Paul Bew

Professor of Irish Politics Paul Bew, Mria

Could Ireland have become a self-governing nation in 1912? Paul Bew's controversial examination of Irish politics in the years 1912-1916 investigates the issues at stake in the home rule crisis, and offers a new assessment of the 1916 Easter Rising.

Ulster Unionism and Irish Nationalism, 1912-1916

Ideology and the Irish Question

Gordon Gillespie

A detailed account, in diary form, of the civil and political unrest in Northern Ireland, spanning 30 years from the late 1960s to the end of the 20th century. The book also provides short essays which look back at the major events, assessing their significance and setting them in context, including: Bloody Sunday (1972), the collapse of the Power Sharing Executive (1974), the Republican hunger strikes (1981), the Anglo-Irish Agreement (1985), the first IRA ceasefire (1994) and the historic Good Friday Agreement (1998).

A Chronology of the Troubles, 1968-1999

Northern Ireland

Paul Teague

Professor of Management Paul Teague

Henry Patterson

In this refreshingly different look at politics in Northern Ireland, the authors argue that the time has come for a completely new perspective. After reviewing the political conflicts of the last two decades, they conclude that there are repeated failures of understanding between the internal political actors in the North and their supposed external allies. The Anglo-Irish Agreement and the Framework documents are recent illustrations of the British government's desire to minimalise its presence in the North - a policy likely to be continued by Labour, and of the gap between the Irish government's rhetorical commitment to nationalism and the reality of contemporary politics in the South. The authors maintain that neither unionists nor nationalists have a perspective which can engage with the real economic and political conditions of the 1990s. Though not sanguine about the prospects for change, they argue the need for the development of a modern democratic politics in the North, which can move beyond the present stalemate.

Between War and Peace

A collection of essays from a Professor of Irish Politics at Queens University Belfast, discusses the many crises which have paralyzed the power-sharing institutions in Northern Ireland since 2002.

The Making and Remaking of the Good Friday Agreement

Peter Gibbon

The State in Northern Ireland, 1921-72

Going right to the heart of the Irish Question, Paul Bew offers a new interpretation of Irish politics in the critical 1912-1916 period. He re-examines the issues at stake in the home rule crisis of 1912-14, arguing that the then leader of constitutional nationalism, John Redmond, possessed aplausible political strategy. Redmond's reputation has suffered from the critiques of those who argue either that he failed to conciliate Unionists, or that he lacked the requisite fighting spirit of militant nationalism. This book contains much that is a sympathetic reconstruction of Redmond'svision but it also acknowledges the seriousness of the Ulster Unionist case. Bew analyses the debate concerning land, economy, religion, language, and national identity in the period, and ends with a discussion of the Easter Rising of 1916 which destroyed Redmond's party. He draws out the political, cultural, and economic implications of this development and examines theircontinuing effect on Irish history.

The French revolution had an electrifying impact on Irish society. The 1790s saw the birth of modern Irish republicanism and Orangeism, whose antagonism remains a defining feature of Irish political life. The 1790s also saw the birth of a new approach to Ireland within important elements of the British political elite, men like Pitt and Castlereagh. Strongly influenced by Edmund Burke, they argued that Britain's strategic interests were best served by a policy of catholic emancipation and political integration in Ireland. Britain's failure to achieve this objective, dramatised by the horrifying tragedy of the Irish famine of 1846-50, in which a million Irish died, set the context for the emergence of a popular mass nationalism, expressed in the Fenian, Parnell, and Sinn Fein movements, which eventually expelled Britain from the greater part of the island. This book reassesses all the key leaders of Irish nationalism - Tone, O'Connell, Butt, Parnell, Collins, and de Valera - alongside key British political leaders such as Peel and Gladstone in the nineteenth century, or Winston Churchill and Tony Blair in the twentieth century. A study of the changing ideological passions of the modern Irish question, this analysis is, however, firmly placed in the context of changing social and economic realities. Using a vast range of original sources, Paul Bew holds together the worlds of political class in London, Dublin, and Belfast in one coherent analysis which takes the reader all the way from the society of the United Irishman to the crisis of the Good Friday Agreement.

The Politics of Enmity 1789-2006

Ireland

Parnell is one of the key figures of modern Irish history and also one of the most enigmatic. He was a wealthy Protestant landlord who led a largely Catholic land reform and nationalist movement. This biography attempts to resolve some of the apparent contradictions in Parnell's life and career. Charles Stewart Parnell is not just one of the key figures of modern Irish history: he is also one of the most enigmatic. He was a wealthy, Protestant landlord who led a largely Catholic land reform and nationalist movement. He was an apparently cold, aloof man whose political downfall was precipitated by his passionate love affair with another man's wife. He was not a great orator in a country that loves oratory, yet he dominated its public life as no man has done before or since. In this short biography, Paul Bew tries to resolve some of the apparent contradictions in Parnell's life and career. He argues that Parnell was fundamentally a constitutionalist and that his primary concern was the survival of his own landlord class, safely integrated into a new Ireland. Other books by Paul Bew Northern Ireland Northern Ireland Chronology.

Charles Stewart Parnell

Charles Stewart Parnell is the most enigmatic figure in Irish history. An Anglo-Irish landlord from a distinguished Wicklow family, he became the most unlikely leader of Irish nationalism imaginable. He hated the colour green. He was not a dynamic speaker. He was cold and aloof and lacked the popular touch. None the less, from the late 1870s until his fall and death in 1891, he held the whole of Ireland spellbound. He established Home Rule for Ireland – previously a taboo subject in British politics – at the centre of Westminster affairs and effectively created the modern Irish state in embryo. His fall was as dramatic as his rise. The affair with Mrs Katharine O'Shea, the mother of his three children, destroyed him. Ever since his fall and his premature death in 1891, Parnell has remained a remarkably potent symbol, particularly in times of crisis and conflict in Ireland. The myth has obscured the man and makes it difficult for us to see Parnell as he really was. Paul Bew presents a completely original interpretation of this fascinating and enigmatic man.

Enigma A New Life of Charles Stewart Parnell

This is the first major biography of Parnell in 30 years. An Anglo-Irish landlord from a distinguished and long-established Wicklow family; he became the most unlikely leader of Irish nationalism imaginable.

A New Life of Charles Stewart Parnell

Enigma

In the fifty years since Churchill's death, there has not been a single major book on his relationship to Ireland. It is the most neglected part of his legacy on both sides of the Irish Sea. Distinguished historian of Ireland Paul Bew now at long last puts this right. Churchill and Ireland tells the full story of Churchill's lifelong engagement with Ireland and the Irish, from his early years as a child in Dublin, through his centralrole in the Home Rule crisis of 1912-14 and in the war leading up to the Anglo-Irish Treaty of 1922, to his bitter disappointment at Irish neutrality in the Second World War and gradual rapprochement with hisold enemy Eamon de Valera towards the end of his life.

Paul Bew

About

Books

Join the club