([Baker Report] Review of the Operation of the Northern Ireland (Emergency Provisions) Act 1978, Cmnd. 9222 [London: HMSO, April 1984], Sir George Baker, Chair).

[83] NIO figures, cited in Belfast Telegraph, 1 November 1989; 1973 figures are from Walsh, Use and Abuse, p. 94.

similar cases without the check of a fresh jury to evaluate each one. This arrangement increases the chances that the accused will be wrongfully convicted.

Despite the fact that Diplock courts show no systematic religious bias in the decisions rendered, they remain highly controversial among Catholics and seem to have affected the standing of the legal system as a whole (see Table 9).^[84] It is widely believed that public confidence could be restored only if the Diplock courts were reformed or abolished.

A relatively recent experiment in these courts was the "supergrass" system, which relied on the uncorroborated testimony of informers to convict individuals accused of political offenses. From 1981 to 1983, 450 people were arrested and charged with terrorist-related offenses on the evidence of 18 Republican and 7 Loyalist supergrasses. The police granted immunity to about half of the supergrasses in return for their testimony, and several received generous monetary payments as well.^[85] An independent investigation by Lord Gifford concluded that the use of uncorroborated evidence had led in some cases to the conviction of innocent persons.^[86] The supergrass system was abandoned at the end of 1986 after the acquittal of a number of defendants on grounds of the informers' lack of credibility.

Persons arrested under the PTA have no right of habeas corpus, are not informed of the charges against them, and have no right to remain silent or to appeal decisions. Abridging the standard right to freedom of movement within one's country, exclusion orders banish suspected terrorists from one part of the United Kingdom to another (most exclusions are from mainland Britain to Ulster). In Britain from 1974 to 1986, 6,246 were detained under the PTA, of whom 4.5 percent received exclusion orders and 8.5 percent were charged with an offense. Of the 7,627 detentions in Ulster between the end of 1974 and July 1987, 31 individuals were given exclusion orders and 2,462 (32 percent) were charged with an offense.

The Shackleton Report on the PTA excused its low rate of exclusions and charges by celebrating "the preventative nature of the legislation in its widest aspects."^[87] Another official justification for exclusion is that it

[84] Boyle, Hadden, and Hillyard, Ten Years On, p. 86.

[85] Secretary of State, Irish Times, 27 February 1985.

[86] Tony Gifford, Supergrasses: The Use of Accomplice Evidence in Northern Ireland (London: Cobden Trust, 1984), p. 34.

[87] [Shackleton Report] Review of the Prevention of Terrorism (Temporary Provisions) Acts, Cmnd. 7324 (London: HMSO, August 1978), Lord Shackleton, Chair.

is necessary when charges cannot be brought against those suspected of planning acts of terrorism in Britain.^[88]

Some have objected to the principle of exclusion or internal exile, noting that this special treatment belies the official position that Ulster is an integral part of the United Kingdom. Others consider it simply unnecessary: the authorities issued exclusion orders (from Britain to Ulster) against only fourteen persons in 1983, two in 1984, and four in 1985, suggesting that it was "no longer of any great significance in the prevention of terrorism."^[89] But the act has been used to induce information from persons with Irish backgrounds and "to severely limit the activities of legitimate groups campaigning on Irish issues in mainland Britain."^[90]

The powers contained in the existing security legislation constitute some improvement—in terms of human rights and the rule of law—over the Special Powers Act of the Unionist state. The current legislation no longer defends a system of sectarian power and privilege. In marked contrast to the regime in Zimbabwe, the British Government has shown a willingness to drop certain provisions of the security law as a result of pressure from opposition parties at Westminster or of recommendations from independent review commissions. But several other provisions arguably overstep what circumstances in the province warrant. In the area of legislation, the net effect of British rule is limited liberalization. The same diagnosis applies to the system of accountability.

Mechanisms of Accountability

Inasmuch as executive departments in Ulster are now answerable to Westminster, formal British involvement is an improvement on the old settler state. But apart from crises, the British Cabinet assigns low priority to Northern Ireland, and Westminster shows little interest in the problem: Parliament's review of the security laws has rarely been more than perfunctory.

[88] Penny Smith, "Emergency Laws and the Prevention of Terrorism Acts," in Securing the State, ed. P. Hillyard and P. Squires, European Group for the Study of Deviance and Social Control, Working Papers in European Criminology, no. 3 (1982), p. 222. See also Catherine Scorer and Patricia Hewitt, The Prevention of Terrorism Act: The Case for Repeal (London: National Council for Civil Liberties, 1981).

[89] Times, 8 December 1988.

[90] Standing Advisory Commission on Human Rights, Annual Report for 1984–1985 (Belfast: HMSO, 1985), p. 23.

One abortive experiment in local democracy and accountability was the Northern Ireland Assembly, which operated from 1982 to 1986. Although it had a narrow advisory role, the Government accepted approximately 75 percent of its recommendations.^[91] In the area of security, however, despite its frequent and impassioned debates, the Assembly had little influence. A Security and Home Affairs Committee was limited to making recommendations and ventilating local concerns over security problems; it was generally disregarded by the Government, as a NIO official confided: "We regard the Committee as something that has to be quieted down rather than something that has to be taken seriously."^[92] Boycotted by the SDLP and Sinn Fein and sometimes the scene of unruly Unionist theatrics over unmet demands, the Assembly was dissolved in June 1986 by the British Cabinet amid protests from the Unionist parties.

In the field of criminal prosecution, a new office of Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) was established in 1972, following recommendations of the Hunt Committee and the report of a working party on public prosecutions. According to one former minister, the DPP's office was designed so that it would "not be open to the same allegations of bias" that were leveled at the previous system of police prosecution.^[93] The DPP is responsible for the prosecution of all cases of serious crime in which the police have decided to prefer charges and determines whether complaints against police justify criminal charges. In his first and primary responsibility, the DPP has proven to be a valuable corrective in bringing about more impartial treatment of Loyalist and Republican suspects.^[94]

The DPP's role in improving police accountability is less clear, since his decisions to prefer charges against officers depend mainly on prior police investigation. The DPP has prosecuted few officers accused of misconduct and has consistently refused to disclose the reasons behind his decisions. Yet the DPP's involvement does introduce a check into the old system under which police investigated themselves.

