According to journalist and author Philip Stephens, for David Lloyd George the Partition of Ireland was a means to an end, an escape route from the Irish question in British politics, and a war against Irish Republicanism that Britain could not win. He argues that for Michael Collins the Free State was a first steppingstone to a united, independent Ireland and that over subsequent decades both parties misread the meaning of the Treaty. In his address to the IIEA and following the release of his new book These Divided Isles: Britain and Ireland, Past and Future, Mr Stephens discusses how he thinks the British assumed they could wash their hands of Ireland, North as well as South, and how Ireland judged that all that was required for reunification was British withdrawal. Mr Stephens also proposes that as the prospect of 32-county Ireland draws closer, both governments must avoid repeating these mistakes.

Speaker bio:

Philip Stephens is a writer and historian. He is a Contributing Editor at the Financial Times, and the author of Inside-Out, a regular column on Substack. He is also a Visiting Senior Fellow at the School for Transnational Governance of the European University Institute, a Richard von Weizsacker Fellow at the Bosch Academy in Berlin, an Honorary Governor at the Ditchley Foundation, and a member of Aspen Italia, Rome. He serves on the steering group of the Franco-British Colloque. His latest book Britain Alone: the Path from Suez to Brexit, was published by Faber. He has won the three main prizes in British political journalism, being named as winner of the David Watt prize for Outstanding Political Journalism, as Political Journalist of the Year by the UK Political Studies Association, and as Political Journalist of the Year in the British Press Awards. He is the author of Politics and the Pound, a study of British economic and European policy, and of Tony Blair, a biography of the former prime minister.