ABSTRACT
The relationship between politics and violence is always problematic. While there is widespread agreement that legitimate governments should have the right to use force in particular circumstances, this raises questions about what constitutes political legitimacy. For their part, ordinary citizens are normally denied the right to resort to violence for political purposes, whether in opposition to the state or in its defence, if it can be shown that there exist sufficient alternative channels for the expression of their demands. This again raises questions about political legitimacy. Who decides whether or not existing political mechanisms are adequate? Who, ultimately, decides if certain violent acts can be described as political rather than as merely criminal? What, in any case, is the relationship between political and criminal violence? Nowhere in the western world in recent times have such questions figured so prominently in political debate as in Northern Ireland.