The response of the police to citizens' complaints has been a chronic problem in Northern Ireland. The difference between the number of

[91] Secretary of State Tom King, Great Britain, House of Commons, Debates, vol. 99, 19 June 1986, col. 1202. Cf. Brigid Hadfield, "The Northern Ireland Assembly," Public Law (Winter 1983): 550–57, and Northern Ireland Assembly, Local Democracy at Work (Belfast: HMSO, 1984). Almost all the Assembly's sitting members were Unionists; fourteen SDLP and five Sinn Fein members boycotted the Assembly from its inception.

[92] NIO official, Law and Order Division, interview with author, 16 August 1984.

[93] Lord Windlesham, Minister of State at NIO, Irish Times, 2 May 1972.

[94] Boyle, Hadden, and Hillyard, Ten Years On, p. 68; Fortnight, September 1983.

complaints registered and those that are substantiated by the police authorities has been high but relatively constant from 1982 through 1988. In 1985, for example, 51 complaints were substantiated out of a total of 3,237 complaints registered (1,349 complaints were withdrawn or not proceeded with).^[95] An unknown proportion of the complaints registered every year consists of attempts by Republicans to undermine public confidence in the force or tie up police resources, but the Bennett Committee of Inquiry found that such malicious motives "can scarcely account for the volume of complaints" registered.^[96] Changes over time in the number of complaints registered may reflect, inter alia, fluctuations in complaint-provoking conduct by officers, but one independent body concluded, "No clear explanation has emerged."^[97]

Attempting to build public confidence, a Police Complaints Board was created in June 1977 to oversee complaints of disciplinary (not criminal) breaches by officers. Between 1977 and 1981, the board received a total of 2,895 complaints. In only 21 cases (0.7 percent) did it disagree with the decision of the Deputy Chief Constable not to prefer disciplinary charges. Continuing public dissatisfaction over the handling of complaints led to the replacement of the Police Complaints Board in February 1988 with an Independent Commission for Police Complaints, which has an enhanced role in investigating cases.

A substantial number of complaints registered in the 1970s stemmed from allegations of assault under police custody and mistreatment during interrogations. This problem was the focus of several official investigations. The Compton Commission concluded that "physical illtreatment" had occurred during prolonged police questioning.^[98] Hooding, noise treatment, threats of violence, and forced standing for prolonged periods were among the techniques used to extract information or confessions. From 1976 to 1979, ill treatment of suspects in police custody was apparently tolerated by police chiefs and top government

[95] Chief Constable, Annual Report (1985); on the complaints system, see my article, "Accountability and Complaints against the Police in Northern Ireland," Police Studies 9, no. 2 (Summer 1986): 99–109; for England, see Steven Box and Ken Russell, "The Politics of Discreditability: Disarming Complaints against the Police," Sociological Review 23, no. 2 (May 1975): 315–46.

[96] [Bennett Committee] Report of the Committee of Inquiry into Police Interrogation Procedures in Nortbern Ireland, Cmnd. 7497 (London: HMSO, March 1979), Judge Bennett, Chair; p. 112.

[97] Police Complaints Board, Annual Report for 1985, p. 3.

[98] [Compton Commission] Report of the Enquiry into Allegations against the Security Forces of Physical Brutality in Northern Ireland Arising out of Events on the 9th August 1971, Cmnd. 4823 (London: HMSO, November 1971), Sir Edmund Compton, Chair.

officials; they had received evidence of brutality from physicians and others.^[99] NIO ministers and police managers insisted that detainees' wounds were self-inflicted, and that allegations of brutality were part of the IRA's propaganda war. Independent investigations found otherwise. In 1978 the European Court of Human Rights ruled that the use of certain interrogation techniques in Ulster constituted "inhuman and degrading punishment";^[100] Amnesty International concluded that "maltreatment of suspected terrorists by the RUC has taken place with sufficient frequency to warrant the establishment of a public inquiry to investigate it."^[101] A subsequent investigation by the Bennett Committee confirmed that suspects had sustained non-self-inflicted injuries in police custody.^[102] After the implementation of most of the committee's recommendations—including television monitoring of interrogations— allegations of mistreatment incustody diminished considerably.

In settings outside the interrogation room, however, allegations of police assault remain high. In 1980, 33.1 percent of the total complaints dealt with by the authorities alleged assault (compared to 19.6 percent in England and Wales); in 1984 the figure was 27.0 percent for Northern Ireland (19.2 percent in England and Wales).^[103]

Another formal mechanism of accountability is the Police Authority (created in 1970). This body is undoubtedly an advance over the Unionist system where the Ministry of Home Affairs was responsible for policing. Its purview might be expected to include the use of undercover specialist police units, the discharge of weapons, and public complaints. But neither controversial incidents nor the causes of recurrent policing problems have been its major concern; it has focused instead on technical and organizational matters.^[104] The authority has the power, which it rarely exercises, to request reports on policing issues from the Chief Constable and can even call for his resignation. On those rare occasions when it has pressed for greater powers—such as its request in 1976 to attend security meetings at the NIO—it has been refused.

[99] Peter Taylor, Beating the Terrorists (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1980).

[100] European Court of Human Rights, Case of Ireland against the United Kingdom: Judgment, Strasbourg, January 1978, p. 82.

[101] Amnesty International, Report of an Amnesty International Mission to Northern Ireland (London: Amnesty International, June 1978), p. 70.

[102] Bennett Committee.

[103] Standing Advisory Commission, 1984–1985, p. 69.

[104] On the reluctance of English police authorities to exert control over police activities, see M. Brogden, "A Police Authority: The Denial of Conflict," Sociological Review 25, no. 2 (May 1977): 325–49.

The authority maintains that "Northern Ireland has one of the best police forces in the world."^[105] With this assessment and with its highly deferential approach to the police, the authority has understandably had difficulty convincing the public that it is an effective independent check on the performance of the RUC.^[106] A body more representative of the entire community, actively devising policing policies and priorities, and working to identify and solve continuing problems might enhance the RUC's image and accountability.^[107]

The Standing Advisory Commission on Human Rights (SACHR) was created in 1973 to investigate areas in which religious or political discrimination existed and recommend changes to the Secretary of State. Its consistent interest in human rights and impartial orientation have made it something of a "counterweight to sectarian forces."^[108] SACHR's often critical Annual Reports have concerned, inter alia, controversial aspects of security legislation, complaints against the police, the use of firearms by security forces, procedures for police interrogation, and a proposed bill of rights. SACHR has advocated changes in legislation and institutional practices bearing on human rights and has consistently counseled against policy changes that might further erode public confidence in the administration of justice. Under no obligation to accept and implement the commission's recommendations, the Government has accepted some and rejected others over the years. Governmental refusals or long delays in redressing problems usually include explanations of inconvenient timing or competing legislative priorities—reasoning that the commission does not accept.

