Ireland, Ireland

To the east of Ireland, separated by the Irish Sea, is the island of Great Britain. Politically, the state Ireland (described as the Republic of Ireland in cases of ambiguity) covers five-sixths of the island, with Northern Ireland, part of the United Kingdom, covering the remainder in the north-east.

Twenty-six of the counties are in the Republic of Ireland, and the remaining six (all in Ulster) are in Northern Ireland. Notably, based on boundaries established in the Early Modern period, Ulster and Northern Ireland are neither synonymous nor co-extensive, as three counties of Ulster (Cavan, Donegal and Monaghan) are part of the Republic. Nonetheless, 'Ulster' is often used colloquially as a synonym for Northern Ireland.

The creation of an all-island Association football league and a single international team (which is the case for rugby union) has been publicly touted by various prominent figures on the island in recent years, such as Irish government minister Dermot Ahern. BBC News, " Call for all-Ireland soccer team ", 19 January 2007 More recently, FAI chief executive John Delaney believes there will be an all-Ireland league, but not before 2012, as a contract involving the Eircom League and the FAI runs to 2011. BBC Sport, " All-Ireland warning from Delaney ", 17 January 2008 There is currently at least one player from Northern Ireland regularly appearing in the Republic of Ireland's squad, a practice that the latter's governing institution and the Irish government claim is permitted by the Belfast Agreement - although in reality there was apparently nothing to prevent the FAI from selecting players from Northern Ireland before the Agreement, since the Republic of Ireland's citizenship laws already extended north of the border. Nonetheless, Northern Ireland's governing body, the IFA, has raised the matter with the world governing body, FIFA, which appears to have ruled in favour of the Republic (although the matter remains unclear and therefore unresolved).

Some trade unions are also organised on an all-island basis and associated with the Irish Congress of Trades Unions (ICTU) in Dublin, while others in Northern Ireland are affiliated with the Trades Union Congress (TUC) in the United Kingdom, and some affiliate to both although such unions may organise in both parts of the island as well as in Great Britain. The Union of Students in Ireland (USI) organises jointly in Northern Ireland with the National Union of Students of the United Kingdom (NUS), under the name NUS-USI.

Six of these policy areas have been provided with implementation bodies, an example of which is the Food Safety Promotion Board. Tourism marketing is also managed on an all-Ireland basis, by Tourism Ireland.

World Socialist Web Site, " Ireland: Fianna Fail and SDLP float unity pact ", 1 February 2003 A significant number of newspapers on the island are circulated in both jurisdictions, (for eample, the Irish Times , The Irish Independent , The Sunday Business Post , The Irish Star and L Nua ) and report news on an all-Ireland basis. Others include Irish editions of tabloids such as : Ireland-based The Sunday World and the Irish editions of UK-based The News of The World . The Irish Times includes news concerning Northern Ireland in its "Home" section, despite the fact that it is based in the Republic. Notable exceptions to this include, The Belfast Telegraph and Sunday Life (although these titles are owned by Ireland-based Independent News and Media , publisher of The Irish Independent .) Other Irish Newspaper publishers like Independent News and Media and Thomas Crosbie Holdings publish local titles for townlands in both parts of Ireland. Furthermore, most of the television stations based on the island broadcast across the whole island, such as RT, TG4 and UTV (although signals may be relatively weaker in more remote areas).

Ireland is sometimes affected by heat waves, most recently 1995, 2003, 2006.

According to the WWF, the territory of Ireland can be subdivided into two ecoregions: the Celtic broadleaf forests and North Atlantic moist mixed forests.

Only 26 land mammal species are native to Ireland, because it was isolated from Europe by rising sea levels after the Ice Age. Some species, such as the red fox, hedgehog, and badger are very common, whereas others, like the Irish hare, red deer and pine marten are less so. Aquatic wild-life, such as species of turtle, shark, whale, and dolphin, are common off the coast. About 400 species of birds have been recorded in Ireland. Many of these are migratory, including the Barn Swallow. Most of Ireland's bird species come from Iceland, Greenland, Africa among other territories. There are no snakes in Ireland and only one reptile (the common lizard) is native to the country. Extinct species include the great Irish elk, the wolf, the great auk, and others. Some previously extinct birds, such as the Golden Eagle, have recently been reintroduced after decades of extirpation.

