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Introduction

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Political Leadership and the Northern Ireland Peace Process

Part of the book series: St Antony’s Series ((STANTS))

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Abstract

On 10 April 1998 Northern Ireland joined a long list of countries which had produced peace agreements in the 1990s. The architects of the Agreement included eight local political parties and the British and Irish governments. Significant architectural influence of the US administration under President Clinton, and to a slightly lesser extent, of the experiences of other peace processes which had reached agreement before Northern Ireland, was noted. The Agreement was the culmination of a prolonged peace process, which had followed an equally prolonged and protracted conflict.1 The origins of this peace process dated back to at least the mid-1980s with the secret dialogue between John Hume, leader of the Social Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP), and Gerry Adams, leader of Sinn Féin. The tentative discussions between Hume and Adams converged with the more formal ‘talks process’ in the early 1990s.2 This ‘talks process’ gathered further momentum after both the republican and loyalist ceasefires in 1994 and the elections to the multiparty talks process in 1996 and eventually resulted in the signing of the Good Friday Agreement in April 1998.3

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Notes

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Authors
  1. Cathy Gormley-Heenan
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© 2007 Cathy Gormley-Heenan

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Gormley-Heenan, C. (2007). Introduction. In: Political Leadership and the Northern Ireland Peace Process. St Antony’s Series. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230596085_1

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