'History, Identity and Politics': Speech by Taoiseach Micheál Martin at the Royal Irish Academy

Dublin, Wednesday 30 November 2022

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President, thank you for the invitation to address the Academy today. This is a topic which is fundamental to who we are, but it is actually rarely addressed outside of academic debates. As we approach the end of a decade-long programme to commemorate various centenaries this is a very good moment to take a broader perspective on whether and in what ways our views of history are evolving.

In an increasingly populist age, with different conceptions of nationalism evident in Europe and throughout the world, how are we reflecting on our history in our national identities and in our politics?

More pointedly, are we making enough effort to examine a widening gap between work which presents a complex view of our history and a wider reality where symbolic gestures are not followed by broadening our sense of our past and our identity?

Are we actually including within our identity and politics a view of history which includes all Irish people?

This has undoubtedly been an unprecedented period of academic reflection on key events in our modern history and it has been combined with a broad range of public engagement activities. This is in many ways a golden age for Irish historical research and for public access to this research.

An important aspect of this has been the state’s approach to planning and funding these commemorations – an approach which has been implemented in a spirit of allowing lost and new perspectives to emerge.

In this we have aimed to achieve a balance which is fundamental but which many countries struggle with. This is the balance between the right of every country to mark its formative events and figures, with the fact that no liberal democracy can ever insist on a uniform national narrative.

To be both inclusive and diverse – to acknowledge what we share and how we differ – remains perhaps the greatest challenge to democratic societies in our modern world.

This has been seen throughout Europe in recent years. Remembrance of the events of a hundred years ago has included a war of immense destruction, genocide, the end of historic empires, the largest period of state formation ever recorded and extended civil conflict.

It is clear that many of the issues which we have confronted in our debates have been far from unique. However, there is another dimension which has particular potency in Ireland.

Emerging from those tumultuous times a century ago was an island which saw a core sectarian divide entrenched between and within the separate jurisdictions which were put in place.

Thankfully we did not experience the mass expulsions and population transfers by which many European countries became the nation states which we recognise today.

Our island has remained a shared space but one with deep divisions to overcome.

For all of the immense progress which we have achieved, we have not yet secured a lasting understanding and reconciliation between radically different views of Irish identity.

Unfortunately, there is rising evidence that many still refuse to see the need to find a place within our historical narrative for elements which are important to other groups. The rhetoric of inclusion and respect is all too often a tactic rather than something which is practiced in all situations.

Symbolic gestures are only important if they are followed by a new approach, and all too often this is not what has happened.

With a growing tendency in modern societies to angry and noisy debate, to polarisation and for the gradual disappearance of a shared public square, history is as important as ever in how we frame our identity and influence politics.

In general, in public debates in Ireland we increasingly have a tendency towards a populist framing of issues – a framing which promotes sharp divisions and sharper judgements of others.

This in turn has inevitable implications for how we frame our history and how this influences our sense of identity.

We are in many wonderful ways a more diverse and tolerant country than we were in the past – but it is a sad fact that if you refuse to conform with the agenda and language of the loudest groups you are today more likely than twenty years ago to be called a ‘Shoneen’ or a ‘Lundy’. The exceptional complexity of our history is often pushed aside so that there is little evidence left of the understanding and reconciliation which remains the great challenge of our time.

When used in one situation a uniform narrative of how to view our history and our identity can be a source of great belonging and strength. It can be a comfort to know that others believe exactly as you do, share the same heroes and are inspired by the same symbols.

Yet, as scholars have repeatedly shown, over time this group identity can become a source of exclusion and division.

Psychologists have for many years addressed this and held that healthy groups are defined not just by the strength of support within the group but also the ability to see the perspectives of others.

The great French historian Marc Bloch explored the dangers of the contemporary misuse of history and his words remain as relevant as ever. Writing in 1942, as he hid from the Nazi and Vichy authorities who would soon find and execute him, Bloch asked:

The same idea and the same warning is to be found in many works of Irish history over the years. For example, John Curry, writing in the eighteenth century, spoke of the use of history “to oppress the living by the abuse of the dead.”

This was not a call for a suspension of all judgement of the past, but rather an appeal for a greater openness and a commitment to not exploit historical grievances to sharpen contemporary divisions. It is a reminder that a diverse history cannot be understood in monochrome – but only in colour and shade.

What I would like to do today is to reflect on how, as a country, we have been approaching historical remembrance – and the limitations of this in terms of the linkage of historical narratives and our popular political discourse.

