Unionism needs to embrace its all-island identity as 'persuaders'
Unionism has been plagued with feuds and fragmentation topped with voter apathy since the 1998 Good Friday Agreement. If it does not find an ideological cure for these ailments, it will suffer a political cardiac arrest come next May’s council and Stormont elections.
The bitter ideological medicine which Unionism must swallow is that it requires a new aspiration; one which will take it beyond the politics of simply ‘No Surrender, Not an Inch, What we have we hold.’
Just as republicanism and nationalism have the aspiration of Irish unity and the Shared Island project is aimed at persuading Unionism to consider a role in a united Ireland, so too, must Unionism develop the aspiration of a Shared Union in which it acts as a persuader to convince the 26 counties of Southern Ireland that their future lies in a new Union of the British Isles.
Ideologically, Unionism urgently needs revolutionary thinking. In this era of the digital revolution, it needs to begin thinking globally rather than parochially. It must grasp the nettle that Unionism has a significant role outside the six counties of Northern Ireland.
That ideology I have entitled Revolutionary Unionism. But no doubt skeptics within Unionism and nationalism will brand the aspirations of this new ideology as ‘compromise’, ‘surrender’, ‘nothing more than a 32-county Ulster’ and ultimately - ‘Irish unity via the back door!’
But why should Unionism confine itself to the six counties of Northern Ireland when it could have a meaningful say in the running of all 32 - provided Southern Ireland recognises the global threat posed by the Russians?
Many republicans will be praying for a so-called border poll by 2030. The reality is that we may be at war with Russia by 2030 and in that context, the island of Ireland will play a significant geographical lynchpin.
This would not be the first time that Irish Unionism have exerted such an influence on the island of Ireland. The success of the Glorious Revolution and the Williamite settlement of the late 17th century - hence the name Revolutionary Unionism - saw the birth of the Ascendancy and parliamentary democracy throughout Ireland and the wider British Isles.
Revolutionary Unionism is based on the need for the countries comprising the British Isles to unite and give themselves a voice against any concepts of Russian territorial expansionism, or Chinese digital power, or European Union financial domination.
It is not the first time such a concept has been mooted. In 1980, Sir John Biggs-Davison, the former Conservative front-bench spokesman on Northern Ireland, suggested a loose linkage of the United Kingdom, the Republic, the Isle of Man and the Channel Islands to form the Islands of the North Atlantic (IONA).
Even then, the shadow of Russia was hanging over the British Isles. During the Cold War, the island of Ireland was dubbed ‘Britain’s Cuba’.
Currently, there is no united Ireland. It is just a theoretical aspiration, just as the Shared Island project is a mere theoretical talking shop.
On the other hand, the main practical pillars of Revolutionary Unionism’s Union of the British Isles are already in place. It has moved beyond theory into practical reality.
The Loyal Orders are organised on an all-island basis. The Orange Order’s ruling body is known as the Grand Lodge of Ireland. Three of the main Protestant denominations - Presbyterianism, Methodism and the Church of Ireland - are also organised on an all-island format. Even the vibrant Elim Pentecostal Christian faith was formed in Monaghan in 1915.
Politically, four of the five nations which comprise the British Isles are already in this new Union. Northern Ireland, Scotland, Wales and England form the United Kingdom. All it requires is Southern Ireland to join the pack.
Revolutionary Unionism must become a ‘persuader’ for Southern Ireland to abandon its military neutrality and join the NATO alliance. The current Irish Defence Forces have played an outstanding role in their capacity as United Nations peace-keepers in Africa and Lebanon.
But with Russian expansionism threatening Europe once again, Southern Ireland can no longer afford the luxury of sitting back and calmly uttering - not our problem!
Likewise, the bitter economic reality for Unionism is that the Irish Sea Border still exists. The so-called Donaldson Deal is a political laughing stock for Unionism.
That sea border would evaporate financially if Southern Ireland could be persuaded to follow the UK out of the EU. Revolutionary Unionism must make Irexit as real as Brexit.
But Southern Ireland, like the UK, needs to be part of a global power bloc other than the EU. Practically, Southern Ireland - as part of a Union of the British Isles - could rejoin the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association (CPA).
The CPA represents some 50 plus national and regional parliaments across the world, not all who were members of the former British Empire. It should also be noted that Ireland was a founder member of the CPA’s fore runner, the Empire Parliamentary Association, when it was formed in 1911 when the entire island of Ireland was part of the Empire.
Revolutionary Unionism gives the Protestant, Unionist, Loyalist (PUL) community the pro-active chance to sell a positive aspiration rather than just simply the defensive political lapdog hope of keeping six Northern Irish counties in the UK by supposedly sucking up to the so-called ‘middle ground’.
Revolutionary Unionism is not about giving concessions to Dublin or the republican movement. The concepts of Revolutionary Unionism are as important to securing the long-term political and economic well-being and stability of Southern Ireland as they are of securing the future identity of Northern Unionism.
Bearing this in mind, let Revolutionary Unionism be the ideological hope which gives the PUL community the aspiration of as Shared Union worth campaigning for.
Dr John Coulter has been a journalist since 1978. His late father, Rev Dr Robert Coulter MBE, was a UUP MLA for North Antrim for 13 years and a senior chaplain in the Loyal Orders.