A United Ulster
The Amputation
In 1920, as the British Parliament prepared to partition Ireland, unionist leaders faced a dilemma. The historic province of Ulster consisted of nine counties. But three of those counties — Donegal, Cavan, and Monaghan — had large Catholic nationalist majorities: Donegal 78.9%, Cavan 81.5%, and Monaghan 74.7%. Including them in Northern Ireland would have threatened the long-term viability of a state defined by its Protestant unionist majority.
The calculus was blunt. Charles Craig, Unionist MP for County Antrim, told the House of Commons that a nine-county parliament would have a slim and precarious unionist majority, while a six-county parliament would have a comfortable one. The arithmetic of sectarian headcount determined where the border fell.
Thomas Moles, an MP for Belfast, captured the mood with a metaphor: "In a sinking ship, with the lifeboats sufficient for only two-thirds of the ship's company, were all to condemn themselves to death because all could not be saved?"
Three counties were cut loose. Donegal, Cavan, and Monaghan were joined to the 23 counties of the south. Ulster, the ancient province, was divided. One hundred and four years later, it remains so.
What the Division Costs
The consequences of partition have been borne most heavily by the communities closest to the border — and by Donegal in particular.
Donegal is geographically extraordinary. It is the most northerly county on the island of Ireland — further north than any county in Northern Ireland. Yet it is part of the Republic. It is connected to the rest of the Republic by a land border only seven kilometres wide at its narrowest point, between Donegal and Leitrim, while sharing a border of over 100 kilometres with counties Tyrone, Fermanagh, and Londonderry.
Donegal's natural economic hinterland is Derry, not Dublin. Its natural transport connections run east, into Northern Ireland, not south. Before partition, Letterkenny and Derry were economically integrated. The border severed those connections. Donegal became a peripheral county in a state whose capital was 250 kilometres away, connected by inadequate roads and no rail link — the railway was closed in 1960.
The economic consequences have been measurable for a century. Donegal consistently records among the highest unemployment rates in the Republic — 464 per 10,000 on the Live Register in December 2024, nearly three times the rate in Meath. The county has among the highest rates of male suicide in Ireland, a crisis that local organisations and community groups have worked to address against a background of limited resources and geographic isolation.
The pattern is replicated, in different forms, in the border communities of Cavan and Monaghan, and on the Northern Irish side in Fermanagh and Tyrone. The border created communities that were cut off from their natural economic and social connections, stranded between two states that each regarded them as peripheral.
The Idea: Start with Ulster
The conventional debate about Irish unification is framed as a binary: Northern Ireland joins the Republic, or it does not. This framing guarantees opposition from the unionist community, for whom the constitutional link with Britain is a matter of identity, not merely politics.
But there is a different way to approach the question. What if the starting point were not the absorption of Northern Ireland into the Republic, but the reunification of Ulster — the restoration of the nine-county province within a framework that recognises and protects the identities of both communities?
The province of Ulster has a population of just over two million people. Across the nine counties, there is a slim Catholic majority of approximately 50.8% over 42.7% Protestant — but neither community dominates. This is not a territory where one tradition can impose its will. It is a territory where cooperation is the only viable model.
What a Devolved Ulster Might Look Like
Ireland already has a tradition of devolved governance. Northern Ireland has the Stormont Assembly. The Republic's local government system, though weaker than its European counterparts, provides a framework for regional administration. The European Union, of which the Republic is a member, actively supports regional development through structural funds.
A devolved Ulster parliament or assembly — covering all nine counties within a united Ireland — could function as a regional government with authority over areas where local knowledge matters most: economic development, transport, healthcare delivery, education administration, policing, and planning. This is not a novel structure. Federal and devolved systems operate successfully in Germany, Switzerland, Spain, Canada, Australia, and the United Kingdom itself. Scotland's devolved parliament and Wales's Senedd demonstrate that devolution within a larger state can accommodate distinct identities without requiring separation.
For unionists, the appeal would be real power within a recognisable jurisdiction. Ulster — the name, the geography, the identity — would not be dissolved into a 32-county unitary state administered from Dublin. It would be a self-governing province within a new Ireland, with authority over the matters that most directly affect daily life. The Orange Order would march on the Twelfth. The GAA would play on a Sunday. Both traditions would be represented in an assembly where neither could be outvoted into irrelevance.
For nationalists and republicans, the appeal is equally tangible: the reunification of the island's most divided province, the removal of a border that has caused a century of economic and social damage, and the integration of communities that have been artificially separated.
