Just a short P.S. to my column from last week on negotiating. On Sunday night the TV film “Mo” was shown on Channel 4, the UK network. It told a pretty remarkable story of the popular British politician who played a key role in establishing the devolved Northern Irish assembly, formed after the ceasefires called by the IRA and other paramilitary groups, and the formal acceptance by the Irish state that the consitutional status of Northern Ireland could only be changed with the consent of the majority of the Northern Irish population.
The film told a dramatic story well. Mowlam was an unconventional, spontaneous and uninhibited figure. What she knew, but had not told anyone outside her inner circle, was that she was suffering from a malignant brain tumour. (The public story was that her tumour was non-malignant and treatable.)
Mowlam’s doctor, who was interviewed as part of the research for the film, has made the following fascinating point. Perhaps Mowlam was such an effective (if unconventional) negotiator because she knew her time was short. There was an urgency to her work.
Not only that, but the side-effects of her illness and drug treatment may have made her more outgoing, less inhibited, and more likely to take risks.
It is a curious thought: the on-again, off-again, fraught peace process in Northern Ireland was given a big boost by a negotiator who may not have been completely in her “right mind”.
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