Within this, I would like to ask whether we see our history in terms of evolution or a fixed path?

How far do we allow within our shared identity the full diversity of Irishness?

I will approach this firstly through looking at some of the ways in which the presentation of history has shaped Irish identities in the past – and what I think are the biggest challenges which this reveals.

Moving from the distant past to recent events, I will then address the issue of our state commemorations and what we can learn from the past decade.

On a more personal level, as a party leader and as Taoiseach I have taken many opportunities, such as this, to speak about events and personalities in our past. I have sought to use these in a very direct way to address how they link to the concerns of today. I would like to explain the themes and approaches I have been emphasising and why I believe it is important for political leaders to use history responsibly.

Finally, I want to suggest that we have not yet fully embraced the need for our identity to be more diverse.

We are seeing today calls for a recognition of parallel histories which allow each group to carry on without change – to embed an inflexible justification for the past.

This stands in contrast to the harder work of recognising a shared history - a history which challenges us to find the complexity and self-reflection which is essential if we are ever to truly overcome division.

Rather than focusing on how we look at specific events, I would like to outline a series of principles which I think we should follow in order to ensure that our engagement with history and how this influences our identity and politics is genuinely reflective, rigorous and inclusive.

Before I do this I would like to acknowledge the work of the Academy in this field and in particular the 1922 collection edited by Fearghal McGarry and Darragh Gannon which we are marking today.

This book is a great testament to a new generation of Irish historians which is doing so much to make our past more accessible and intelligible. In succinct chapters which focus on specific events, institutions and social realities, its great strength is that it seeks to both engage and challenge the reader.

In a manner which is both rigorous and to the point it shows us a defining year in our history – a year which simply cannot be understood by accepting a traditional and limited narrative.

What particularly impresses me is that it combines familiar events and personalities with little-known voices and experiences from many different parts of Irish society.

It does not demand that we accept one framing of what is important and it illustrates the vital necessity for history which includes very different approaches.

The link to primary sources and further research encourages the reader to inform themselves and to become a participant in historical reflection rather than just a passive recipient of the judgements of others.

Personally, I am very happy to see the number of contributors who have in the past been recipients of Government of Ireland Studentships and Fellowships.

This was a scheme which I put in place under the leadership of your former Vice-President Maurice Bric.

The core idea was that we needed a mechanism to fund excellent researchers in the humanities and social sciences, and to do this through rigorous and independent processes. The evidence is again clear that support for historical research is an immense public good and essential to a strong national debate.

I want to congratulate the Academy, the editors and the contributors for their work on what is an important contribution to a new approach to Irish history – one which will hopefully continue growing in influence in the years ahead.

I think it is also important to acknowledge the wider role and history of the Academy –one of our most significant all-island institutions. Core to the Academy’s role is that it is an independent and self-governing community of scholars.

Over nearly two and a half centuries the Academy has played a consistent and often unappreciated part not only in key debates but also in the preservation and opening-up of aspects of our past which are widely seen as core to our identity.

For example, the collection of Celtic and early-Christian gold and silver held by the National Museum is one of our greatest national treasures. Images of torques and chalices are found in every publication and on every website which looks at Irish culture. They are a source of pride and part of a story of the uniqueness of the culture of our island. Yet behind this, there is a more interesting and very contemporary story to be told.

The single biggest reason why these treasures are intact and on public display is that people, as it happens overwhelmingly Protestant and Anglo-Irish, worked to stop them being melted down to make jewellery when they were discovered by farmers and others going about their daily business.

They gradually brought many of the items together as the Academy’s Museum of Irish Antiquities – placed on public display here in this room.

When the National Museum was founded it was part of the creation of similar state institutions in Cardiff and Edinburgh. The core collections of the national museums derived from effectively parcelling-out some of the stores in the British Museum in London.

What made the Dublin museum unique from the start was the now permanent loan by the Academy of this collection – a collection which has been steadily added to and is a source of immense national pride.

This long tradition of the Academy as a leader in opening up the diversity of our past has continued consistently over the years. I was very happy as Minister for Education to agree to a request by James McGuire to fund a major expansion of the work of the Academy’s Dictionary of Irish Biography. The case made then was that the Dictionary was needed to provide a trusted resource which would make Ireland and the lives of the Irish accessible to all.

What is especially impressive is how the Dictionary has evolved, becoming a living resource which not only records the more recently deceased but actively seeks opportunities to show us people who had previously not been part of our historical memory.

