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AbstractHow does political structure affect ethno‐national distinction? Partitioned societies are a good test case where we can see the effects of changed socio‐political circumstances on historically inherited distinction. This article takes nominally identical distinctions of nationality and religion with common historical roots and shows how they are differentially understood in two polities partitioned in 1920:NorthernIreland, a devolved region of theUnitedKingdom, and theIrish state. Using a data base of interviews with over 220 respondents, of which 75 inNorthernIreland, conducted between 2003 and 2006, it shows how complex, potentially totalising and exclusive 'ethnic' and 'ethno‐national' divisions are built up from simpler and more permeable distinctions. Respondents interrelate the same elements into a loosely‐knit symbolic structure – different in each jurisdiction – which frames expectations and discourse, and which is associated with different logics of national discourse, one focussing on personal orientation, the other on group belonging. The resultant 'ethno‐national' distinctions function differently North and South.

A long process of state-institutional change underlay an eventual swift restructuring of Northern Ireland on a more equal basis in the 2000s. This article shows how change occurred and explains its phasing, arguing that it took a threshold form. It gives a distinctive characterisation of the 'recognition', 'agenda' and 'implementation' thresholds, and the different politics that followed each. This model of state change is of interest in three ways: in providing a distinctive characterisation and explanation of the process; in addressing the comparative literature on 'exclusion', conflict and settlement by sketching a threshold model of change from 'exclusion' to 'inclusion'; and in speaking to a pressing moral concern - if settlement was possible at all, why was it not possible sooner? The article makes use of new evidence in the form of over 70 elite interviews with senior British and Irish politicians and officials who made, influenced and closely observed the process. Adapted from the source document.

A long process of state-institutional change underlay an eventual swift restructuring of Northern Ireland on a more equal basis in the 2000s. This article shows how change occurred and explains its phasing, arguing that it took a threshold form. It gives a distinctive characterisation of the 'recognition', 'agenda' and 'implementation' thresholds, and the different politics that followed each. This model of state change is of interest in three ways: in providing a distinctive characterisation and explanation of the process; in addressing the comparative literature on 'exclusion', conflict and settlement by sketching a threshold model of change from 'exclusion' to 'inclusion' and in speaking to a pressing moral concern – if settlement was possible at all, why was it not possible sooner? The article makes use of new evidence in the form of over 70 elite interviews with senior British and Irish politicians and officials who made, influenced and closely observed the process.