The Politics of Land

This is the first of two programmes on the politics of land in Ireland in the early years of the Irish state.

There is an assumption that during the Anglo-Irish war from 1919-1921 all those of a Republican bent put their shoulders to the Sinn FéIn wheel, ceased all other forms of activism and pushed hard for independence. Another line of thought makes the assumption that, once independence was achieved, the often vicious land agitation that had characterised the last forty years of British rule, simply ceased. Both assumptions are entirely erroneous.

In some parts of the country in 1919-1920 land seizures were far more common than IRA attacks on the Crown forces. Furthermore the Civil War was accompanied by a massive resurgence in the illegal seizure of agricultural land, forcing the first Free State government to create a sizeable military unit to deal with the problem.

2023 marks the centenary of the first land legislation ever introduced by an independent Irish government, tonight we 'll look at the environment around the 1923 Land Act, the purpose of the legislation, and the success, or otherwise, of the first two governments of the new Irish Free State in finishing the job of acquiring and re-distributing landlord property – a process left incomplete by the departing British administration.

In this programme we hear from the following guests:

Dr. Terence Dooley is a Professor of History at Maynooth University and in his book, The Land for the People he has studied the land strategy of Sinn Féin and the IRA during the War of Independence as well as the policies of the first two governments of the Irish Free State.

Dr Eoin Kinsella talks about the Special Infantry Corps, the short-lived force tasked with dealing with the scale of the problem of rural land seizures and the burgeoning radicalism of agricultural labourers. He is the author of the book The Irish Defence Forces, 1922–2022.

Dr Tony McCarthy is an author and historian, who has looked closely at the guarantees offered by Britain for Ireland's first tilt at land purchase.

William Nolan talks about the creation of the Gaeltachts of Rathcairn and Baile Ghib or Gibbstown. William is Emeritus Professor of Geography at University College Dublin, and series editor and founder of Geography Publications.