It is perhaps one of the first times that such a national resource has been created which does not seek to be a fixed monument of scholarship at a point of time, but rather to expand and to evolve our understanding of our past.

Time and again in our history we can see examples of cultural elements which are seen as a fixed part of the story of one type of Irish identity actually emerging in a very different way.

If we look at early efforts to write down the Irish language, to preserve the uniquely Irish music of former centuries or to record the folk tales and traditions of dispersed communities, we find men and women who do not conform to any national stereotype.

The division of society into ‘the Gael and the Gall’ is a construct which describes certain moments in history – but it distorts far more than it illustrates when used to frame Irish history as a whole.

As Richard Bourke has pointed out, over many centuries you will find in Irish historical writing both assertions of a continuous narrative and scepticism towards the credibility of such a continuous narrative.

The same can be said about presenting both a diverse island and an island defined by one identity. Bourke refers to these factors as representing a fallacy of continuity and a fallacy of composition – and suggests that it is here that we find the main points of controversy in how we see our history.

I find this idea persuasive on many levels, though I would add to it.

I think this tension between promoting a fixed and narrow narrative versus an evolving and broader picture of our history is itself a very distinct part of our Irish identity. It’s not just that we have constantly used history to establish, reinforce or challenge distinct traditions, we have done this in a way which is very different from many countries.

The distinct Irish protestant and then unionist tradition used historical memory in a profoundly political way to present narratives of insecurity, difference, superiority and danger.

Temple, Musgrave and Froude are just a few of the names we remember of those who built the idea of a thread of consistent themes and opposites. However, this consistency is far from absolute.

Temple was writing at a time when there was very real uncertainty about the ability of the community to survive. Musgrave can be seen as a rebuke to those who were foolish enough to believe that peace was possible in Ireland. Froude, writing at the time of disestablishment and home rule agitation, is a demand that Ireland be seen as an imperial possession rather than an equal nation in a united kingdom.

Each of these histories was influential in its own way, particularly because of the ability to redefine the tradition and the political objectives they were promoting.

You also find a near constant evolution in what I believe is reasonably defined as nationalist sentiment even when applied to times when that concept had not been fully developed.

When John Curry wrote in defence of Irish Catholics in the mid eighteenth century he both defended the virtues of Irish culture and asserted the possibility of being loyal subjects of a non-Irish monarch.

But this narrative soon changed.

This is radically different from the new narrative which emerges post-1798 and the Act of Union.

The world’s first mass political movement came together in the cause of Catholic rights and then the return of a separate Irish state. That rising nationalism and ultimately republican nationalism involved what was at times a radically evolving use of history and its reflection in contemporary identity.

One thing certainly shared by the full range of historical narratives, irrespective of religion or allegiance, is that over time there grew a willingness to acknowledge that both sides were Irish – or at the very least had become a permanent part of Ireland.

While this is not something which appears to have been studied extensively, it would be worth exploring how far this contrasted with rising nationalisms of that time.

If we look at the great figures of nineteenth century Irish nationalism and nationalist republicanism, we find a remarkable diversity in terms of their backgrounds, the ways they talked about Irish history, their political objectives and the means which they used to promote them.

And within this is a point which we far too rarely admit – which is how these often radically different strands were important to each other and demonstrated the almost constant and dramatic evolution of how Irishness was talked about and used as a basis for political and cultural activism.

Yet, in spite of this, how often are towering figures such as O’Connell and Parnell reduced to afterthoughts because we find it difficult to include them within a seamless narrative which leads to and from our revolution? And while we talk about diverse traditions as being part of our history, can it really be said that we respect this in our sense of what makes us Irish?

In all countries the state plays a central role in promoting and supporting historical commemoration. Most have a fixed origin story which revolves around the triumph of national sentiment or a revolutionary moment which defines the nation.

There are, of course, places which are more complicated - where events are still contested or where there is an uncertainty about the future.

The importance of building a strong shared historical narrative can be seen in the fact that invaders always start by seeking to delegitimise the separate history of their intended victims.

We have seen this again in Ukraine, where Putin and his propagandists have sought for years to promote the idea that this nation of 44 million people has no historical legitimacy. Tragically there are even those representing our country in elected office who have supported what they see as the historical right of an imperial power to control the destinies of neighbours.

