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Professor explains how Ireland adapted to modern world

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This new study on the emergence of the "Celtic Tiger" should be read by Irish-Americans with an interest in the "Ould Sod." Roy Foster, a history professor at Hertford College at Oxford University, brings readers up-to-date on the momentous and sudden changes that have transformed Ireland from a somewhat removed and underdeveloped region on the fringes of Europe to one of the most prosperous nations in the European Union.

Highlights

By John H. Carroll
Catholic News Service (www.catholicnews.com)
4/4/2008 (1 decade ago)

Published in U.S.

Today the Irish are enjoying prosperity at home and Europeans from other parts of the continent and even Americans are immigrating to Ireland. The U.S. descendants of the impoverished Irish immigrants are entitled to an answer to this question, "What happened?"

The author indicates in his introduction that Irish government administrations in the latter part of the 20th century, despite political differences, instituted changes in education that produced a generation of young people prepared for the computer age. Also, the rural republic in the south was not encumbered by a depressed and antiquated industrial base like Northern Ireland. The various Dublin administrations attracted foreign business enterprises with tax breaks and other incentives.

Suddenly there was more to do in Dublin than work for the government or brew stout in the Guinness Brewery. Dublin in its own right became a busy and forward-looking administrative and financial center. Agricultural modernization developed as control of old family farms and the use of antiquated techniques were replaced by a forward-looking younger generation.

The respective Irish government administrations favored change and innovation. However, the author is very critical of the Fianna Fail party leader and Prime Minister "Charley" Haughey and his corrupt wheeling and dealing. Fortunately for Haughey and his associates, he died before formal charges were ever brought against him and members of his government for corruption and embezzlement. Other administrations have been relatively free of corruption as prosperity became the norm.

Foster presents an enlightening chapter on "'Big, Mad Children': The South and the North." He indicates that the problem is an old one rooted in a sad history of sectarian rivalries between Presbyterians, Anglicans and Catholics and a struggle for political domination between Unionists, Nationalists and Republicans. Since 1969 British, Irish and American leaders have struggled to find a solution to the problem.

Today matters have definitely improved. The author notes that on one past occasion a minor British Foreign Office official told the Irish foreign minister that the republic had no reason to interfere in Northern Ireland.

However, relations between London and Dublin are better today than they've ever been. Even the old Orange firebrand, the Rev. Ian Paisley, recently called outgoing Prime Minister Bertie Ahern in Dublin to ask assistance in stopping the shipment of fighting dogs to Northern Ireland. Ahern offered to help stop the shipments. Rev. Paisley thanked him and added that we all live on the same island. That comment some years ago might have helped save lives.

Readers will find "Luck & the Irish" presents an enlightening insight into the new Ireland ("Eire Nua"), a bit apart from the "Bord Failte" old Ireland approach.

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Copyright (c) 2007 Catholic News Service/U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops

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