Partition was about minorities and their oppression real or imagined, anticipated or remembered which inspired a wide debate, still relevant today for the future of Northern Ireland. The partitionist assumptions that a new nation-state required religious homogeneity and that minorities would be victimised were rooted in historical experience and reflected contemporary political practice. This book illuminates the historical significance of religious minorities in southern Ireland at a time when the twenty-six Counties formed 'a Catholic state for a Catholic people'. Dragged into a process of nation building about which Jews and Protestants had serious reservations, they often felt like guests of an unappeasable host. Many emigrated, but those who stayed offered a critical contribution to civil society. Based on a wide range of primary sources, including recently discovered personal diaries, Eugenio F. Biagini's holistic account of the minority experience explains the role of entrenched diversity in shaping attitudes to civil rights and national identity.
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The 'minority question' disrupted twentieth-century Europe but in Catholic Ireland minority groups helped shape a more pluralist society.
Introduction;
1. Minorities matter; Part I. Democracy and Fear:
2.
Democracy and patriotism;
3. Transfiguration;
4. Making minorities safe for
the nation state; Part II. Strategies in Times of Retrenchment:
5. Retaining
their principles and prejudices;
6. 'Windows open towards Jerusalem':
internationalism, sacred and secular;
7. In a world of sectarianism;
8.
Promised lands, chosen races; Part III. World Crises and the Refashioning of
Minority Identities:
9. Emergency?
19391948. 10. Rome rule?
11. The end of
the beginning; Conclusion.
Eugenio F. Biagini teaches British and Irish history at the University of Cambridge. His publications include British Democracy and Irish Nationalism (Cambridge, 2007), The Cambridge Social History of Ireland (Cambridge, 2017 with Mary E. Daly), and A Cultural History of Democracy (2021). He is a Fellow of the Accademia delle Scienze dell'Istituto di Bologna.