Other independent bodies, such as the Committee on the Administration of Justice (CAJ) and the National Council for Civil Liberties (NCCL), have issued reports critical of the security laws, the system for handling complaints, plastic bullets, and fatalities caused by the police. Judging by official practices, these reports have had at best a modest impact. Several major commissions have examined institutional practices and security laws. Their reports led to new mechanisms of accountability, but the changes have stopped short of major reforms.^[109] Commis-

[105] Police Authority for Northern Ireland, Report on the Work of the Police Authority for Northern Ireland: 1970–1981 (Belfast: Police Authority, 1982), p. 6.

[106] See Standing Advisory Commission, 1984–1985, p. 29.

[107] See Committee on the Administration of Justice, Police Accountability in Northern Ireland (Belfast: CAJ, 1988).

[108] Paul Maguire, "The Standing Advisory Commission on Human Rights," Northern Ireland Legal Quarterly 32, no. 1 (Spring 1981): 53.

sions of inquiry have, for example, not questioned the need for emergency legislation, the Ulster Defense Regiment, and the Diplock courts.

The judiciary offers a potential check on abuses as it adjudicates cases alleging criminal conduct on the part of the security forces; but the courts' record in controlling such misconduct has been less than impressive. Of the twenty-two members of the security forces prosecuted for killings while on duty, two have been convicted; one received a suspended sentence, and the other served two years of his life sentence.

As a signatory to the European Convention on Human Rights and other covenants, the British Government accepts the principle of international judicial review of human rights. The European Court of Human Rights has heard cases regarding violations of human rights in Ulster, and its adverse decisions have generated modest improvements. London has sometimes derogated from the court's rulings. In 1988 the European Court ruled that the seven-day detention power under the EPA was excessive, but the Thatcher Government opted not to comply with the verdict.

Another international oversight body is the Inter-Governmental Conference established under the Anglo-Irish Agreement of November 1985, with the Dublin Government acting on behalf of the Catholic minority. Law and order issues have featured prominently in discussions between British and Irish representatives. Thus far, the British Government has responded favorably to some Irish proposals, for instance, Dublin's objection to reintroducing internment without trial. In contrast, suggestions to reform Diplock courts—introducing juries or replacing a single judge with three—or to disband the UDR were flatly rejected by the British authorities.

The preceding discussion has focused primarily on mechanisms of oversight within the state. The question of civic accountability— whereby state agencies respond to representatives of leading social institutions—is a separate issue. It is especially problematic in deeply divided societies: a body committed to democratic accountability might find itself torn by the conflicting demands of a divided public and thus wholly ineffective. Ideally, oversight agencies would be maximally depo-

[109] See the reports of the Gardiner Committee (1975), the Bennett Committee (1979), and the Baker Commission (1984); see also Gavin Drewry, "Judges and Political Inquiries: Harnessing a Myth," Political Studies 23, no. 1 (March 1975): 61; Boyle, Hadden, and Hillyard, Law and State, pp. 126–30.

liticized and composed of responsible members of the community; but in Northern Ireland enticing such persons to serve on bodies like the Police Authority has proved difficult, either because insurgent organizations have issued threats to members or because potential members consider such agencies to be illegitimate or cosmetic.

On balance, the structure of accountability that has been built since 1972 is a clear departure from the settler era, but additional checks would enhance the overall accountability of the security sector. The courts, independent commissions, and oversight bodies have not adequately scrutinized some of the most controversial activities of the security forces. Moreover, when human rights organizations and other bodies have questioned practices such as the use of plastic bullets and the so-called shoot-to-kill tactic, corrective action by the authorities has been difficult to discern.

Obstacles to Further Liberalization

Britain's experience from 1969 to 1972 indicated the futility of attempting by remote control to reshape Ulster's institutions. Direct involvement since then has given the metropole greater leverage, with significant results. Northern Ireland is one of the few contemporary communally divided societies where a modernizing regime has revamped important elements of the security system. The remainder of this chapter uses our explanatory model to assess the constraints on further liberalization.

The authorities in Northern Ireland have advanced the familiar security-imperatives thesis. They insist that political instability and armed insurgency have made extraordinary security precautions a dire necessity. As one RUC spokesperson told me, "Further progress [i.e., police reform] depends on the level of violence."^[110] The official view is that any further relaxation of controls would create a vacuum inviting an upsurge in political violence; every violent incident, however isolated, dramatizes and justifies the need for exceptional measures.

The existence of protracted political violence is clearly an important part of the explanation for prevailing institutional arrangements in Northern Ireland. Yet, as our analysis of postsettler Zimbabwe suggested, political violence alone is not a sufficient explanation. Other social and political variables condition Ulster's security system and

[110] Interview with author, 3 August 1984.

contribute to changes as well as continuities in its structure, ethos, and operations.

A Sectarian Political Culture

At the macrolevel, democratic political development and liberalization of a security system require a congruence between a society's normative and institutional orders. Prager states the case in newly independent nations:

the construction of new institutional structures following independence always stand[s] in relation to the prevailing cultural orientations of the society. The challenge of modernization is to establish complementarity between those orientations and modern institutional forms. Normative commitments set the limits for institutional development.^[111]

British reconstruction in Ulster requires both institutional transfer and cultural convergence with the metropole. Of course, it is far easier to remodel institutions than to reconstitute a cultural order—particularly one split along communal lines. Britain has had modest success in Ulster in arranging institutional transfer and, predictably, less progress in grafting norms of universality and justice onto the sociopolitical order and nurturing transcommunal solidarity. The fact that the new regime is an adjunct of an existing liberal democracy may seem to favor liberalization (in contrast to Zimbabwe and Liberia, where the new regimes lack strong commitments to democratic norms), but much depends on the degree of societal receptivity. It often appears that this divided society is "hermetically sealed from British political life and traditions"^[112] Ulster's traditional communal allegiances and cultural orientations clash with new, modern institutions; this disjunction limits the legitimation of those institutions.