The fierce urgency of history in sustaining national identity and sovereignty – and also the very positive role which historians can play – is to be found in the lecture series on Ukraine’s history which Yale Professor Timothy Snyder has been delivering in recent months.

It is academically rigorous and it is uncomfortable for chauvinists - it is no one-sided history. But it has been seen by the Ukrainian people as a great support in their time of need.

In recent days the 90th anniversary of the beginning of the Holodomor genocide against Ukraine has been commemorated. It is noteworthy that in those areas of Ukraine under the control of Russian forces it is illegal to even mention the very existence of a state-imposed famine which caused five million deaths.

The right to know and to debate your history is not something which we should ever take for granted – and we should be slow to allow those we disagree with to be shouted down.

The programme of our decade of commemorations may well be unique in terms of its duration, how it was shaped and the diversity of the events which it has marked.

Ireland began a new approach to commemoration when it marked the Great Famine and the Rebellion of 1798 during the 1990s. As well as holding relatively traditional state occasions, funding was put in place for supporting academic conferences and local initiatives.

1998 was particularly important because of the mixture of sensitivity and pride shown in Wexford and other places where there were major public events. There was an understanding of both the inspiring and the dark elements of the Rebellion. It was accepted we could not project backwards the values, expectations and behaviours of our time, and that we could acknowledge the different meaning of those events to different parts of our community.

In terms of scholarship, it was the first time that a wider audience engaged with how dramatic the evolution was in the political beliefs of the majority. It was shown how the end of looking for a ‘prince beyond the seas’ and the move towards a more modern political consciousness was a transformative moment.

The military parade to mark the 90th anniversary of 1916 was another milestone in commemoration. It showed a positive and communal spirit in which there is no contradiction between honouring both the struggles of the past and the very changed opportunities which they enabled.

It was in light of this that there was a very high level of confidence that we could find a way to mark the complex range of upcoming centenaries in a meaningful and constructive manner. In 2011, then Taoiseach Enda Kenny approached me about maintaining a cross party approach to this and I was very happy to agree.

The work of the expert committee which was put in place proposed a series of recommendations about appropriate events to commemorate and for the balance to be struck between state commemoration, academic reflection and local activities.

We were very lucky to have as Chair and Deputy Chair Maurice Manning and Martin Mansergh – members of the Academy and historians who had been elected to both houses of the Oireachtas.

The body of activity over the past 10 years is so broad that it has not yet been brought together. There are many highlights which stand out.

A new effort to include within our remembrance the terrible losses of the First World War has made a permanent impact.

2016 saw many moments of national and local pride. The centenary of the establishment of Dáil Éireann was a reminder of an enduring democratic spirit.

More recently we have been marking the dramatic events of the year which followed the signing of the Treaty on December 6th 1921.

Participation in the commemorations has been widespread and has involved a very positive spirit.

In the succession of conferences which have been held, it is impossible to miss how, as the decade has gone on, the agendas have broadened. They now habitually include new perspectives, including from Europe and giving a meaningful voice to overlooked groups.

I also think we have finally reached a point where the recognition of both the role and treatment of women in our history is being recognised far beyond the old narratives.

The centrality of women to the victory of separatism in the 1918 election and the propaganda directed against women in public life in 1922 are now central to our understanding of those times. Yet the release this week of the military service pension files for 1,634 women reinforces the exciting scale of what we have still to learn.

As the leader of a political party founded by men and women who were central to our revolution, I have always understood that part of my role is to reflect on the tradition which we belong to. As a result, commemoration events have always been an important part of my diary.

A very significant extra dimension has been added to this during my time as Taoiseach.

I have long believed that there is no positive purpose to be served by trying to promote a one-dimensional and partisan picture of our past.

We need to make time for serious reflection on our past if we are to have a politics which goes beyond the search for headlines and victory in whatever is the issue of the day.

My staff have regularly pointed out to me that the surest way to have no impact in today’s media world is to deliver a long and thoughtful speech. They may indeed be right in this, but I believe we have an obligation to take the time to engage in fundamental issues in far more depth than is allowed in brief statements and partisan debates.

During the commemorations I have sought to explore a number of themes which I think jump out from our history and which should still guide us.

When I accepted the very generous invitation of the Collins family and the Michael Collins Commemoration Committee to speak at Beal na Blath in August my objective was not to pass judgement on the events of 1922 but to reflect on what we can learn from them and the scale of the change achieved over 100 years.

It was not about trying to minimise political divisions, but rather to both respect their legitimacy and note what we share.

