Govern or Lose: The Choice Northern Nationalism Has Spent Twenty-Five Years Avoiding

‘What happens fast is illusion, what happens slowly is reality. The job of the long view is to penetrate illusion.’

– Stewart Brand

It’s been a week for commentary on nationalism north and south. Brian highlighted Dr Feeney’s counsel of despair which focuses on unionism rather than nationalism’s stalled journey. His “solution” is to try another Samson act and pull it all down (again). Brian’s ear, close to SF, may be picking up inside noises most of the rest of us don’t hear.

David McCann’s more optimistic take suggests dumping the illusion that a border poll can be won when neither polling nor results suggest it’s likely to happen, and instead work taking on a longer view of what it might do and what benefits people might reasonably expect from it (regardless of their identities, traditional or otherwise).

Elsewhere however people are starting to question where all of this talk is going (if anywhere). Diarmaid Ferrirter reflecting on the out-workings of Sinn Féin’s Belfast ardfheis last weekend quotes an unnamed “senior TD” saying “Are we Sinn Féin or are we Independent Ireland? … no one knows what we stand for.”

Which begs the question of what does nationalism want, versus what it is willing to do to get there?  I’d suggest four possible strategic positions, each of which come with both costs and gains. Which is nationalism capable of choosing — because the current answers have quietly stopped working over the last twenty five years?

In reality, a referendum on unity cannot be won by nationalists alone. For a generation it has hovered about 40%. Even a bare majority in favour currently sits with others, soft unionists and the economically anxious, ie those without a strong constitutional preference but a powerful one for competent government and a stable future.

Reaching them requires two things at once: a unity offer reframed around economic security, public services, and shared civic identity, and a prior record of governance that makes the offer credible. Neither condition currently exists. Both could be achievable. Yet it is the most serious path toward nationalism most precious goal.

So why has that path not been taken? The current answer is that, since 1998, nationalism has held the constitutional line, used Stormont as a platform rather than an engine, and trusted demographic change to do the heavier lifting. It preserves ideological coherence and keeps the base engaged, but keeps nationalism pinned to the past.

The cost is visible in communities west of the Bann that remain some of the most deprived in these islands, in the underutilised Shared Island funding from Dublin, and in Casement Park — a project with funding secured and community support established — still unfinished. Nationalist areas increasingly dominate the 100 poorest SOAs.

These are not outcomes imposed entirely from outside.  They reflect choices made, or not made, from within.

The second possibility is the one that requires the most from nationalism, but also offers the most in return. It demands no abandonment of the unity project. In fact, pursued seriously, it would accelerate it. The argument is straightforward: demonstrate, through sustained and effective government, that a nationalist led  administration improves lives.

Invest in the infrastructure west of the Bann that previous administrations neglected. Spend Dublin’s money. Make the connection between nationalist political power and community improvement visible enough so even sceptical voters recognise it.  In this regard the SNP provides at least a partial reference point, though its powers differ significantly in some regards.

What it does illustrate is that visible infrastructure investment builds political credibility in ways that constitutional argument alone cannot. The genuine cost of this path is not often articulated: it means ministers accepting that good governance is slower, less dramatic, and less publicly legible than opposition. That is a harder sell internally than it looks from the outside.

The third option is perhaps the most dangerous, and the one a movement under pressure might drift into without quite intending to. It involves moderating the constitutional message — reaching toward the centre, softening the cultural content of the unity offer — while the work of governing remains unfinished. Something I noted during the flags crisis of 2012.

The result would be a nationalism that its own base no longer trusts and that the persuadable middle still has no reason to believe. There is something particularly costly about that outcome: it means losing ground on two fronts simultaneously, disappointing people who gave their loyalty early while failing to earn the trust of those who might have given it later.

The fourth position, circling back to where this began, is the only one that leads anywhere worth going. It is demanding precisely because it requires both things at once — the reframed offer and the demonstrated record. The people it would need to persuade are not unreachable. They are, in many cases, already asking the same questions.

What has nationalist political power actually delivered? What would a united Ireland mean for my job, my health service, my children’s prospects? Those are not hostile questions. They are the questions of people who might be moved, given sufficient reason. But it requires dropping the preoccupation unrealistic fads like calling for a border poll, when conditions remain unmet.

The choice before northern nationalism is not between unity and compromise. It is between “performance” and delivery — between a politics that speaks about its project and one that builds toward it. Unlike the south, which has remade itself from the spare years post partition into a modern European state, there is no such tradition in northern nationalism. At least, not yet.

The communities west of the Bann, the young people who cannot find affordable housing in Derry or Newry, the families who have waited years for basic healthcare — they are not waiting for a border poll. They are waiting for a government that notices them. Nationalism has the institutions, the mandate, and access to the funding to be that government.

Why has it not chosen to be? That question is worth sitting with. Because until something changes, the vote share will remain where it has been for a quarter of a century.

“The greater preoccupation we have with something the greater belief that the thing that we are preoccupied with is true.”

– Norman Bowman, The Weight of Listening

Mick Fealty

Mick is founding editor of Slugger. He has written papers on the impacts of the Internet on politics and the wider media and is a regular guest and speaking events across Ireland, the UK and Europe. Twitter: @MickFealty