Ailbhe Cullen, 1592130: From Radical Comrade to Diplomatic Republic: Ireland’s revolutionary juncture and the development of transnational radical solidarity, 1916 - 1939.

Abstract

The 1916 Easter Rising catalysed Ireland’s final revolution against the British Empire. Ireland’s position as the first colony of the British Empire enabled its mythologisation by Irish Republicans, who portrayed it as a beacon of anti-colonialism and anti-imperialism at the beginning of a period of global decolonisation. This MA thesis seeks to answer how relationships of solidarity between global anti-colonial and anti-imperial movements and Ireland developed during its revolutionary juncture, with a focus on leftist networks. This study examines how these dynamics were forged and nurtured. The Irish Republican movement’s international conceptualisation between 1916 and 1939 rapidly evolved, from radical activist to a symbolic memory evoked for rhetorical impact. This thesis examines how this conceptualisation emerged by analysing the interactions between Irish Republican activists and anti-colonial and anti-imperial figures in various movements, including those from India, Trinidad, and the Caribbean. The success of Ireland’s violent resistance of 1916 demanded the attention of international anti-colonialists and anti-imperialists; however, their attention was held for motivations such as political pragmatism and the networking of Irish Republican socialists. This evolving dynamic is not yet comprehensively studied in the historiography, a disparity this MA thesis seeks to rectify.