Drawing the Line: The Irish Border in British Politics

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Although it is approaching a century in existence, the Irish border is currently one of the most topical issues in British politics. For most of its existence, the border rarely impinged on the consciousness of most British people, until the outbreak of the Troubles in Northern Ireland. Now, twenty years on from the landmark Good Friday Agreement that helped to bring an end to British-Irish conflict, the question of the Irish border could scupper any final agreement on Britain's exit from the European Union - threatening to derail Britain's relationship not only with Ireland but with the entirety of Europe. This book charts the genesis of the Irish border in the early 20th century, and examines how the border's existence soured relations between Ireland and Britain in the subsequent decades, leading to the emergence of extremist republican military campaigns to eradicate the border both in the 1950s and in the recent Troubles. The understanding at the heart of the Good Friday Agreement - that there will be no