Much of the land is now covered with pasture, and there are many species of wild-flower. Gorse ( Ulex europaeus ), a wild furze, is commonly found growing in the uplands, and ferns are plentiful in the more moist regions, especially in the western parts of Ireland. It is home to hundreds of plant species, some of them unique to the island. The country has been "invaded" by some grasses, such as Spartina anglica . H. & J. Groves The algal and seaweed flora is that of the cold-temperate. The total number of species is:- Rhodophyta: 264; Heterokontophyta: 152; Chloropyta: 114; Cyanophyta: 31 giving a total of 574. Rarer species include: Itonoa marginifera (J.Ag.) Masuda & Guiry); Schmitzia hiscockiana Maggs and Guiry; Gelidiella calcicola Maggs & Guiry; Gelidium maggsiae Rico & Guiry and Halymenia latifolia P.Crouan & H.Crouan ex Ktzing.

Sea-levels were lower then, and Ireland, as with its neighbour Britain, rather than being islands, were part of a greater continental Europe. Mesolithic stone age inhabitants arrived some time after 8000 BC.

They are traditionally thought to have colonised Ireland in a series of waves between the 8th and 1st centuries BC, with the Gaels, the last wave of Celts, conquering the island and dividing it into five or more kingdoms. Many scientists and academic scholars now favour a view that emphasises cultural diffusion from overseas over significant colonisation such as what Clonycavan Man was reported to be.

The same chronicles record that Saint Patrick, Ireland's patron saint, arrived in 432.

In 1171, King Henry II of England came to Ireland, using the 1155 Bull Laudabiliter issued to him by then Pope Adrian IV, to claim sovereignty over the island, and forced the Cambro-Norman warlords and some of the Gaelic Irish kings to accept him as their overlord. From the 13th century, English law began to be introduced. By the late thirteenth century the Norman-Irish had established the feudal system throughout most of lowland Ireland. Their settlement was characterised by the establishment of baronies, manors, towns and large land-owning monastic communities, and the county system. The towns of Dublin, Cork, Wexford, Waterford, Limerick, Galway, New Ross, Kilkenny, Carlingford, Drogheda, Sligo, Athenry, Arklow, Buttevant, Carlow, Carrick-on-Suir, Cashel, Clonmel, Dundalk, Enniscorthy, Kildare, Kinsale, Mullingar, Naas, Navan, Nenagh, Thurles, Wicklow, Trim and Youghal were all under Norman-Irish control.

The medieval English presence in Ireland was deeply shaken by Black Death, which arrived in Ireland in 1348.

This resulted in the complete conquest of Ireland by 1603 and the final collapse of the Gaelic social and political superstructure at the end of the 17th century, as a result of English and Scottish Protestant colonisation in the Plantations of Ireland, and the Wars of the Three Kingdoms and the Williamite War in Ireland. Approximately 600,000 people, nearly half the Irish population, died during the Cromwellian conquest of Ireland.

The new English Protestant ruling class was known as the Protestant Ascendancy. Towards the end of the 18th century the entirely Anglican Irish Parliament attained a greater degree of independence from the British Parliament than it had previously held. Under the penal laws no Irish Catholic could sit in the Parliament of Ireland, even though some 90% of Ireland's population was native Irish Catholic when the first of these bans was introduced in 1691. This ban was followed by others in 1703 and 1709 as part of a comprehensive system disadvantaging the Catholic community, and to a lesser extent Protestant dissenters.

The Anglo-Irish Treaty recognised the two-state solution created in the Government of Ireland Act 1920. Northern Ireland was presumed to form a home rule state within the new Irish Free State unless it opted out. Northern Ireland had a majority Protestant population and opted out as expected, choosing to remain part of the United Kingdom, incorporating, however, within its border a significant Catholic and nationalist minority. A Boundary Commission was set up to decide on the boundaries between the two Irish states, though it was subsequently abandoned after it recommended only minor adjustments to the border. Disagreements over some provisions of the treaty led to a split in the nationalist movement and subsequently to the Irish Civil War. The Civil War ended in 1923 with the defeat of the anti-treaty forces.

