As a Mitchell Institute Fellow (Legacy), I recently travelled to San Francisco to participate in an event reflecting on 25 years of the Belfast/Good Friday Agreement. It was held at the city’s grand Hibernia building, and organised by the Irish and British Consulates in San Francisco, with the Mitchell Institute and the California Legislative Irish Caucus amongst the sponsors.

I acted as chair on a panel which included senior figures involved in the Northern Ireland peace process or the supporting US role. One was the former SDLP leader, Mark Durkan, a leading negotiator of the 1998 accord, and later Deputy First Minister in the power-sharing Executive that it created. He spoke of the role that political figures like John Hume and David Trimble played in the peace settlement, but also civil society, including the voters in both parts of Ireland who provided its electoral mandate. Another speaker was Sarah Friar, native to Northern Ireland, but now CEO of the San Francisco-based company, Nextdoor. She provided a particular appreciation of the role that US investment played in supporting the peace process, and the current challenges of Brexit, but also the economic opportunities that the Windsor Framework provides for both Northern Ireland and US investors. Also well-placed to speak on this subject was the final panellist, Jim Lyons, who served as Special Advisor to President Clinton for economic initiatives in Ireland. He reflected on his role in promoting economic development across the island of Ireland, and how this also incentivised compromise from the various actors involved in the peace process.

Also speaking at the event were a range of US politicians from the California Legislative Irish Caucus, and the UK government’s Consul-General for San Francisco, Joe White, and his Irish counterpart, Micheál Smith. Amongst the attendees at the event were many from the Irish-American community in San Francisco and California more broadly. They heard from the various speakers of the vital role that US actors played and indeed still play in supporting the British and Irish governments and the local Northern Ireland parties in the making of the Belfast/Good Friday Agreement, and in seeking to ensure the revival of the power-sharing Executive that it produced.

The centrepiece of the San Francisco event, however, was a fireside chat between the Irish Ambassador to the US, Geraldine Byrne Nason, and the former US House Speaker, Nancy Pelosi. The first woman to hold the role of US House Speaker, Pelosi has long been a strong supporter of the Northern Ireland peace process. She visited in 2019 to stress the importance of protecting the Belfast/Good Friday Agreement in the context of the ongoing Brexit negotiations.

All in all, the event was a worthy celebration of the settlement that brought an end to the Northern Ireland Troubles, and a recognition of the important role of the US in supporting this. However, as the current political stalemate at Stormont reminds us, peace-building is an ongoing process here. Brexit has created new challenges for the Belfast/Good Friday Agreement, and it will take new generations of political leaders, and the efforts of civil society, to continue making the settlement work. Both need to show the same spirit of compromise evident in the negotiation of the Belfast/Good Friday Agreement 25 years ago. Only that spirit will ensure that the benefits of peace continue to be enjoyed by all sections of the community here.

 

Dr McLoughlin works in the broad field of contemporary political history in Ireland and Northern Ireland, with a particular focus on the Northern Ireland problem and peace process.

He is currently completing a book on the role of Irish-America and the US government in Northern Ireland.