United ireland

In 1801, the entire island became part of the Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and was ruled as a whole. Since the 1870s, support for some form of elected parliament in Dublin has grown. In 1870, Isaac Butt, an Irish Protestant, created the Self-Government Association, which later became the League of Self-Government, to gain more autonomy for Ireland. Charles Stuart Parnell, also a Protestant, became the League leader in 1880 , and in 1882 the organization was renamed the Irish National League. Despite the faith of their first leaders, it was supported by Irish Catholics. In 1886, Parnell formed a parliamentary alliance with the Prime Minister of the Liberal Party, William Ewart Gladstone, thereby securing the adoption of the island’s first draft law. The Conservative Party opposed this, which led to a split within the Liberal Party. Opposition in Ireland was concentrated in heavily Protestant counties in Ulster . In 1893, the second self-government bill was passed in the House of Commons, but was defeated in the House of Lords, which was dominated by conservatives. The third self-government bill was introduced in 1912 .

In 1916, a group of revolutionaries led by the “Republican Fraternity of Ireland” raised an armed uprising in Dublin, known as the Easter Rising , during which the Proclamation of the Republic of Ireland was adopted. The uprising was not successful, and sixteen of its leaders were executed.

In 1919, a new uprising arose on the island, which later turned into a full-fledged war for the separation of Ireland from Great Britain. In 1921 , according to the peace treaty that ended the war of independence, the island of Ireland was divided into two territories: Northern (as part of Great Britain) and Southern Ireland (later the Irish Free State , now the Republic of Ireland ).

The separation occurred when the British Parliament adopted the Government of Ireland Act of 1920 on May 9 and created Northern and Southern Ireland in the status of British dominions ^[3] . In 1922, Northern Ireland emphasized the opportunity to join the United Kingdom (a body that de facto played the role of the Northern Ireland Parliament sent a petition to King George V ) ^[4] .

Since the division of the island by Irish nationalists, work has been carried out to reunite the territory so that the island as a whole forms a separate state. As a result, the northern territory of the island was embraced by many years of armed conflict . Formally, in 1998, the Irish government and the UK government agreed that the status of Northern Ireland would not be changed without the consent of its residents.

Northern Ireland polls show that the majority oppose United Ireland and in support of Northern Ireland as part of the UK. For example, in a November 2015 poll between RTÉ and the BBC, 30% of the population favored the unification of Ireland throughout their lives, 43% opposed it, and 27% were undecided. However, when asked about the status of Northern Ireland in the short and medium term, only 13% of the population supported the association ^[5] . The annual Northern Ireland Life and Times survey, conducted in 2013 by Queen's University of Belfast and the University of Ulster, showed that 15% of the population supported the idea of ​​a United Ireland, while 66% supported the idea of ​​joining Britain ^[6] . When the same study was conducted in 2015 , support for irredentism was 22% ^[7] .

A 2010 Red C / Sunday Times survey in Southern Ireland found that 57% were in favor of a united Ireland and 22% were against. 21% were undecided ^{[8] [9]} .

In the Assembly of Northern Ireland, such parties as DUP (28 seats), UUP (10 seats), TUV (1 seat) and independent candidate Claire Sugden are designated as unionists who are for joining the region into Britain; Sinn Fein (who won 27 seats in the 2017 Assembly elections ) and SDLP (12 seats) are considered nationalists; the rest are the Alliance Party (8 seats), the Green Party (2 seats) and PBP (1 seat).

There are a number of small nationalist parties, including the Irish Republican Socialist Party, which intends to create a single socialist Irish state. The party is closely linked to the Irish National Liberation Army .

The Oireachtas is traditionally for the unification of Ireland, but there has been debate within the party about how this will be achieved. The original party charter of the Oireachtas of 1926 contained the principle of “Ensuring the unity and independence of Ireland as a republic” ^[10] . In 1937, the party proposed amending the Constitution of Ireland, according to which the republic had sovereignty over the entire island.

Established in 1933, “Fine Gel” was originally called “United Ireland” (United Ireland). After the start of discussions about Brexit , the party began to look for ways to reunite Northern Ireland with Southern [9] ^[11] if Britain exited the EU .

In a survey conducted by TheJournal.ie on support for the Irish association in December 2016 , only representatives of the Austerity Alliance (now Solidarity) stated that it was currently opposed to a united Ireland ^[12] .

Historically, the idea of ​​a united Ireland is supported in the left wing of the British Labor Party ^{[13] [14]} . The current Labor leader, Jeremy Corbin, supports a united Ireland, although he said that the Irish “should decide” whether to remain part of the UK or not ^[15] .