other · British Isles

Northern Ireland

1921 CE – present · capital Belfast

The part of the United Kingdom in north-east Ireland, created by partition in 1921 and marked by decades of conflict and a power-sharing peace.

Origins

The Government of Ireland Act 1920 created Northern Ireland from six of Ulster's nine counties, where Protestants, mostly unionists, were a majority. Its Parliament opened in June 1921, and it opted out of the Irish Free State in December 1922.

Rule and society

Northern Ireland was governed for fifty years by the Ulster Unionist Party from Stormont, with discrimination against the Catholic, mainly nationalist minority. Belfast was a centre of shipbuilding and linen. The civil rights movement of the late 1960s was followed by the Troubles, which killed about 3,600 people, and direct rule from London from 1972.

To the present

The Good Friday Agreement of 1998 established a power-sharing Assembly and Executive and confirmed that Northern Ireland remains in the United Kingdom unless its people vote otherwise.

Connections (2)

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Cite this page
APA
The Epoch Institute. (2026). Northern Ireland. In The Epoch Institute States Register. https://the-epoch-institute.org/state/northern-ireland
MLA
“Northern Ireland.” The Epoch Institute States Register, The Epoch Institute, 2026, https://the-epoch-institute.org/state/northern-ireland. Accessed .
Chicago
The Epoch Institute. “Northern Ireland.” The Epoch Institute States Register. 2026. https://the-epoch-institute.org/state/northern-ireland.
Harvard
The Epoch Institute (2026) ‘Northern Ireland’, The Epoch Institute States Register. Available at: https://the-epoch-institute.org/state/northern-ireland (Accessed: ).

Last reviewed October 2026Random state ↻