The Orange order risks damaging the cause for Irish unionism

Another year and another July has come round where viewers in the UK have been treated to the sight of some of their compatriots in Northern Ireland marking William of Orange’s triumph over his father-in-law James II, the Catholic Stuart King, on the ‘green grassy slopes of the Boyne’ – as the Orange song goes – in 1690. 

Mention Ulster unionism and, to the casual mainland observer, it will conjure up images of stern bowler hatted men in orange collarettes and sashes, the skirl of pipes and flute bands, parading disputes and monumental bonfires of pallets and tyres on loyalist housing estates. Even weeks after the event, the acrid smell of these colossal structures lingers in the air, as much a sensory reminder of the marching season as the Union Flag bunting criss-crossing the streets. It is commonly held that while this is going on, many nationalists slip over the border to Donegal to escape it. 

Orangeism is an essential part of the rhetorical and cultural underpinning of unionism, despite only a minority actually pursuing membership of the Orange Order itself.