The Ireland that we made

Community breakdown

Bars show the community-aggregated score per category. Rate this book to contribute.

"During the last decade of the nineteenth century, a remarkable experiment in realpolitik restored land and power to the descendants of the victims of the expropriations of the Elizabethan and Jacobean plantations of Ireland. Successive Conservative and Unionist administrations accomplished this extraordinary restitution, and its active agents were members of the most elite political, social, literary, and intellectual circles. The name given to this program of beneficent legislation for Ireland is "Constructive Unionism," though sometimes it was referred to (unkindly) as "Killing Ireland with Kindness." The idea behind this latter name was that as necessary and long-overdue reforms were passed, the agitation for Home Rule for Ireland would wither and die. Throughout this study, the phrases "Killing Ireland with Kindness" and "Constructive Unionism" will be used synonymously. Both terms refer to the period between 1887 and 1905 when, chiefly under the Irish Chief Secretaryships of Arthur Balfour ( 1887-91), Gerald Balfour (1895-1900) and George Wyndham (1900-1905), there was a sustained effort on the part of successive Conservative administrations to diminish (if not eliminate) Irish disaffection toward the Union with Great Britain through the passage of substantial internal reforms. Redistribution of land was always at the heart of the policy - a striking instance of the rootedness of the policy in an understanding of Irish history and the enduring grounds of conflict with Great Britain. Although the policy has frequently been dismissed as either incoherent or inconsequential, it very nearly succeeded in its objectives and certainly brought about a profound transformation in the political, social, and economic landscape of Ireland."--BOOK JACKET.