This thesis examines the development of Sinn Féin's communication strategies and considers how news coverage of the party has evolved in recent years, and in particular with the advent of the Irish peace process from the mid-1990s onwards. The aim of the research presented here is to establish the relationship between the development of the party's professional communication apparatus and the evolution of its news coverage and to determine the extent to which the emergence of a sophisticated approach to communication has impacted upon media coverage. The thesis argues that the development and implementation of the party's professional communication apparatus has been the result of a much wider process of republican reappraisal that took place during the 1980s. This culminated in the 1990s with the transformation of the republican movement into a more constitutional and negotiation-oriented party, while progressively moving away from the armed struggle as a means to achieve Irish re-unification. Moreover, in emphasising that there has been a considerable improvement in the reporting of Sinn Féin; namely that the news media have become progressively more interested in republican predicaments, less biased and more critical of unionism, it also suggests that the improved media coverage must be seen as a result of the political re-alignment of the movement itself. Ultimately, the main argument of this thesis is that we are now witnessing a new phase of the republican movement and, by proxy, of Northern Irish politics and its coverage in the media. This has meant that Sinn Féin has become more wiling to reach a political compromise and to find a peaceful solution to the conflct, and has attempted to affirm itself as a party with political and social interests, other than Irish re-unification. This has also forced the British government to reappraise its own view of the conflict and of Sinn Féin, recognising above all that the party and Northern Irish politics have evolved from a situation of war to one where it is dominated by careful and sensitive diplomacy. The result is that most of the common assumptions held about Sinn Féin including those of some academics, its political communication and its news coverage, must now be reconsidered in light of the radical transformations that have taken place.

Peu d'études se penchent sur la démilitarisation de l'Irish Republican Army et la poursuite de sa lutte dans l'arène politique. Deux raisons m'ont poussée à étudier le conflit nord-irlandais. D'abord, il est intéressant d'étudier une organisation paramilitaire qui possède un lien symbiotique, une attache historique à un parti politique, le Sinn Fein, dont certains membres ont combattu dans ses rangs, sont présents à l'Assemblée nationale nord-irlandaise et agissent à titre de politiciens reconnus en Irlande du Nord. De plus, les relations internationales du 21e siècle créent d'importantes réflexions sur le phénomène de groupes paramilitaires politisés et le cas de l'Irish Republican Army est souvent repris par professeurs et journalistes comme exemple d'une victoire face à un groupe paramilitaire extrémiste. On insiste toutefois sur le fait qu'inclure la branche armée nord-irlandaise dans les négociations de paix relève d'une exception plutôt qu'une règle dans la lutte contre ces groupes. Pour bien des experts et des politiciens, il s'agit autant d'un modèle à suivre qu'à bannir dans cette lutte où la nostalgie du temps de la bonne vieille IRA semble incomparable aux demandes inaccessibles et à la terreur irréelle qu'engendre certains groupes paramilitaires d'aujourd'hui. Ainsi, dans ce travail, nous nous intéressons à la relation qu'entretient l'IRA auprès de sa branche politique, le Sinn Fein comme facteur principal contribuant à la démilitarisation du groupe paramilitaire. On se rend compte qu'une série de dynamiques sont à réunir afin d'encourager, voire de forcer, le dépôt des armes de l'IRA. Comme première dynamique, il est alors essentiel que la branche politique domine la branche paramilitaire. Pour ce faire, d'importants bouleversements internes bousculent la structure du mouvement afin que la branche politique contrôle la branche paramilitaire. De plus, la deuxième dynamique entraîne la branche politique à bénéficier d'une place au sein même des négociations de paix. Finalement, comme troisième dynamique, le soutien, voire la reconnaissance, de la communauté internationale, à la branche politique permet d'affirmer que la branche politique, le Sinn Fein, a subordonné la lutte armée de l'IRA. ______________________________________________________________________________ MOTS-CLÉS DE L’AUTEUR : Irish Republican Army, Sinn Fein, Accord de Belfast, démilitarisation.

