Another election behind us. The greatest bore
show in Western European politics keeps running,
the audience always willing to come back for more.
Not for us the luxury available to the British
public, aptly described by Peter Preston in the
Guardian: 'Yes, we mainlanders can relax, switch
off and concentrate on global warming, not Belfast
hot air.'
Those
of us who felt Sinn Fein would be hard pressed
to make gains this time round were wide off the
mark. Although according to Sinn Fein members
the party too was as wrong with its predictions.
The result not for the first time surpassed its
own expectations. The 2001 Westminster election
where Sinn Fein took over from the SDLP as the
leader of northern nationalism was one that had
jumped the queue. Prior to it the Sinn Fein president
felt it would be the election 'after next.' This
time the SDLP despite claiming to have installed
the proper brakes to arrest its own decline failed
to apply them. While not faring as poorly as its
lacklustre UUP counterpart across the sectarian
fence, it could ill afford to lose the two seats
that it did. Sinn Fein proved much more resilient
and in the North at least is now over the setback
it suffered as a result of the accumulative effects
of the murder of Robert McCartney and the Northern
Bank robbery.
As
expected the bottom has dropped out of the UUP's
future. It will be a major achievement for the
party if it can hold onto Sylvia Hermon's Westminster
seat at the next British general election. Overall,
the DUP emerged as the big winners with Sinn Fein
coming in a close second. Had it not been for
the double whammy of the Northern Bank/McCartney
Sinn Fein would be much closer to the DUP. The
party has now begun to make the advance onto the
electoral terrain it failed to take in the wake
of those two events. Fortunately for it, but not
for the SDLP, there is more ground to capture.
Whatever
the opinions we hold on Sinn Fein it would be
stingy not to admire the efficiency of the party's
vote management. Almost laser guided in its precision,
it is the sort of activity authoritarian parties
more than their democratic counterparts can be
expected to excel in. It is no surprise therefore
to find that those quickest out of the traps to
follow Sinn Fein's example are the DUP's vote
managers. Tight dictatorial control, euphemistically
called 'discipline' by some media commentators,
is an essential management function in authoritarian
parties.
Even
at that, the vagaries of the electorate can upset
the best of plans. Sinn Fein failed to get it
right in Fermanagh South Tyrone where the leadership's
preferred candidate, Sean Lynch, was outdone by
the sweeper Gerry McHugh. The chances of Sinn
Fein now being able to eventually replace Michelle
Gildernew with the affable Lynch, a former O/C
of the H-Blocks, are slim.
For
all the talk that this was the first 'post-troubles'
election where for once the issues were 'real',
whatever that is, it was the same as all other
elections; what colour complexion future governance
shall acquire.
It
might be more accurate to describe the election
as more post-republican than post--troubles. The
republican project is effectively over with the
one time republican opposition having been incorporated
into the structures of the British state in Ireland.
It supports the partition principle, euphemistically
termed consent, accepts the legitimacy of the
police force whose historical function has been
to suppress republicanism, and like the other
parties it long opposed is now eager to work within
the parameters of an internal settlement.
Abandoning
republicanism has proved a successful strategy
for Sinn Fein. It can now advance its own bureaucratic
interests through structures never devised to
facilitate republicanism. In return for Sinn Fein
having gaily somersaulted the DUP is reluctantly
moving along the path towards accepting that the
nationalist party, because it is now loyal to
the police force of the British state, should
be allowed to administer British rule which the
police force will ensure is upheld.
Sinn
Fein has merely done what many one time radical
parties did to stay in business. The politics
that brought the social movement into being often
have to be abandoned for the same movement to
stay in existence and prosper. Chief revisionist
of the German Social Democratic Party, Eduard
Bernstein, recognised it two centuries back when
he argued that "the final goal is nothing
... the movement is everything."
It
is the staple diet of reformism everywhere. Jeremy
Paxman knew what he was about when he reportedly
advised a former IRA prisoner to stop pretending
he was still involved in a revolution.
The
election ended up being a sectarian headcount.
Sinn Fein and the DUP benefit from the forward
momentum of each other. Sinn Fein, once it shafted
Trimble prior to the November 2003 assembly election,
effectively ensured the hegemony of the DUP within
unionism. The spin off for Sinn Fein was that
with Paisley installed as Big Chief Orange Face,
Big Chief Green Face was needed to curb him. Gerry
Adams, a long time ethnic warlord and the undisputed
leader of sectarian nationalism was always better
positioned than Mark Durkan to serve as a foil
to the ethnic warlord now leading unionism.
Where
it all goes from here is a moot point. The 'extremes'
have been pulled onto the centre ground as society
wonders whether it is broad enough to contain
them. Or are they likely to outbid each other
to the point where the whole edifice collapses
under the weight of contradictions it was never
designed to support? If the institutions are to
survive until the crucial point of seeing policing
and justice powers devolved the battle a day scenario
predicted by Gerry Adams may have to be abandoned
in favour of the Martin McGuinness prognosis of
mutual back scratching. Wake us up when it's over.