Because of its settler heritage, Ulster's polarized political culture is deficient in norms of mutual trust, tolerance for opposition, willingness to compromise on key issues, and a shared sense of national identity. Extreme views flourish, mutual distrust among organized Catholic and Protestant forces is the norm, and compromise equals betrayal of one's side. Overarching bonds of solidarity are weak; a tradition of zero-sum politics is strong and parochialism is valued; the cross-sectional public

[111] Jeffrey Prager, Building Democracy in Ireland (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986), p. 5.

[112] Paul Arthur, "Rules of Disengagement," Times, 28 October 1988.

support necessary to sustain modern institutions is precarious. Survey data and in-depth interviews document significant levels of religious intolerance as well as political polarization.^[113]

Like some other deeply divided societies, the antagonistic communities in Northern Ireland are not impressed by the regime's attempts to build a universalistic and autonomous state. Though sometimes pledging nominal support for these ideals, both sides (but particularly the Loyalists) hold more particularistic and instrumentalist views of state power. They invoke the language of democracy on behalf of their communal preferences: majoritarianism for Protestants, minority rights or majoritarianism in an all-Ireland context for Catholics. Similarly, they tend to favor security arrangements that appear to advance their partisan interests.^[114]

On the Catholic side, the Social Democratic and Labour party routinely lobbies for an impartial and accountable security system, not reverse discrimination against Protestants. Yet its support for liberalization is somewhat ambiguous and conditional. First, its demands understandably address problems that inflame Catholic sensitivities but ignore Protestant concerns. Second, it has given at best muted support—and more often virulent criticism—to specific institutional reforms, which it labels cosmetic. In Catholic quarters, there are electoral risks in lending support to security and criminal justice institutions; Sinn Fein is always anxious to portray the SDLP as having sold out to the British. (Sinn Fein brands all reforms as subtle forms of repression.) Third, the

[113] Interviews with political elites can be found in Padriag O'Malley, The Uncivil Wars: Ireland Today (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1983); see also John Conroy, Belfast Diary (Boston: Beacon, 1987); and Sally Belfrage, Living with War: A Belfast Year (New York: Penguin, 1987). In the mid-1960s only 39 percent of Protestants and Catholics thought that "most people can be trusted"; 62 percent believed that the preaching of "false" religious doctrines should not be allowed (Richard Rose, Governing without Consensus: An Irish Perspective [Boston: Beacon, 1971], p. 498).

[114] Illustrating this point is the partial erosion of Loyalist support for the security forces after the Anglo-Irish Agreement; of the Protestants polled, 33.6 percent thought the agreement would bring a reduction of confidence in the security forces; 11.6 percent expected an increase, and 46.2 percent anticipated no effect (Coopers and Lybrand poll, Belfast Telegraph, 15 January 1986). Another survey found that 27 percent of Protestants believed the agreement would lower public confidence in the courts; 7 percent thought it would raise confidence; and 53 percent expected no effect (Ulster Marketing Surveys, BBC Spotlight/Newsnight: Public Opinion of Anglo-Irish Agreement [British Broadcasting Corporation, January 1986], p. 15). In 1988, 86 percent of Protestants (and 70 percent of Catholics) believed it had not improved the security situation; 76 percent of Protestants (and 58 percent of Catholics) saw no positive effect on the administration of justice; 55 percent of Protestants (and 34 percent of Catholics) said it had not increased cooperation between the RUC and the Irish police, or Garda (Coopers and Lybrand poll, Belfast Telegrapb, 4 October 1988).

SDLP continues to condition support for the institutions of law and order on a political solution to the conflict. The SDLP leader, John Hume, put it bluntly: "We will only have total unequivocal identification with the institutions of law and order when there is agreement among the people as a whole as to how we are governed."^[115] For the SDLP, a political solution spells a united Ireland—anathema to Protestants.

Protestant political forces tend to see law and state power as instruments to advance majority interests. They are, like most settler castes, antimodernists who oppose the elevation of coercive institutions above communal demands. The Unionists have fought virtually every change in the direction of liberalization—from legal reforms and judicial impartiality to police accountability. On occasion, this opposition has manifested itself in street protests that have turned into full-scale riots and attacks on the forces of order, throwing into question the celebrated Loyalist fondness for law and order.

A great deal of criticism has centered on policing, which one Democratic Unionist party (DUP) leader questioned:

There must come a time when the conscience of each police officer must overrule the brainwashing ... that professionalism must overrule conscience on every occasion. At present there appears to be an attitude within the RUC that officers ... must carry on their task in a professional manner.^[116]

A colleague warned: "The individual policeman is going to have to choose who he is loyal to—his paymaster [the British Government] or the [Protestant] community which has supported him for so long."^[117]

Some Protestant leaders are unabashed about their preference for security structures that discriminate against Catholic offenders. One Official Unionist party (OUP) leader, Harold McCusker, questioned the principle of impartial law enforcement and insisted that the police should instead distinguish between offenders "who uphold the Constitution and those who would subvert it."^[118] Some have placed a sinister construction on security policies that treat such Loyalists on a par with Catholic political offenders. Similarly, others see a world of difference between the annual Protestant and Catholic parades. Consider the comment of a DUP member:

[115] Quoted in Conor Cruise O'Brien, letter to the editor, Times, 20 May 1989.

[116] Alan Kane, Northern Ireland Assembly, Debates, vol. 19, 19 March 1986, p. 231.

[117] DUP press officer, Sammy Wilson, quoted in Irish Times, 16 July 1985.

[118] Belfast Telegraph, 12 July 1985.

What is the Loyalist demonstrating? He is demonstrating his loyalty to law and order and to British rule in this country. What are Republican parades demonstrating? They are demonstrating their support for murder, terrorism, and the overthrow of the state.^[119]

Uttered at a particularly traumatic time for Protestants—when the RUC was banning or rerouting Loyalist parades that traditionally traveled through Catholic neighborhoods—these particular views may not be universally popular among Protestants. But they certainly reflect a widespread antimodernist orientation to institutions of law and order. One senior member of the OUP remarked: "The fact that they are 'our police' is inscribed on the Protestant mind."^[120]

Northern Ireland's political culture contains strong particularistic values, despite the formal support Protestant and Catholic leaders sometimes pledge to universalistic and democratic ideals. The cultural milieu does not preclude institutional progress—as the record of partial reconstruction attests—but it makes future change more problematic.

