Governing Hibernia: British Politicians and Ireland 1800-1921

Governing Hibernia is the first book to examine in detail how British ministers and politicians sought to govern Ireland throughout the period of Anglo-Irish Union (1800-1921). It offers an entirely new interpretation of the subject, and places post-Union developments within a framework (both pragmatic and conceptual) of shifts within British policy between periods in which Ireland was seen as so distant and different that it demanded ‘special’ ways (coercive and benign) of control and periods when the ‘solution’ to the problems of the Anglo-Irish relationship was seen to lie in a policy of assimilation – of trying to make Ireland as much like Britain as possible. The ultimate outcome of these approaches can be seen as pointing to some species of independence – as in fact occurred in 1921.