British rule in Ireland was never legitimate

The argument

The argument turns on how Northern Ireland came into being rather than on how it has been governed since. On this account the territory was not a natural unit that happened to prefer the union; its boundaries were drawn to produce that preference. The line was placed so as to guarantee support for remaining in the United Kingdom, and it was drawn over the opposition of many Irish leaders at the time. A border designed to deliver a particular answer cannot then be cited as evidence that the answer reflects consent, because the consent was manufactured by the drawing. What followed is held to confirm the point. For most of its history the state was governed by Protestants, for Protestants — an arrangement in which the community the border had been drawn to favour held power, and the community it had been drawn to contain did not share in it. Proponents of this position argue that this was not a malfunction of the settlement but the settlement working as intended: a jurisdiction created to secure one community's position behaved accordingly once established. The conclusion drawn is about legitimacy rather than grievance. Political authority is legitimate when the governed have consented to it, and on this reading consent was never obtained; it was engineered, and the engineering was then maintained by a government that excluded a large part of the population it ruled. What remains in Ireland is therefore described as a surviving piece of imperialism — an external claim to territory originating in partition rather than in agreement. An illegitimate arrangement does not become legitimate by lasting, and proponents conclude that it should come to an end, with Ireland united.

Context

British governance in Ireland emerged through forcible conquest. Since then, Britain has treated Ireland like a colonial territory and maintained its grip on the territory through oppressive and undemocratic methods.

Premises

Counter-arguments

British rule in Ireland is supported by the self-determination of the people of Northern Ireland, many of whom can trace their families in the area back to the 17th century when they arrived legally and settled on land that had been abandoned after the Flight of the Earls. Britain's initial occupation of Ireland may have come through force, but this was standard in the Middle Ages and many other uncontested territorial claims stem from similar invasions.

Rejecting the premises

[Rejecting P1] British rule in Northern Ireland is supported by the people of Northern Ireland, making it democratic.