‘We’re Not Quite as Interesting as We Used to Be’: Interpreting the International Dimension

Abstract

There is no real consensus as to the precise importance or influence of the international dimension to the Northern Ireland conflict and, while globalisation has the potential, if not the actuality, to change the political, economic, social and cultural context in which politics is practiced (Meehan, 2000; Ruane and Todd, 2002), most analysts have tended to remain focused on the relationship between high politics and the international dimension. One of the major criticisms of those who have stressed the international dimension as a key aspect in changing politics in Northern Ireland is that the types of changes they have attempted to explain can be more easily explained by internal factors. This debate has sometimes led a mischaracterisation of the arguments of people such as Cox and Guelke, who have been more sensitive to the limits of their causal statements than is frequently acknowledged (Guelke, 2005). A mediating position was suggested by Darby and MacGinty, who argued that external actors ‘contributed to the gradual spread of new ideas and approaches… although intangible and impossible to track from source to outcome, much of the peace process was informed by outside forces’ (2002, 122). However, this position is particularly unsatisfactory: if we cannot trace the influence of external actors, how can we possibly assert with any confidence that they had an effect?

This article was written with funding from the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), grant number: RES-223-25-0045. I would also like to thank Adrian Guelke and Colin Irwin for their help on this project.