The Making of Ireland’s Carceral State
During the last century, the Irish state imprisoned a greater share of its population than any other country on Earth: not just for crimes against people or property, but for falling foul of a repressive moral code. The victims are still counting the cost.
An unidentified Magdalene laundry in Ireland in the early twentieth century. (Wikimedia Commons)
During the last century, church and state in Ireland built up a system of mass incarceration for women who didn’t follow a repressive sexual code. They also locked up countless children whose parents didn’t have a conventional relationship or simply didn’t have the money to look after them.
Violent abuse was pervasive throughout the system of industrial schools, Magdalene laundries, and mother and baby homes. After a long conspiracy of silence, Irish public life began coming to terms with this dark history from the 1990s. It is still a major political issue in Ireland today.
Sarah-Anne Buckley teaches history at the National University of Ireland, Galway. She is the author of The Cruelty Man: Child Welfare, the NSPCC and the State in Ireland, 1889–1956.
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