The Art and Effect of Political Lying in Northern Ireland

This article explores one of the paradoxes of the Belfast Agreement. On the one hand, the provisions of the Agreement are presented as a model of democratic ingenuity and political inclusion. On the other hand, the creation and maintenance of the Agreement have been judged to involve lying and deception. The article is divided into two parts. The first part examines the relationship between modern democratic theory and the art of political lying. The second part assesses how suspicion of deceit informs the mood of certain constituencies of opinion within Irish republicanism and Ulster unionism. The article concludes with the suggestion that the longer-term effect of political lying, which was a necessary to achieve the Agreement, is to undermine the essential attribute of agreement, namely trust.