The minority refused to accept the result and this resulted in the Irish Civil War, which lasted until 1923. On 6 December 1922, in the middle of the Civil War, the Irish Free State came into being. During its early years the new state was governed by the victors of the Civil War. However, in the 1930s Fianna Fil, the party of the opponents of the treaty, was elected into government. The party proposed, and the electorate accepted in a referendum in 1937, a new constitution which renamed the state " ire or in the English language, Ireland " (article 4 of the Constitution).

It offered some assistance to the Allies, especially in Northern Ireland. It is estimated BBC History of Northern Ireland that around 50,000 volunteers from ire /Ireland joined the British armed forces during the Second World War. In 1949, Ireland declared itself to be a republic.

From 1921 until 1972, Northern Ireland enjoyed limited self-government within the United Kingdom, with its own parliament and prime minister.

Although the Irish Free State was neutral during World War II, Northern Ireland as part of the United Kingdom was not, and became involved in the British war effort (albeit without military conscription as it was introduced in Great Britain). Belfast suffered a bombing raid from the German Luftwaffe in 1941.

Other groups, on both the unionist side and the nationalist side, participated in the violence and the period known as "The Troubles" began, resulting in over 3600 Religion, Identity & Politics Northern Ireland Conflict & Resolution, 1969-2005 - NYU department of history deaths over the subsequent three decades. Owing to the civil unrest during "The Troubles", the British government suspended home rule in 1972 and imposed "direct rule" from Westminster.

In 1998, following a Provisional IRA ceasefire and multi-party talks, the Belfast Agreement was concluded and ratified by referendum. This agreement attempted to restore self-government to Northern Ireland on the basis of power-sharing between the two communities. Violence decreased greatly after the signing of the accord, and on 28 July 2005, the Provisional IRA announced the end of its armed campaign and international weapons inspectors supervised what they currently regard as the full decommissioning of the Provisional IRA's weapons. http://cain.ulst.ac.uk/events/peace/decommission/iicd190106.pdf The power-sharing assembly was suspended several times but restored from 8 May 2007.

Noted particularly is Ireland's contributions to fiber optics technology and related technologies.

More recently, Ireland has produced four winners of the Nobel Prize for Literature: George Bernard Shaw, William Butler Yeats, Samuel Beckett and Seamus Heaney. Although not a Nobel Prize winner, James Joyce is widely considered one of the most significant writers of the 20th century; Samuel Beckett himself refused to attend his own Nobel award ceremony, in protest of Joyce not having received the award. Joyce's 1922 novel Ulysses is considered one of the most important works of Modernist literature, and his life is celebrated annually on 16 June in Dublin as the Bloomsday celebrations.

Together with Hurling and Rugby, they make up the four biggest team sports in Ireland. Gaelic Football is the most popular in terms of match attendance and community involvement, Irish Government Website Culture and Sport Information http://www.irlgov.ie and the All-Ireland Football Final is the biggest day in Ireland's sporting calendar. Association football, meanwhile, is the most commonly played team sport in Ireland and the most popular sport in which Ireland fields international teams.

The GAA is organised on an all-Ireland basis with all 32 counties competing. The headquarters of the GAA (and the main stadium) is located at the 82,500 capacity Croke Park in north Dublin. Major GAA games are played there, including the semi-finals and finals of the All-Ireland Senior Football Championship and All-Ireland Senior Hurling Championship. During the redevelopment of the Lansdowne Road stadium, international rugby and soccer are played there.

