One of the major trouble spots in the world is Northern Ireland, which is actually only a portion of Ireland as a whole. Ireland is a democratic state run on the British model. There is a complex political relationship between Northern and Southern Ireland, just as there is a complex relationship between Ireland and Britain.
Ireland has been an independent state since 1921 and has operated under a republican constitution since 1937. The Republic of Ireland is separate from Northern Ireland but closely connected to it. The 26 counties of Southern Ireland were granted Dominion status in 1921, while the six counties of Northern Ireland elected to remain within the United Kingdom. The Irish Republic views this partition as provisional and remains formally dedicated to the incorporation of the northern counties into a unified Irish nation. Southern Ireland was known officially as the Irish Free State from 1922 to 1937 and then became the Irish Republic. Its present constitution, adopted in 1937, is the basis of its government. Ireland's association with the British Commonwealth was terminated in 1949, and for the following decade power shifted between the Republican and United Ireland parties. From 1957 to 1973 the Republic Party ruled, and in 1973 a coalition of the United Ireland party and the Labour parties was installed (Banks 311).
The Irish constitution is theoretically applicable to the whole of Ireland, and thus citizens of Northern Ireland are considered citizens and can run for office in the South. A president is directly elected for a seven-year term. Also elected is a bicameral legislature consisting of a directly elected lower house and an indirectly chosen upper house with the power to delay, but not to veto, legislation. The cabinet is responsible to the upper house and is headed by a prime minister, who is the leader of the majority party or coalition and who is appointed by the president for a five-year ...