Kevin Lougheed

The centralisation of state power in pre-Famine Ireland enabled the British government to target the Irish social body under the pretext of reform. Institutional reform was part of a wider governmental rationale and resulted in the transformation of institutions such that their focus shifted to acting on the Irish social body more generally, with the intention of civilising Irish subjects. In Ireland the transformation took on the added imputes of attempting to legitimise the British state as key actor in Irish society. The shift in focus of institutions in Ireland represents what Michel Foucault referred to as governmentality, with the British state aiming to ‘conduct the conduct’ of the Irish population in order to provide security. One key institution was the establishment of a national education system pre-Famine Ireland. The establishment of the Commissioners of National Education in 1831 attempted to introduce a non-denominational education system in Ireland which would unite ...

The establishment of the National Education System in 1831 provided Ireland with a non-denominational education system aimed at reducing sectarian distrust and uniting the population. The national system was one element in the wider emergence of an institutional landscape in nineteenth century Ireland. The system involved a central-local management structure with the Commissioners of National Education having tight central control of an overall system but relied on local impetus to apply for, establish, and operate individual schools. As a result of this interaction, the emergence of national education was dependent on activities of various individuals and groups in Irish society, most notably the hierarchies of the various Churches. This paper examines the geographic aspects of the emergence of national education in the landscape of pre-Famine Ireland. The emergence of the system occurred in four distinct phases, with the activities of different groups affecting the uptake of natio...

As a feature of the Fish Revolution (1400–1700), the early modern “invention” of the Grand Banks in literary and cartographical documents facilitated a massive and unprecedented extraction of cod from the waters of the north Atlantic and created the Cod/Sack trade Triangle. This overlapped with the southern Atlantic Slave, Sugar, and Tobacco Triangle to capitalise modern European and North American societies. In 1719, Pierre de Charlevoix claimed that the Grand Banks was “properly a mountain, hid under water,” and noted its cod population “seem to equal that of the grains of sand which cover this bank.” However, two centuries later in 1992, in the face of the collapse of the fishery, and fearing its extinction, a moratorium was placed on five centuries of harvesting Grand Banks cod. The invention and mining of its waters serves as a bellwether for the massive resource extractions of modernity that drive the current leviathan and “wicked problem” of global warming. The digital enviro...

The influence of Archbishop John McHale on the geography of national schools in the West of Ireland. In influencing the initial establishment of national schools and the subsequent withdrawal the actions of John McHale illustrate the emergence of the national system depended on the precise nature of social relations among different scales in Ireland.

The centralization of state power in pre-Famine Ireland enabled the British government to target the Irish social body under the pretext of reform. Institutional reform was part of a wider governmental rationale and resulted in the transformation of institutions such that their focus shifted to acting on the Irish social body more generally, with the intention of civilizing Irish subjects. In Ireland the transformation took on the added imputes of attempting to legitimize the British state as key actor in Irish society. The shift in focus of institutions in Ireland represents what Michel Foucault referred to as governmentality, with the British state aiming to " conduct the conduct " of the Irish population in order to provide security. One key institution was the establishment of a national education system pre-Famine Ireland. The establishment of the Commissioners of National Education in 1831 attempted to introduce a non-denominational education system in Ireland that would unite the children of different creeds in the same classroom. This paper examines this introduction of a national education system in Ireland as a governmental technology and the geography of the early years of the system. The system involved a central-local management system, with the Commissioners controlling regulations and local actors responsible for the operation of schools. The establishment and operation of national schools was therefore dependent on local networks of social relations developing common interests in accessing state capacities for education and therefore interacted with the rationale of the state. The placing of local actors under the regulations of the system, while also being placed under the surveillance of the British administration, resulted in the establishment and engineering of social norms that extended well beyond the walls of the schools. The introduction of national education therefore sought to reshape local social relations in line with the rationale of the state. The emerging geography of the system, with core regions of high and low national school densities, were therefore the result of the spatial variation of social relations and interactions with the state across the country. A case study of east Ulster is examined to provide an example of how the introduction of national education attempted to reshape local social relations and how those relations were also influenced by other social actors in pre-Famine Ireland. A n important element within the emerging research on the colonial contexts in Irish historical geography has been the legacy of colonial technologies, such as plantation, partition, and state institutions. Discussions around the nature of colonial technologies used by the British administration in nineteenth-century Ireland have focused on the " social engineering " of the Irish populations and have been examined in various cases; such as the policy of the British government in dealing with the Great Famine. 1 Many recent studies have depicted the British colonial administration of Ireland as an exemplar of what Michel Foucault called governmentality. 2 Governmentality refers to a range of practices and institutions intending the " conduct of conduct " of the population, shaping behavior according to a particular set of norms for a variety of ends. 3 Foucault states that power, and more specifically social power, is

The passing of the Act of Union of 1801 transferred the government of Ireland from Dublin to Westminster. This began the intensification of direct British influence on everyday life in Ireland. Increasing control from London manifested itself through a new rationale of government which resulted in various state-run institutions emerging in the Irish landscape which intended to manage and shape the behaviour of the population. This paper looks at one institution, national education, and how it emerged within the changing rationale for the government of Ireland. Foucault’s concept of governmentality is used to inform how national education was used as a technology of government aimed at shaping the conduct of the population in relation to certain objectives. The connection between the national education system in Ireland and education systems established in other parts of the empire is explored, bringing the concept of governmentality to a broader Imperial context. The geography of national education in Ireland, and the factors influencing school distribution, is investigated using geostatistical methods such as geographically weighted regression to observe how this example of the emerging rationale of government manifested itself in the landscape, and how other societal actors interacted and impacted on this state strategy.