The Battle to Control Female Fertility in Modern Ireland
Published on 25. May 2023
Book
Paperback/Softback
348 pages
978-1-009-31487-9 (ISBN)
Description
The Irish battle for legal contraception was a contest over Irish exceptionalism: the belief that Ireland could resist global trends despite the impact of second-wave feminism, falling fertility, and a growing number of women travelling for abortion. It became so lengthy and so divisive because it challenged key tenets of Irish identity: Catholicism, large families, traditional gender roles, and sexual puritanism. The Catholic Church argued that legalising contraception would destroy this way of life, and many citizens agreed. The Battle to Control Female Fertility in Modern Ireland provides new insights on Irish masculinity and fertility control. It highlights women's activism in both liberal and conservative camps, and the consensus between the Catholic and Protestant churches views on contraception for single people. It also shows how contraception and the Pro-Life Amendment campaign affected policy towards Northern Ireland, and it examines the role of health professionals, showing how hospital governance prevented female sterilisation. It is a story of gender, religion, social change, and failing efforts to reaffirm Irish moral exceptionalism.
Reviews / Votes
'A magisterial survey, rich in archival material and full of surprises while deftly charting the various players and high stakes in the battle to control female fertility. Essential reading for those who want to understand why the 'Irish solution to an Irish problem' prevailed for as long as it did.' Alana Harris, King's College London 'Mary Daly's book is substantially more than an extended case history, examining as it does developments which reflected underlying currents and factors of social and political change in what had been, up to the mid-twentieth century, a society and a polity hall-marked by the regressive forces of poverty, emigration and overarching institutional power.' John Hogan, Dublin City University 'The Battle to Control Female Fertility in Modern Ireland offers a brilliantly detailed examination of the history of family planning in independent Ireland. Professor Daly rightly casts Ireland's convoluted and often controversial birth control reform process as a long contest between church, state, the medical profession, moral conservatism and individualism.' Diane Urquhart, Queen's University Belfast 'Daly's monograph provides an encyclopaedic magisterial account of the ways in which fertility control became the crucial litmus test for evaluating the strength of Catholic adherence in Ireland and, more broadly, the endurance of a distinctive Irish Catholic identity in the context of global social, demographic and cultural change. Daly demonstrates her expertise in historical research alongside her vibrant writing skills to bring the story of Ireland's family planning journey to life for the reader. This text is essential reading for scholars of religion, sex, and family planning, and especially those studying the intersection of all three.' Kristin Hay, Social HistoryMore details
Language
English
Place of publication
Cambridge
United Kingdom
Product notice
Paperback (trade)
Illustrations
Worked examples or Exercises
Dimensions
Height: 151 mm
Width: 230 mm
Thickness: 22 mm
Weight
522 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-009-31487-9 (9781009314879)
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Schweitzer Classification
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Additional editions
Book
05/2023
Cambridge University Press
€101.50
Shipment within 15-20 days
E-Book
05/2023
Cambridge University Press
€33.99
Available for download
Person
Mary E. Daly is Professor Emerita in Modern Irish History, University College Dublin. She is the author of ten books and co-author of eight edited volumes, including Sixties Ireland: Reshaping the Economy, State and Society, 1957-1973 (Cambridge, 2016) and, with Eugenio F. Biagini, The Cambridge Social History of Modern Ireland (2017). She was the first woman to serve as President of the Royal Irish Academy (2014-17) and was awarded a Royal Irish Academy Gold Medal in the Humanities in 2020.
Content
Introduction; 1. Late marriages and large families: 'the enigma of the modern world'; 2. The pill, the Pope and a changing Ireland; 3. 'A bitter blow: humanae vitae and Irish society, 1968-1973; 4. Contraception, access and opposition, 1973-80; 5. 'Against sin': an Irish family planning bill, 1973-79; 6. The 1983 Pro-Life Amendment; 7. 'Bona-Fide family planning': the 1980s and 1990s; Conclusions.