John Barry is Associate Director of the Institute for a Sustainable World and Reader in Politics both at Queen’s University Belfast.  He was educated at University College Dublin and the University of Glasgow.  From 2003-2009 he was co-chair of the Green Party in Northern Ireland and was a key figure in the creation of an [...]

So the DUP and Sinn Féin have managed to negotiate their way through the disaster scenarios to a deal. No walkouts, elections or joint authority after all. The agreement is now out for consultation, so there will be plenty of opportunity to pick over the details over the next few weeks. The outline is:

The devolution [...]

The number of unresolved issues in the Northern Ireland Assembly is increasing - such as the transfer test replacement, the new good relations strategy, the Review of Public Administration and, of course, the devolution of policing and justice powers. All have foundered on the attempts of parties in the mandatory coalition to make gains for [...]

Gerry Adams outlined Sinn Féin’s new campaign for a united Ireland in the Guardian yesterday. The London launch of the campaign took place on Tuesday evening, following a similar event in New York. If I understand the strategy correctly, SF intends to build a broad campaign in Britain and the USA in order to change [...]

So the Romanians intimidated out of their homes in South Belfast have decided to leave Northern Ireland. No surprises there.
Of course the majority of people in Northern Ireland are ashamed and disgusted by this episode, which has put us back in the news for the wrong reasons. Politicians tell us that the incidents brought people [...]

Robin Wilson is an independent policy analyst based in Belfast. He is co-leader of the Northern Ireland devolution monitoring team-part of a UK-wide project co-ordinated by the Constitution Unit in London-which provided the Northern Ireland input to the democratic assessment of the two jurisdictions in Ireland conducted by the think tank TASC. He was part [...]

Recently on South Belfast Diary I leaked the draft Section 8 of Labour’s 21st Century Commission, dealing with Party organisation in Northern Ireland. Since 2002, the Irish Labour Party has allowed membership in the North. We have actively participated in conferences and have had an NEC co-opted member, Mark Langhammer. More to the [...]