The Economic Case
The economic argument for a united Ulster is stronger than the economic argument for either the status quo or a simple merger of North and South.
Northern Ireland is the poorest region of the United Kingdom. Its GDP per capita lags behind every English region. Its economy depends heavily on public sector employment and the UK's fiscal transfers — the "subvention" estimated at approximately £10-14 billion annually. This dependence is often cited as a barrier to unification: the Republic, it is argued, cannot afford to replace the British subvention.
But the three Ulster counties in the Republic are not thriving either. Donegal, Cavan, and Monaghan are among the least economically developed counties in the state. They are far from Dublin, poorly connected by transport infrastructure, and economically isolated by the border.
A united Ulster, within a united Ireland, would create an economic unit of two million people centred on Belfast — the island's second-largest city, with a significant industrial base, two universities, established financial services, and a growing technology sector. Derry, freed from its status as a peripheral city at the edge of a small state, would become a regional centre connecting Donegal, Tyrone, and Fermanagh. The border counties — on both sides — would move from the periphery to the centre of a new economic region.
The EU's structural and investment funds, to which a united Ireland would have full access, are specifically designed to support regional development in exactly these circumstances. The precedent of German reunification, where massive fiscal transfers supported the integration of the former East Germany, demonstrates that political will can mobilise economic resources on a transformative scale.
The Identity Question
The deepest objection to Irish unification from the unionist community is not economic. It is existential. Unionists fear that in a united Ireland, their British identity would be dissolved — that they would become a minority in a state that does not recognise or value who they are.
This fear deserves to be taken seriously, because it is grounded in historical experience. Northern Ireland's Catholic minority spent decades as second-class citizens in a state that discriminated against them in housing, employment, and political representation. Unionists have reasonable grounds to fear that the shoe might be placed on the other foot.
A devolved Ulster addresses this fear directly. In a nine-county Ulster assembly, unionists would not be a minority to be managed. They would be a substantial community — roughly 43% of the population — with guaranteed representation, protected rights, and real political power over the matters that most affect their daily lives. The British identity of the unionist community — their culture, their traditions, their connection to Britain — would be constitutionally protected within the devolved framework, just as Scottish identity is protected within the United Kingdom.
The Good Friday Agreement already provides the constitutional architecture for this. It recognises the right of people in Northern Ireland to identify as Irish, British, or both. It establishes institutions for cross-border cooperation. It requires power-sharing between communities. A devolved Ulster within a united Ireland would be an evolution of these principles, not a departure from them.
The Uncomfortable Questions
This proposal raises questions that deserve honest answers rather than evasion.
Would unionists accept it? Many would not, at least initially. The emotional and cultural attachment to the United Kingdom is genuine and deep. No constitutional arrangement can substitute for belonging. But the question is not whether all unionists would be satisfied. It is whether a critical mass could be persuaded that their interests — economic, cultural, and political — would be better served within a devolved Ulster than within the current arrangement.
Would the Republic accept it? A devolved Ulster with significant autonomous powers would represent a significant change to the structure of the Irish state, which has operated as a unitary state since independence. Provincial assemblies for Ulster, Munster, Leinster, and Connacht — a federal Ireland — would require constitutional reform. Whether the political will exists for such reform is an open question.
Would the British government accept it? The Good Friday Agreement commits the British government to respect the outcome of a border poll. If a majority in Northern Ireland voted for unification, the British government would be treaty-bound to facilitate it. The form of that unification — unitary or federal, with or without devolution — would be a matter for negotiation.
The Province That Suffers Most
Ulster is the province that was divided. Ulster is the province where the Troubles were fought. Ulster is the province where communities on both sides of the border have paid the highest price for a partition that was designed to serve political arithmetic, not human welfare.
Donegal did not choose to be separated from Derry. Fermanagh did not choose to be separated from Cavan. The communities along the border — Catholic and Protestant, nationalist and unionist — did not choose the line that was drawn through their lives. They have lived with its consequences for over a century.
The question of a united Ireland is usually discussed in Dublin, London, and Belfast as a matter of constitutional theory. In the border counties, it is a matter of daily life: the road that goes nowhere, the hospital that is closer but in another jurisdiction, the job that is across a border, the family that lives in another state.
A united Ulster would not solve all of these problems. But it would begin with the recognition that the province's division was an act of political convenience, not of natural geography, and that the people who have paid the price for it deserve a voice in deciding what comes next.
The conversation has barely begun. It should.