The recent dramatic decline in the economic fortunes of the Republic of Ireland have been all the more painful, because it followed the most rapid period of economic development ever witnessed in Irish economic history, when growth rates since the early-1990s surpassed those in the rest of Western Europe. With an unusual openness to international trade and capital flows and a relatively benign corporate tax regime and closer links to the American economy (in terms of investment and trade) than other parts of Western Europe, this growth was something of an aberration in a wider European context and requires explanation. This book provides a synthesis of recent research on Irish economic development, tracing the evolution of the economy since independence with particular reference to how the state sought to shape, regulate and deregulate economic activity to deal with the challenges posed by the wider international environment. In many ways, this book is a follow up to Bielenberg's Ireland and the Industrial Revolution, published by Routledge in 2009. Bielenberg and Ryan chart Ireland's economic progress, examining the unsuccessful attempts to promote economic growth from 1932 through import-substitution and protectionism, the policy frameworks developed in the 1950s and 1960s which sought to create a more open economy, Ireland's entry into the EEC in 1973 and the improvement of the country's economic performance, as well as Ireland's economic relationships with Europe, the USA and the UK.

This book provides a cogent summary of the economic history of the Irish Free State/Republic of Ireland. It takes the Irish story from the 1920s right through to the present, providing an excellent case study of one of many European states which obtained independence during and after the First World War. The book covers the transition to protectionism and import substitution between the 1930s and the 1950s and the second major transition to trade liberalisation from the 1960s. In a wider European context, the Irish experience since EEC entry in 1973 was the most extreme European example of the achievement of industrialisation through foreign direct investment. The eager adoption of successive governments in recent decades of a neo-liberal economic model, more particularly de-regulation in banking and construction, has recently led the Republic of Ireland to the most extreme economic crash of any western society since the Great Depression.

Selected from more than 1,000 interviews, this book presents edited interviews with individuals who had dreams about dead relatives or friends. Dreams about the Dead presents these interviews and the interviewees' descriptions of the dreams meaning in an attempt to show the importance of dreams to the grieving process. With extraordinary detail, the book examines these dreams and the impact of various factors-such as the relationship between the dreamer and the deceased, the dreamer's age and gender, and the cause of death-on the bereaved and their grieving process. Dreams About the Dead is an important study of how we manage grief unconsciously and the importance of our dreams in the healing process.