I believe that, in a world where we are under ever more pressure to embrace stark divisions, we can only actually understand our history by recognising its complexity and seeing it in the context of its time.

It is possible, indeed essential, to be able to combine a pride in your own tradition with rejecting the idea that you must keep alive the divisions and methods of the past.

It is in truth a deeply pessimistic view of history to see it as an unbroken chain, where each generation passes on the divisions and methods which it inherited, or where events of the past are viewed as indistinguishable from the present.

Where I find hope and a positive message is in the remarkable volume of evidence that our history, and the identity which it informs, is constantly evolving. One where each generation seeks to create new opportunities for the next – where divisions can be both respected and overcome.

It is in this that I find the greatest relevance, indeed the greatest challenge, to our generation.

The Good Friday Agreement, to use Seamus Mallon’s wonderful phrase, was not an end in itself but rather a new dispensation – an opportunity to build the sense of community without which we cannot overcome the sectarianism which has blighted our history.

With an agreed framework for governing relations on this island and for deciding on constitutional questions, the Agreement challenged us all to get on with the harder work of building understanding and reconciliation. It created the space where not every conversation had to be viewed through the lens of one big issue.

In reality we have squandered much of the time given to us by the Agreement. Whatever way you look at it we have not succeeded in creating the breadth and depth of understanding we hoped for.

The evidence is that we know too little of each other.

North and South, and between communities, we have often not got beyond symbolic statements. Instead of building a sense of how we can understand a shared Irishness, what we have been seeing is a growing tendency to push the idea of parallel histories – histories which mean we can honour our own and keep alive and unchanged our sense of ourselves.

As historians such as Ian McBride have written, at a popular level there has been an attempt to make historical narratives more partisan and more entrenched. This narrative is of course overwhelmingly focused on justifying actions repeatedly rejected by the majority of the Irish people.

And while I instinctively recoil from the tendency to talk about ‘both sides’, this really is something where the extremes on both sides have sought to mainstream their historical narratives.

Before we can begin to understand each other we must acknowledge how little we know about each other and how little we have done as a society to address this.

The great Indian Nobel Laureate Amartya Sen has written extensively about the role of reason in allowing us to shape our identities. As a young man he experienced the catastrophic effects of partition and the struggles of a state to address sectarian conflict.

For Sen, and many others who have studied this, it falls to each of us individually to accept our responsibility for the choices we make about how we see others.

On a day to day basis, on this small island, both North and South and within each jurisdiction we engage with different media. We have many opinions about groups to which we do not belong, but we actually know little of them.

This is why the Shared Island Initiative is such a priority for me. Whatever your political position is, and whatever your identity is, the absolute starting point for securing peace and reconciliation on our island is for us to know each other better.

We need to move beyond making assumptions about each other and to start a systematic engagement.

To take just one example, it is remarkable that until recent months we did not have a detailed comparative review of critical education and health services North and South.

What is a great source of hope for me is the enthusiasm for this work which we are seeing in communities and amongst groups eager to find ways of achieving progress through cooperation.

The scale and high quality of projects submitted for the Shared Island research funding shows the incredible potential there is for work which benefits institutions and students throughout the island.

I think we need to embrace this spirit and go much further. In Dublin we have to do much better in engaging with the North outside of times of crisis – we have to start hearing the full diversity of voices in the North and reject the idea that everything must be framed in a particular political way.

We need to invest in making meaningful exchanges between schools and communities open to far more people.

We need our media and our politicians to move on from only considering other communities when there is a crisis.

I am today, as much as ever before, convinced of the incredible future we could have together in an Ireland which united its diverse communities.

In terms of prosperity, creativity and inclusion, I know that we could be a powerful example for other countries. However, I completely reject the idea that this could ever be achieved by seeking the victory of one tradition over another.

And in this we are confronted by our failure to move from rhetoric to the reality of challenging how we define our Irish identity.

For those of us who are nationalists, how far have we actually gone in engaging with the fact that others who we see as Irish do not share our narrative?

How far do we accept as part of Irish identity symbols which do not stir the emotions of the group to which we belong?

A genuine conversation about our shared future must start with an acknowledgement of how much we all must do to include within our understanding of Irish history the diversity and change which has been so central to it.

As we draw near the end of our decade of commemorations, let us learn the lesson of how much we can be enriched when we are genuinely open to engaging with all of our histories and the threads which bind them as uniquely Irish.