A Polarized Civil Society

In addition to insurgency and the partisan political culture, two other interrelated factors condition Northern Ireland's security system: the interests and capacities of Catholic and Protestant political forces and civic institutions and those of the British regime.^[121] After surveying Catholic and Protestant attitudes on law and order issues and the relative power of organized forces on each side, I assess their impact on the regime.

Catholic views.

Under British rule, Catholic preferences are central to the debate over fundamental political and constitutional questions. Catholic civic bodies—the church, media, voluntary associations—and political parties actively express grievances and demands on public policies, and nowhere more intensely than on matters of law and order.

The attitudinal data presented below should be treated cautiously; the sensitivity of some of the questions may produce responses that exaggerate disapproval of illegal activities and radical organizations. But it

[119] Northern Ireland Assembly, Debates, vol. 15, 1 May 1985, p. 252.

[120] Quoted in Fortnight, no. 239 (19 May 1986), p. 5.

[121] The following discussion extends arguments in my article, "Contested Order: The Struggle over British Security Policy in Northern Ireland," Comparative Politics 19, no. 3 (April 1987): 281–98.

is clear that Catholic views on security matters are less uniform than conventional accounts suggest. Surveys have found that 55.5 percent of Catholics think the authorities should take a tougher line with the IRA;^[122] 41 percent say that Britain's first short-term priority should be to reduce the level of violence;^[123] and 86 percent disapprove of the use of violence for political ends.^[124] The critical mass of loyal IRA supporters should be distinguished from those who simply tolerate the insurgents, those who occasionally support specific actions of the IRA but condemn others, and those who have been intimidated into compliance with IRA demands.^[125] Catholic support for Republican insurgency is taxed periodically by attacks that have gone awry (Republican insurgents were responsible for the deaths of 170 Catholic civilians from 1969 to 1988) and by the punishment (like kneecappings) the IRA administers to suspected informers.^[126] That the state lacks legitimacy among Catholics, and that IRA blunders are often followed by controversial security force operations, help to reinforce tolerance for IRA activity.

Another picture emerges from a breakdown of attitudes along party lines. Four out of five SDLP voters reject the use of political violence, and the same proportion believe that Sinn Fein should abandon the armed struggle. By contrast, four out of five Sinn Fein voters support political violence, and two out of three support the armed struggle.^[127] It is noteworthy that of the Sinn Fein supporters one out of three believes the party should terminate the armed struggle, a staple of the party's strategy. These findings document important intracommunal differences on key questions facing the Catholic population. Many Catholics harbor negative views of Sinn Fein; in a recent poll only 14 percent of Catholics expressed staunch support for Sinn Fein, 53 percent said they had never sympathized with the party, and 28 percent indicated that their views were affected by more immediate events involving the IRA.^[128] Actual voting results, however, suggest that Sinn Fein enjoys the support of a sizeable minority of Catholics. In the 1983 general election, Sinn Fein

[122] Moxon-Browne, Nation, Class, p. 58.

[123] Opinion Research Centre poll, New Society, 6 September 1979. Thirty-two percent thought the first priority should be a political solution.

[124] Market and Opinion Research International [MORI] Poll, June 1981.

[125] Patrick Bishop and Eamonn Mallie, The Provisional IRA (London: Heinemann, 1987), pp. 227-28.

[126] See Table 7 above and "An Ulster Town Mourns Woman Killed by I.R.A.," New York Times, 16 April 1989.

[127] Cynthia Irvin and Eddie Moxon-Browne, "Not Many Floating Voters Here," Fortnight, no. 273 (May 1989): 7–8.

[128] Coopers and Lybrand poll, Fortnight, no. 261 (April 1988): 8.

won 43 percent and the SDLP 57 percent of the Catholic, nationalist vote; in 1987 Sinn Fein's share dropped to 35 percent. In a 1988 survey, 40 percent of Catholics said that Sinn Fein should not be allowed to field candidates in the 1989 city council elections.^[129]

Catholics who disapprove of Sinn Fein/IRA and political violence do not necessarily support security policies or specific institutions. A 1982 poll found that 60 percent of Catholics disapproved of the government's general handling of security while 33 percent approved.^[130] There is widespread Catholic discontent with many existing and proposed security measures (see Tables 8, 9, and 10), and a majority believes that the police and the legal system operate unfairly. These attitudes contrast sharply with Protestant views and suggest that the organs of law and order remain "institutions of discord" today.^[131]

[129] Coopers and Lybrand poll, Belfast Telegraph, 4 October 1988.

[130] NOP poll, "Political Attitudes in Northern Ireland," Ulster Television, February 1982, p. 6.

[131] Rose, Governing .

The IRA, Sinn Fein, and their supporters take a predictably hostile view of Northern Ireland's legal system and security arrangements, including the reforms implemented since the advent of British rule. In their view, the existing state is "unreformable"; the creation of new institutions of law and order will be possible only after the British withdraw. In the meantime, the IRA and Sinn Fein fear genuine reforms and depend on state repression to fuel the fires of Catholic discontent and support for the Republican movement. By contrast, the SDLP and its supporters advocate immediate reforms in the security system: that the UDR be disbanded, the Diplock courts abolished, the Emergency Provisions Act and Prevention of Terrorism Act withdrawn, and the police restructured.^[132]

[132] The SDLP has not urged Catholics to join the RUC, has been ambivalent on cooperating with the police against political violence, and has refused to give unconditional support to the force.

It might be expected that moderate Catholics would be the first to support liberalizing changes. But the SDLP and its supporters have given at best qualified, conditional support to reforms—because they define the changes as insufficient, or because of perceived miscarriages of justice, or because enthusiastic support for reforms might put the SDLP at an electoral disadvantage vis-à-vis Sinn Fein. Moreover, abrasive security operations disproportionately affect Catholics, creating the impression that the entire security enterprise is one-sided. The lack of support for direct rule, coupled with the lack of political progress, also colors reforms imposed by the British state. As noted earlier, Catholic support for reforms of security and criminal justice structures is unlikely to be enthusiastic if such changes do not proceed in conjunction with progress on the political front.

