Seeking Shelter From Brexit: Ireland and the United States

Abstract

This article explores the factors that account for the US foreign policy position on Brexit and situates that discussion in a ‘seeking shelter’ context. Through a specific focus on how Ireland approached the challenge of Brexit, it determines the logic for pursuing US shelter and identifies the conditions which facilitated the cultivation of American support for the Irish position. Using a framework developed by James (2022), the article documents how Ireland used efforts at bargaining, lobbying and bonding to encourage key US actors and institutions to offer diplomatic and political support for the maintenance of an open border on the island of Ireland. It concludes that US shelter, though not determinative, served as a key lever among others that Ireland deployed to influence the EU–UK negotiations.