The game has been played in Ireland since the 1860s (Cliftonville F.C. of Belfast being Ireland's oldest club) but remained a minority sport outside of Ulster until the 1880s. However, some clubs based outside Belfast felt that the IFA largely favoured Ulster-based, Protestant clubs in such matters as selection for the national team. Following an incident in which, despite an earlier promise, the IFA, for security reasons, moved an Irish Cup final replay from Dublin to Belfast, the clubs based in what would soon become the Free State set up a new Football Association of the Irish Free State (FAIFS) - now known as the Football Association of Ireland (FAI) - in 1921. Despite being initially blacklisted by the Home Nations' associations, the FAI was recognised by FIFA in 1923 and organised its first international fixture in 1926 (against Italy). However, both the IFA and FAI continued to select their teams from the whole of Ireland, with some players earning international caps for matches with both teams. Both also referred to their respective teams as "Ireland". In 1950, FIFA directed the associations only to select players from within their respective territories, and in 1953 FIFA further clarified that the FAI's team was to be known only as "Republic of Ireland", and the IFA's team only as "Northern Ireland" (with certain exceptions). Northern Ireland qualified for the World Cup finals in 1958 (reaching the quarter-finals), 1982 and 1986. Team Republic qualified for the World Cup finals in 1990 (reaching the quarter-finals), 1994, 2002 and the European Championships in 1988. The IFA still retains all-Ireland cups and trophies at its Belfast HQ.

Irish rugby has become increasingly competitive at both the international and provincial levels since the sport went professional in 1994. During that time, Ulster (1999 The Fourth Heineken Cup Final ) and Munster (2006 Munster fulfil their destiny and 2008) Munster claim second Heineken Cup have both won the Heineken Cup. The Ireland cricket team was among the associate nations which qualified for the 2007 Cricket World Cup, where it defeated Pakistan and finished second in its pool, earning a place in the Super 8 stage of the competition.

Greyhound racing and horse racing are both popular in Ireland: greyhound stadiums are well attended and there are frequent horse race meetings. The Republic is noted for the breeding and training of race horses and is also a large exporter of racing dogs. The horse racing sector is largely concentrated in the central east of the Republic. Boxing is also an all-island sport governed by the Irish Amateur Boxing Association. In 1992, Michael Carruth won a gold medal for boxing in the Barcelona Olympic Games. Irish athletics has seen some development in recent times, with Sonia O'Sullivan winning two notable medals at 5,000 metres; gold at the 1995 World Championships and silver at the 2000 Sydney Olympics. Gillian O'Sullivan won silver in the 20k walk at the 2003 World Championships, while sprint hurdler Derval O'Rourke won gold at the 2006 World Indoor Championship in Moscow.

In recent years, Bundoran has hosted European championship surfing. The south-west of Ireland, such as the Dingle Peninsula and Lahinch, also has surf beaches. Scuba diving is increasingly popular in Ireland with clear waters and large populations of sea life, particularly along the western seaboard. There are also many shipwrecks along the coast of Ireland, with some of the best wreck dives being in Malin Head and off the County Cork coast. With thousands of lakes, over of fish bearing rivers, and over of coastline, Ireland is a popular angling destination. The temperate Irish climate is suited to sport angling. While salmon and trout fishing remain popular with anglers, salmon fishing in particular received a boost in 2006 with the closing of the salmon driftnet fishery. Coarse fishing continues to increase its profile. Sea angling is developed with many beaches mapped and signposted, and in recent times the range of sea angling species has increased.

The largest is the Anglican Church of Ireland. The Irish Muslim community is growing, mostly through increased immigration (see Islam in Ireland). The island also has a small Jewish community (see History of the Jews in Ireland), although this has declined somewhat in recent years. Over 4% of the Republic's population describe themselves as of no religion.

All three languages are spoken on both sides of the border. In recent decades, with the increase of immigration on an all-Ireland basis, many more languages have been introduced, particularly deriving from Asia and Eastern Europe, such as Chinese, Polish, Russian, Turkish and Latvian.

Dublin Airport is the busiest airport in Ireland, carrying over 22 million passengers per year; a new terminal and runway is now under construction, costing over 2 billion. All provide services to Great Britain and continental Europe, while Belfast International, Dublin, Shannon and Ireland West (Knock) also offer a range of transatlantic services. Shannon was once an important stopover on the trans-Atlantic route for refuelling operations and, with Dublin, is still one of the Ireland's two designated transatlantic gateway airports.

