Armalite and ballot box strategy

The Armalite and ballot box strategy was a strategy pursued by the Irish republican movement in the 1980s and early 1990s in which elections in Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland were contested by Sinn Féin, while the IRA continued to pursue an armed struggle against the British Army, the Royal Ulster Constabulary, and loyalist paramilitary groups. This strategy was a matter of some controversy within republicanism; some IRA members and supporters who disagreed with the strategy left to form Republican Sinn Féin in 1986.

Armalite refers to the AR-15 and AR-18 ArmaLite rifles. Both were originally manufactured by the Armalite corporation, later Colt. The IRA smuggled significant quantities of these rifles into Northern Ireland during the early 1970s and the "Armalite" became a symbol of republican armed struggle. Through the AR-18's mass use by the PIRA and volunteers' love of the weapon for its accuracy and compact nature, the rifle became known as the "Widowmaker".

The strategy emerged after the 1981 Irish hunger strike as a response to the electoral success of Bobby Sands in the April 1981 Fermanagh and South Tyrone by-election and pro-hunger strike campaigners in the Northern Ireland local elections and Republic of Ireland Dáil Éireann elections of the same year. It was first formulated by Sinn Féin organiser Danny Morrison at the party's Ard Fheis (Annual Conference) in 1981, when he said:

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