In the meantime, groups representing Catholic interests (the church, SDLP) and several independent human rights organizations have lobbied for major reforms in the law, police, courts, and specific security measures. Generally, the governmental response has been unfavorable. One official at the NIO insisted that it is "farcical to suggest that our security policy is determined by the minority."^[133] Still, the regime has tended to avoid introducing measures likely to prompt a widespread Catholic outcry, disorders, or international protests, as indeed occurred in the early 1970s after several misguided security experiments. One measure that would be likely to inflame the Catholic minority to violent resistance is the reintroduction of internment without trial; several British officials have opposed it on precisely these grounds.

A relatively recent innovation designed to give Catholics a formal voice in decision making through representatives from the Irish Republic is the Inter-Governmental Conference established under the Anglo-Irish accord, wherein Irish officials have pressed for several liberalizing reforms. In the first four years (1986–1989), most of Dublin's recommendations came to naught.

Protestant views.

Significant proportions of Catholics (36 percent) and Protestants (22 percent) believe that terrorism cannot be defeated in Ulster (see Table 11). Of the remainder, Catholics place greater weight on political solutions whereas Protestants favor security measures. A substantial core of Protestants (29 percent) believe that security measures alone are the answer, and many others see security as the cutting edge of a strategy supported by a political offering (e.g., power sharing). Many Protestants appreciate that reliance on force alone will not defeat the IRA. Forty-four percent of Protestants and 38 percent of Catholics thought that a combination of security and political measures was the solution. (The crucial unaddressed question is the meaning of "political measures" to each community.)

The survey data presented in the tables above show that, with few exceptions and despite intracommunal differences, the security measures that Catholics denounce as draconian and unacceptable, Protestants overwhelmingly applaud . As a rule Protestants favor any measure that may help to subdue the IRA and its civilian supporters. Support for drastic security measures does not, however, translate into approval of the Government's overall performance in security. One survey found that

[133] NIO official, Law and Order Division, interview with author, 3 August 1984.

50 percent of Protestants disapproved of the handling of security, while 44 percent approved.^[134] The main reasons for this disapproval have been articulated by Unionist leaders: they complain that an alien power takes security decisions and imposes programs without the consent of the majority in Ulster; that it does not exert security powers to the fullest extent against Catholic culprits but uses them increasingly against Protestant protesters and political offenders.

Most Protestants would question the claim that the existing security system serves their interests, which is made in one model of British rule presented at the beginning of this chapter. They believe instead that British security policy and routine practices pander to the minority population, hold the security forces on a short leash, and allow insurgents to run amok. In one poll (Table 9), 92 percent of Protestants thought that the security forces were restricted by political policies. Ian Paisley's Democratic Unionist party has gone so far as to accuse Britain of having "a vested interest in not defeating the terrorism that, if permitted to succeed, would deliver it of the Province it seeks to ditch."^[135]

The two Unionist political parties have aggressively and ceaselessly campaigned for greater access to security elites, fortification of coercive agencies, more vigorous enforcement of existing laws, and a host of more repressive measures. As evidenced by the wealth of the Loyalists' unmet demands, this pressure has had little direct impact on specific security arrangements. Success is most likely when their demands coincide with a major IRA attack; even then the official response—military reinforcements, for example, or blanket search-and-seizure operations in Catholic areas—is dismissed as terribly inadequate. The Unionist leaders sometimes exaggerate their impotence, however. A former OUP General Secretary stated, "We've had no success in influencing Britain on security."^[136] Ian Paisley insisted that "nothing I can do in this Parliament [Westminster] is going to bring about a security situation in Northern Ireland that will give a measure of safety to my people."^[137] His party's security manifesto laments, "We must be the only country where those who are fervently pro-security forces and who often pay the ultimate price for giving such support, have their loyalty repaid by the Government distancing itself from them."^[138]

[134] NOP poll, "Political Attitudes," p. 6.

[135] Democratic Unionist Party, A War to Be Won (Belfast: DUP, 1984), p. 26.

[136] Interview with author, 8 August 1984.

[137] Newsletter, 17 November 1981.

[138] Democratic Unionist Party, War to be Won, p. 37.

An official at the Northern Ireland Office seemed to agree:

The Unionists have very little influence on security policy. It is politically necessary for the Secretary of State to dampen down the outrage of the Protestant community after major terrorist attacks, like sending in the Spearhead Battalion. Basically, we put up with Unionist pressures on security. Security policy is settled.^[139]

In most instances, the Government has indeed simply tolerated or made cosmetic responses to Unionist clamor. Another NIO official indicated the danger of accepting the Unionist program: "The Unionist demands on security are uniquely designed to make a violent situation worse."^[140]

Yet the Protestants' poor record in shaping specific security arrangements does not mean that their efforts have been fruitless; their unrelenting pressure has had a more generalized deterrent effect.^[141] Of utmost concern to state officials is the Protestant community's capacity for armed revolt and street disturbances. This potential for resistance—occasionally realized—circumscribes the kinds of reforms the state might place on the agenda.^[142] Changes that might lead to a violent and protracted Loyalist rebellion include dismantling the UDR, demilitarizing the RUC, or repealing the emergency legislation.

Just such a backlash followed the signing of the controversial AngloIrish Agreement in November 1985. Loyalists see Dublin's advisory role as a wholly unacceptable intrusion into Northern Ireland's sovereign affairs and believe it is a poorly disguised first step toward the dreaded reunification of Ireland.^[143] During 1986 and 1987 Loyalists expressed their indignation in a campaign of mass defiance that included several huge demonstrations and strikes; the boycotting of local governmental bodies; violent dashes between protesters and the police; the formation of an Ulster Resistance Movement to oppose the agreement; sectarian assaults on Catholics; and attacks on RUC officers, their homes, and families for the alleged police role in upholding the agreement. (In this period, 550 attacks on police officers' homes occurred and 140 police

[139] NIO official, Law and Order Division, interview with author, 3 August 1984.

[140] NIO official, Political Affairs Division, interview with author, 3 August 1984.

[141] Walsh argues that repressive practices continue today primarily because of "the implacable resistance of the Unionist majority to reform in this field" (Use and Abuse, p. 122).

[142] Cf. Fisk, No Return, pp. 231–38. This illustrates "non-decision making" discussed in Peter Bachrach and Morton S. Baratz, Power and Poverty (New York: Oxford University Press, 1970).