Scheduled services from these regional points are mostly limited to the rest of Ireland and Great Britain.

Services in Northern Ireland are sparse in comparison to the rest of Ireland or Britain. A large railway network was severely curtailed in the 1950s and 1960s (in particular by the Ulster Transport Authority). The current situation includes suburban services to Larne, Newry and Bangor, as well as services to Derry. There is also a branch from Coleraine to Portrush. Waterside Station in Derry is the main railway station for Derry as well as County Donegal in Ireland, which no longer has a rail network.

Most of Ireland's gas now comes through the interconnectors with a decreasing supply from the Kinsale field. The Corrib Gas Field off the coast of County Mayo has yet to come online, and is facing some localised opposition over the controversial decision to refine the gas onshore.

It is predicted to generate 10% of Ireland's energy needs when it is complete. These constructions have in some cases been delayed by opposition from locals, most recently on Achill Island, some of whom consider the wind turbines to be unsightly. Another issue in the Republic of Ireland is the failure of the aging network to cope with the varying availability of power from such installations. The ESB's Turlough Hill is the only energy storage mechanism in Ireland.

Fianna Fil abandoned free trade and put up protective tariffs on almost all manufactured products. In June, 1932 De Valera withheld land annuities, which dated back to the land acts of the 18th and early 19th century, which were until then paid to the British Government. Britain responded by placing tariffs on Irish exports of livestock and by-products. In turn De Valera imposed duties on British coal. This developed into an 'economic war' known as the Anglo-Irish Trade War. The economic war resulted in widespread hardship for Irish farming, which was the backbone of the economy, and which relied on exports to English cities for a market. The tariffs resulted in price increases for many essential manufactured goods, and an increase in the cost of living. High unemployment in richer English speaking countries made emigration from Ireland less of an option, decreasing wages. At this time many Irish industries were established, based of low wages, and protectionist barriers. With the British anticipating war, and the Irish in a dire financial situation, the trade war ended in 1938, with the British agreeing to discontinue land annuity payments from Irish farmers. Fianna Fil established many semi-state organizations for the purposes of utilizing national resources, and marshalling larger scale industries. At this time the Irish economy enjoyed a stable period.

This was a period of great concern, with considerable social heamorrhaging taking place in rural Ireland in particular. In the early 1960s, the new Fianna Fil leader Sen Lemass abandoned its previous protectionist policies, and embarked on a programme of economic reform. Serious efforts were made to attract inward investment from the United States in particular, and to a lesser extent West Germany, and Japan. Purpose built industrial estates were developed in most large towns. Rural Electrification, the division of large estates, and agricultural scientific education resulted in dramatic increases in agricultural output in the 1960s. In 1972, second level education was made free and compulsory. Ireland applied to join the European Economic Community, gaining entry in 1973 along with Britain.

However, poor management of the state finances was being addressed with repeated increases in taxation of all beneficial activity, until employment became less attractive than welfare. At the same time it was found that Irish industry was completely unprepared for competition that arose as a result of free trade with continental Europe. Ireland's heavy industries, located primarily in Cork, almost disappeared between 1982 and 1984. Agriculture, the only sector of the economy which was competitive at this stage, was constrained by production quotas, and prevented from taking up the slack in the economy. At the same time Ireland was producing its first generation where university education was widely attained. There was mass unemployment, with many people with tertiary education working minimum wage jobs or being out of work. Emigration returned to 50,000 per year. From 1982 to 1986 the national debt had doubled, mostly due to stabilisation policies like welfare, gigantic subsidies to semistate organisations and public utilities, and an effort to reduce inflation and stabilise the currency.

From 2002, this was augmented by low interest rates set by the European Central Bank which encourage private sector consumption. In July 2006, a survey undertaken by Bank of Ireland Private Banking showed that, of the top 8 leading OECD nations, the Republic of Ireland was ranked the second wealthiest per capita country in the world, showing an average wealth per head of nearly 150,000 (~ $190,000).

Source: Wikipedia > Ireland