1914 : Home Rule Act → limited self-government, suspended for the duration of the First World War
1922 : Ireland partitioned between Northern Ireland and the Irish Free state.
Irish Free State : state within the British Empire with internal self-government
Ulster Unionist party : predominantly protestant, discriminated against catholics; dominated Northern Ireland
Catholics : seen as nationalist who wanted a united Ireland by the UUP.
1968 : Catholic civil rights had become a major issue in NI politics → Protestant unionist reaction which led to major sectarian violence in 1969; British government sent troops to NI in 1969 in an attempt to maintain law and order.

1972 : The government suspended the NI parliament and ruled the area directly from LDN.
From 1969 – 1998, NI badly affected by political violence. British government attempted to involve nationalists and unionists, but failed.
1985 : new attempt with the Hillsborough Agreement which involved co-operation between the British and Irish governments
By the 1990s attempts to solve the conflicts in NI involved a fusion of fusion of previous attempts at a political solution ; co-operation in government between political parties within NI.

After the victory of Labour party in England (Tony Blair with support of Bill Clinton) in 1997 → Good friday agreement (1998) (between Britain, the Republic of Ireland and political parties in NI but the democratic Unionist party (Ian Paisley) did not sign up to the agreement. An important part of the agreement was the decommissioning of IRA weapons (IRA was reluctant to do). Also a New northern Ireland Executive and parliament were chosen involving both nationalists and unionists.
After 2000, UK government was forced to suspend the NI executive and Parliament because of disputes over decommissioning.
2006 : The IRA, renounced violence and decommissioned its weapons.

Political parties in NI : The Ulster Unionist party : main party since the creation of