[143] In 1988, three years after the signing of the agreement, 62 percent of Protestants were "just as opposed" to it and an additional 17 percent were "less in favor" (Coopers and Lybrand poll, Belfast Telegraph, 4 October 1988).

families were forced to relocate.)^[144] This organized resistance dissipated in late 1987, but it serves as a graphic reminder of the response the state may provoke by policy shifts unacceptable to Protestants.

In the first four years after its announcement, the Anglo-Irish Agreement only exacerbated the conflict: communal polarization and political violence increased; the gulf widened between the Protestant majority and the British regime; the Catholic minority remains alienated from the state; and the objective of political reconciliation has been stymied by Protestants' refusal to cooperate and their insistence on the termination of the agreement. Failing to achieve political progress, the Inter-Governmental Conference has by default focused on security matters—resulting in increased cooperation between London and Dublin but no material improvements in security.

British Capacities

Earlier in the chapter I outlined the British Government's long-term interests in Ulster and its goals for political development and reconstruction of the security system. These interests and goals are generally favorable to democratization and liberalization. One self-imposed commitment, however, has unintended consequences that limit Britain's ability to press forward with liberalization: the 1976 decision to Ulsterize the conflict, gradually disengaging and retrenching British troops and giving local agencies prominence (RUC, UDR, the Diplock courts). By removing the military from the front line of counterinsurgency and saddling criminal justice agencies with responsibility for internal security as well as conventional crime control, British officials in effect disallowed certain kinds of reform in these agencies. Thus, Ulsterizing the conflict significantly hampers further liberalization of the police and courts. One alternative, the resumption of military primacy in internal security, would contradict the logic of Ulsterization, which has bipartisan support in British political circles.

Diametrically opposed to Ulsterization is the option of full integration of the province into the United Kingdom. This scenario might offer the best hope for liberalization, insofar as it would bring an end to constitutional uncertainty and foster provincial convergence with the metropole. But integration is unacceptable to Catholics, does not appeal to a majority of Protestants (see Table 5), and is unpopular in the United

[144] Times, 19 September 1988.

Kingdom. Integration would entail full and permanent British involvement in the province—even allowing for some devolved power as in Scotland—which would violate the premium London places on achieving an internal settlement and disengaging from Ulster.

Important environmental constraints also hinder liberalization and democratization. Although Britain has made significant progress, its capacity to drive liberalization much further is conditioned by countervailing communal forces. One critical difference between the postsettler regime in Northern Ireland and its counterpart in Zimbabwe is that the former is an adjunct of a liberal democracy. This circumstance may seem propitious for democratic political development, but a tutelary regime must be able to marshal broad-based indigenous support—something chronically elusive in contemporary Ulster. The British Government cannot depend on the consent, let alone the active support, of the Catholic minority or the Protestant majority. The system of direct rule and many of the regime's policies alienate groups on both sides.^[145] Britain's very presence in Northern Ireland is the raison d'être of the Republican movement and a major objection for Loyalists who demand devolved government.

The British Government does not make history in Ulster just as it pleases. Protestants and Catholics alike have some capacity not only to derail a political settlement but also to thwart unacceptable innovations in the security field. Labour MP Clive Soley captures this point: "Neither Unionists nor Republicans have positive power. They only have negative power, the ability to dig in, to resist, to destroy."^[146] Catholics have in the past reacted to repressive measures in ways that raise the political and security costs of introducing new ones; but of greater salience is the Protestant capacity to frustrate liberalizing changes. Should security policy tip too far in any direction, it might upset the fragile balance of forces and cause a full-scale crisis. In addition to the routine pressures of political parties and civic institutions (churches, the press) associated with each side, the possibility of mass mobilization and increasing violence, occasionally manifest, helps set the outer limits on the regime's political and security policies. In Zimbabwe, as we have seen, the forces of civil society have shown no comparable power of resistance.

[145] Richard Rose, Northern Ireland: A Time of Choice (London: Macmillan, 1976), pp. 28, 140.

[146] Clive Soley, "Britain's Duty to Make Clear Her Intentions," Fortnight, June 1984, p. 9; Irish Times, 17 August 1984.

Neither side appears to appreciate the constraints under which the British Government rules Northern Ireland and instead assumes that the regime has the capacity to prevail against the other side or unilaterally to resolve the problem.^[147] London's leverage is largely fictional in light of Catholics' and Protestants' determination to boycott any innovation they perceive to violate their political interests, aspirations, and deeply felt communal identities. This social milieu is therefore unreceptive to radical initiatives. In fact, any security policy, whether impartial or favoring one community, is likely to antagonize either or both groups to a greater or lesser degree.

If Protestants and Catholics have degrees of negative power, the same may be said for the state. Balanced between actual or potential Protestant and Catholic pressures and lacking credibility in both communities, British power is largely reduced to limiting the damage and maintaining a semblance of order. These are manifestations of negative power. The state's military, administrative, and economic assets do not translate into decisive political leverage over entrenched domestic forces. Northern Ireland illustrates the argument that a state may be autonomous from civil society but also rather ineffective in pursuing its long-term goals. This ineffectiveness derives largely from its very autonomy, its lack of a domestic base of support for policy initiatives.

Since the mid-1970s, British officials have taken the position that security measures alone will not end Ulster's political violence. A corollary principle is that of avoiding the temptation to overreact to spectacular incidents of political violence, in light of the possible counterproductive impact (which the Government has often underestimated in its security measures). Acknowledging the need to address the underlying political causes, officials nevertheless see a political solution as remote. Bold policy initiatives thus yield by default to political drift and containment of the security problem.^[148] The paramount aim is to keep the conflict within manageable bounds in Ulster and away from mainland Britain. Successive British Cabinets have feared that Ulster's street disorders, political radicalization, and polarization might have a demonstration effect on the rest of the United Kingdom. In the words of a former army commander in Northern Ireland, the price of any relaxa-

[147] Bew and Patterson, Ulster Crisis, p. 96.