The Irish peace process is heralded as a success among insurgencies that attempt transitions toward peaceful resolution of conflict. After thirty years of armed struggle, pitting Irish republicans against their loyalist counterparts and the British State, the North of Ireland has a reconfigured political landscape with a consociational governing body where power is shared among several parties that hold divergent political objectives. The Irish Republican Movement, whose main components are the Provisional Irish Republican Army, a covert guerilla armed organization, and Sinn Fein, the political party of Irish republicans, initiated peace that led to all-inclusive talks in the 1990s and that culminated in the signing of the Good Friday Agreement in April 1998, setting out the parameters for a non-violent way forward. Given the traditional intransigence of the IRA to consider any route other than armed conflict, how did the leadership of the Irish Republican Movement secure the support of a majority of republicans for a peace initiative that has held now for more than fifteen years? This dissertation explores the dynamics of leadership in this group, and in particular, focuses on the prisoner resistance waged by its incarcerated activists and volunteers. It is the contention here, that various prisoner resistance tactics enabled a wide-ranging group of captives to develop the skill set necessary to persuade their community to back the peace initiative, engage in electoral politics, mobilize their supporters to invest in attaining a united Ireland by peaceful negotiations, and put down their arms in a permanent and unequivocal manner. In this dissertation, the work of Paulo Freire is explored in order to capture the processes inherent the resistance-leadership continuum.

The Irish peace process is heralded as a success among insurgencies that attempt transitions toward peaceful resolution of conflict. After thirty years of armed struggle, pitting Irish republicans against their loyalist counterparts and the British State, the North of Ireland has a reconfigured political landscape with a consociational governing body where power is shared among several parties that hold divergent political objectives. The Irish Republican Movement, whose main components are the Provisional Irish Republican Army, a covert guerilla armed organization, and Sinn Fein, the political party of Irish republicans, initiated peace that led to all-inclusive talks in the 1990s and that culminated in the signing of the Good Friday Agreement in April 1998, setting out the parameters for a non-violent way forward. Given the traditional intransigence of the IRA to consider any route other than armed conflict, how did the leadership of the Irish Republican Movement secure the support of a majority of republicans for a peace initiative that has held now for more than fifteen years? This dissertation explores the dynamics of leadership in this group, and in particular, focuses on the prisoner resistance waged by its incarcerated activists and volunteers. It is the contention here, that various prisoner resistance tactics enabled a wide-ranging group of captives to develop the skill set necessary to persuade their community to back the peace initiative, engage in electoral politics, mobilize their supporters to invest in attaining a united Ireland by peaceful negotiations, and put down their arms in a permanent and unequivocal manner. In this dissertation, the work of Paulo Freire is explored in order to capture the processes inherent the resistance-leadership continuum.

The Irish peace process is heralded as a success among insurgencies that attempt transitions toward peaceful resolution of conflict. After thirty years of armed struggle, pitting Irish republicans against their loyalist counterparts and the British State, the North of Ireland has a reconfigured political landscape with a consociational governing body where power is shared among several parties that hold divergent political objectives. The Irish Republican Movement, whose main components are the Provisional Irish Republican Army, a covert guerilla armed organization, and Sinn Fein, the political party of Irish republicans, initiated peace that led to all-inclusive talks in the 1990s and that culminated in the signing of the Good Friday Agreement in April 1998, setting out the parameters for a non-violent way forward. Given the traditional intransigence of the IRA to consider any route other than armed conflict, how did the leadership of the Irish Republican Movement secure the support of a majority of republicans for a peace initiative that has held now for more than fifteen years? This dissertation explores the dynamics of leadership in this group, and in particular, focuses on the prisoner resistance waged by its incarcerated activists and volunteers. It is the contention here, that various prisoner resistance tactics enabled a wide-ranging group of captives to develop the skill set necessary to persuade their community to back the peace initiative, engage in electoral politics, mobilize their supporters to invest in attaining a united Ireland by peaceful negotiations, and put down their arms in a permanent and unequivocal manner. In this dissertation, the work of Paulo Freire is explored in order to capture the processes inherent the resistance-leadership continuum.