For a century, Northern Ireland has been torn by a conflict between a unionist Protestant majority and a nationalist Catholic minority. However, the results of the 2021 census in Northern Ireland have just been published and, for the first time since the creation of this “country” within the United Kingdom in 1921, we observe that Catholics constitute a majority compared to Protestants. Thus, 45.7% of people who answered these questions presented themselves as Catholics or having grown up in Catholicism, against 43.5% of people claiming to belong to one of the very many Protestant denominations (there are a good twenty ) or claiming to have grown up in Protestantism.
This is the first time that, for this composite variable, we obtain a Catholic majority: in 2001, there were thus 53.1% Protestants against 43.8% Catholics; in 2011, 48.4% Protestants against 45.1% Catholics. This (relative) majority of Catholics in Northern Ireland, as well as the victory of the Sinn Féin party which came out on top in the May 2022 elections, allow us to believe that a referendum on the reunification of the island (called: border poll) and a victory for his supporters are within reach?
In our opinion, it is worth examining these data a little more closely. If we break down this composite variable to distinguish people who have openly claimed a religion (we could say: the hard core), we obtain this time a striking difference: 42.3% of Catholics against a little less 37.3% of Protestants, all denominations combined. How to explain the increase in the gap? In the 2021 census, no less than 19% did not answer the question or declared no religion.
With these people, a follow-up took place to find out in which religion they had been brought up: this increased the group of Catholics by 3.4% and that of Protestants by no less than 6.2%. This is how we arrive at 45.7% Catholics and 42.3% Protestants. Once these people have been assimilated to one of the two major denominations, there remain 1.34% of people declaring another religion (which roughly corresponds to people who have declared themselves to be Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist or other denominations not Christians) and 9.3% of people with no religion.
Data that calls for caution
If we go back to the 1991 census, we observe that, every 10 years, the proportion (this is also true of the number) of people declaring themselves Catholic increases regularly (from 38.4% to 42.3%), that of Protestants decreased dramatically (from 42.8% to 37%), while that of people declaring themselves to have no religion increased from 11.0% to 19.0%. We see that in addition to very real demographic factors such as fertility or emigration, the variations in the answers on religion are largely explained by the growth of the group of people without religion and the fact that a majority of these were brought up in Protestantism.
It should be noted that apart from the particular case of Belfast, the four counties where the proportion of “no religion” exceeds 10% all have solid Protestant majorities. Conversely, the three counties where this proportion falls below 5% all have solid Catholic majorities. The question may therefore arise as to how many, among the 9.3% of people with no religion, who did not want to answer the question on the religion in which they had grown up, actually come from a Protestant background.
This casts doubt on the possibility of drawing hasty political conclusions from these numbers. Other data from the latest census also call for caution. Thus, to the question on national identity, 29.1% of respondents said they were “Irish only” against 31.9% “British only”; but most of the rest reported a ‘Northern Irish only’ (19.8%) or ‘British and Northern Irish’ (7.9%) identity, which does not precisely suggest strong Irish nationalism.
The census also includes a question on the passport held, which could be seen as a measure of nationalism or unionism (it has long been possible for people in Northern Ireland to travel with a Republic of Ireland passport). Ireland): thus, 32.3% held an Irish passport (alone or with another, including British) while 47% held a British passport, but no Irish passport.
No hasty conclusions
Turning now to the most recent election results, we see that in the elections for the members of the Northern Ireland Assembly held in May 2022, we see that Sinn Féin ( SF) came first with 29% of the vote and 27 seats. But its success is due to a drop in support for the Social Democratic Labor Party (SDLP), a moderate nationalist party. If we combine the votes of the parties in favor of reunification (SF + SDLP + People Before Profit [PBP]), we obtain a total of 39.2%, against 40.1% for the three unionist parties (Democratic Unionist Party [DUP]Ulster Unionist Party [UUP] and Traditional Unionist Voice [TUV]).
What we have witnessed, compared to 2017, is a drop of 2.4% in the votes for the supporters of reunification and 3.5% of the votes for the unionist parties, accompanied by a strengthening of the weight of the extreme parties (SF and TUV) on one side and on the other. It is the Alliance, a party which does not want to define itself according to the religious/national divide, which benefits from this: it obtained 13.5%, up 4.5%.
We should therefore not draw too bold conclusions from statistical data that is more complex than it seems or from tremors in the electoral results. It is true that the results of the Brexit referendum (with 55.8% for “ Remain » and 44.2% for « leave ) have certainly given rise to arguments in favor of reunification that cannot be reduced to traditional nationalism and republicanism.
But it is doubtful that a government of the Republic of Ireland would want to hold such an exercise without first being convinced that a very large majority of the inhabitants of Northern Ireland are now in favor of reunification: after all, what government would like to “import” to the south the problem that has torn Northern Ireland apart for a century, that of a large minority dissatisfied with its fate and the risk of violence that accompanies such a situation?