[148] Liam O'Dowd, Bill Rolston, and Mike Tomlinson, "From Labour to the Tories: The Ideology of Containment in Northern Ireland," Capital and Class 18 (Winter 1982): 68; [Glover Report] "Northern Ireland: Future Terrorist Trends," 15 December 1978 (in Roger Faligot, Britain's Military Strategy in Ireland [London: Zed, 1983], p. 226).

tion in the security effort would be nothing short of "a nasty overspill indoors," contaminating mainland Britain.^[149]

The incompatible communal outlooks discussed above explain why the Government is not prepared to devolve control over security policy and institutions to domestic parties. The transfer of security powers to the majority would almost certainly mean a return to sectarian maintenance of order and Protestant domination. Shared responsibility for security among leaders of both sides is also unlikely, given their diametrically opposed visions of law and order.

In contrast, British elites paint their position as supremely enlightened. One NIO official argued that "security policy is the one element that is criticized by all sides, which shows we are not influenced by any one side."^[150] Not only is the statement a non sequitur, it suggests a completely neutral approach; the Government has sometimes responded favorably to communal pressures. Also misleading is the claim that "security policy is determined by an entirely British perspective."^[151] The implication that policy develops in a vacuum ignores the environmental constraints discussed above.

These points bear on two of the three broad perspectives on British rule discussed at the beginning of the chapter. Our findings challenge the depiction of the metropole as a guardian of Loyalist interests. Particularly on security questions, contemporary British rule is no simple prop for or instrument of Loyalist supremacy. Were the Government a servant of the Loyalists, it would not generate such unrelenting and bitter Loyalist opposition to "lenient" security measures, nor would it instruct state agencies to treat Republican and Loyalist offenders even-handedly.

One NIO official underscored the "fundamental dispute between the Secretary of State and the Unionists over security."^[152] In its ideals of universalistic maintenance of order and restrained use of force, the Government indeed seems worlds apart from the Unionists. And yet the security program has not had a neutral impact on this divided society. First, there is bound to be some institutional inertia—in this case favoring the Protestant majority—in any effort to modernize state agencies, although it has been checked more vigorously in Ulster than in Zim-

[149] General Sir John Hackett, "Containing the Explosive Mixture," Hibernia, 9 August 1979.

[150] NIO Political Affairs official, interview with author, 16 August 1984.

[151] Ibid.; emphasis added.

[152] Ibid.

babwe. Second, since the principal challenge to the state comes from Republican forces rooted in Catholic working-class areas, security operations have concentrated in those areas, where they daily disrupt social life and offend popular sensibilities—quite disproportionately to anything experienced in Protestant working-class areas.

Despite Protestants' dissatisfaction over specific security arrangements, the effects of the security enterprise are generally compatible with a core Loyalist demand. Security is pursued within a context that takes for granted the constitutional status of Northern Ireland as part of the United Kingdom as long as the majority so desires. Impartial maintenance of order is thus not inconsistent with a security policy whose net effect is to favor Loyalist over Catholic constitutional preferences.

Conclusion

Since 1972, the trajectory of change in law and order arrangements has been uneven: the elimination of some sectarian structures, modernization of others, and retrogression in still others. British rule in contemporary Northern Ireland has made significant departures from the record of the Unionist settler state. Abolished with the settler-dominated executive and parliament were some of the most sectarian institutions (e.g., Ministry of Home Affairs); others were partially reformed (e.g., Royal Ulster Constabulary). Moreover, metropolitan intervention has produced not only organizational improvements but also systemic changes in the relations between various agencies (including oversight bodies) and the ethos cultivated in the commanding heights of the system (Northern Ireland Office). These systemic changes have brought greater internal accountability, diffused universalistic norms, and reduced the incidence of repressive events. In 1972, the police and military killed seventy-four people; in 1988, seven.^[153] In the coercive order, the net effect of British rule is the partial liberalization of the internal security system and a relaxation of repression .

The extent of liberalization should not be exaggerated, however. The advent of bodies responsible for ensuring accountability is a significant improvement on the Unionist system, but they could be further empowered. Innocent civilians continue to experience rough justice from the security and criminal justice agencies; the policing of marches and riots is

[153] The years between 1972 and 1988 saw a steep decline in deaths caused by the security forces.

often ruthless and bloody. The Diplock courts, Ulster Defense Regiment, and undercover units of the SAS and the RUC Special Branch have engaged in controversial activities of sufficient magnitude to contaminate the image of the entire security enterprise.

Security agencies have been in the vanguard in frustrating progressive changes in many transitional societies. In Northern Ireland the security branch vigorously resisted the original reforms but subsequently became more compliant. The police, courts, and military continue to advocate the retention of exceptional powers, but these agencies play a relatively modest role today in blocking liberalization. Other factors have a greater impact.

Northern Ireland exemplifies the special problems confronting an external regime committed to reconstructing a settler power structure and a sectarian security system but fettered in its capacity to do so. The response of communal forces may have important effects on the transformation of state institutions. There are obstacles to structural change in a postsettler polity where the regime hovers above society with little moral authority and where antagonistic social forces can sabotage major political and security initiatives. Protestant and Catholic forces are sufficiently powerful to block the political projects of their antagonists but unable to impose their own. By default, the situation has become one of political impasse and containment of the security problem. These constraints, coupled with continuing political violence and the policy of Ulsterization, circumscribe the process of liberalization.

Finally, the partial modernization of the security enterprise has had no appreciable impact on nation building in Northern Ireland. The citizens of Northern Ireland, no less today than in the past, have no single national identity or common political culture. The territory continues to host two nations, advancing irreconcilable solutions to the problem. It seems plausible to conclude that the impact of reformed security institutions on nation building in a divided society will be limited unless liberalization proceeds in conjunction with political progress. Since politics and security are so intertwined in Northern Ireland, communal attitudes toward, and experience of, security arrangements are confounded with political fears and aspirations. The history of direct rule is testimony to the difficulties inherent in working to alleviate the political fears and to satisfy the aspirations of Protestants and Catholics alike.

As alternative routes away from settler rule, the cases of Zimbabwe and Northern Ireland illustrate larger themes. Zimbabwe demonstrates that formal democratization of a polity may proceed without an over-

haul of the inherited security system. Northern Ireland shows the opposite: formal democratization is not a necessary condition for significant liberalization of security structures. These outcomes suggest other conclusions: genuine substantive democratization in Zimbabwe will remain tenuous until the institutions of control are rebuilt; more extensive liberalization of security arrangements in Ulster seems contingent on political progress and communal reconciliation. Northern Ireland illustrates both the prospects and limits of institution building in a deeply divided society governed by a regime imposed from without.