Dan O'Brien: 'We may one day look back on this year as one when a huge step was taken towards a united Ireland'

Northern nationalists are horrified by Brexit. Many who had backed the current constitutional status quo have shifted towards favouring a united Ireland. Some unionists - although it would be wrong to overstate the numbers - have come to question their position on the union with Britain, mostly because of Brexit, and don't look south with the same dread and disdain as they once did.

One reason is economic. The Republic's economy, which has had its best year in over a decade, is in a sweet spot and continues to play to its exporting strengths. In 2018, wage growth has been strong. Unemployment has fallen back to close to 5pc of the workforce. And there is still a lot of momentum in the economy as the year draws to a close.

That will help if the new year brings a shock, in the form of Brexit or the materialisation of other risks that loom threateningly on the horizon.

By contrast, the economy of Northern Ireland is weaker structurally. It is not a basket case, as it is often portrayed, and it has grown over the past year, but growth was weaker than south of the Border and prosperity levels are lower.

Another factor that is working to change the minds of socially liberal unionists is how society in the Republic has changed. A two-to-one vote in favour of removing the Republic's constitutional ban on abortion was bigger than almost anyone on either side expected and reflects huge societal change.

In an era of intensifying culture wars, people's positions on social issues appear to be becoming more important to their overall identity.

For social liberals in particular, views on these issues could be overtaking nationality as the part of their identity about which they feel most strongly. If current societal and political trends in Ireland and Britain continue, more liberal unionists may shift to supporting a united Ireland.

If abortion remains a divisive issue both south and north, a matter that has been extraordinarily undivisive in the Republic has been one of the biggest foreign policy calls in the history of the State.

The decision of the Government and its 26 EU peers to demand a Brexit border backstop from Britain was not only widely supported over the course of the year, it was hardly questioned.

This column has been in the lonely position of arguing that it was a mistake and that it could cause a no-deal Brexit. I hope to be proved wrong on that in 2019, but as of now a perilous situation is looming at the end of March.

If Brexit brought excessive consensus to the Republic, it has done the opposite in Britain.

The turmoil over the matter seems to have no end. Two and half years on from the referendum on Britain's EU membership, and just 99 days away from the scheduled date of departure, Brexit has caused divisions in British politics unlike any other issue in living memory.

The rest of Europe has looked on with increasing bewilderment. But it is not as if the continent doesn't have its own share of problems. Despite another decent economic performance - a sixth consecutive year of expansion was clocked up and employment in the EU reached all-time record levels - politics has continued to sour.

The great hope of the political centre - Emmanuel Macron - looks to be a busted flush. Elected just 18 months ago, his poll ratings have collapsed.

The latest bout of yellow vest protests were among the most violent in decades, and that is saying something for a country that takes to the streets more than any other in Europe.

Support for political extremists continues to grow in line with popular anger. One sometimes wonders if the Fifth Republic will have to collapse before the French can be content with themselves.

The year brought what could be a turning point in another of the continent's big countries. Italians elected a Trumpian government in the spring. Unlike Macron, the two populist parties which formed a coalition administration continue to do well in the polls. They have done so despite an already weak economy sliding back towards yet another recession.

With massive public debt, Italy is close to going Greek. The really big story in Europe in 2019 may well not be Brexit, but a re-eruption of the euro crisis with its epicentre in Rome.

In the continent's most powerful country, Germany, the slow changing of the guard began in 2018. Angela Merkel, by a distance democratic Europe's longest-serving premier, stepped down as leader of her party in the autumn, even if she plans on remaining chancellor until the next election in 2021.

Her stance on immigration was central to her resignation. It is an issue that now concerns more Germans than the economy, which had yet another strong year.

If there was a sign of weakness in that powerhouse economy, it was poor export growth. Foreign sales stagnated in the first nine months of the year. Part of the reason was Donald Trump.

While much of the coverage on this side of the Atlantic of the US president is about trivia of little relevance to Ireland or Europe, his aggressive anti-import measures have put the global trading system at risk.

For Ireland, one of the most economically open countries in the world and a poster child of globalisation, any erosion of that system would threaten an economic model that has turned the economy from a backwater to a transatlantic hub.

Although there is a fragile truce between the US and the EU on trade, Trump is threatening to hit German cars going to America with new taxes. That would trigger counter-measures from Europe.

The US is now Ireland's largest single export market. While most of the talk over the past year has been about the threat of Brexit, a Trump trade war threatens Irish prosperity almost as much.

However, that is for the future. It will no doubt be the subject of columns in 2019. As this is my final column in these pages for this year, I'd like to wish readers a happy and harmonious Christmas.

Irish Independent