- Home
- Publications
- Irish Foreign Policy
Irish Foreign Policy
by Michael KennedyBen TonraJohn DoyleNoel DorrAn authoritative textbook presenting major themes and analysis of Irish foreign policy in a contextual framework of history, political science, economics and international relations. The first contemporary and authoritative textbook presenting major themes and analysis of Irish foreign policy within a contextual framework of history, political science, economics and international relations.
* Structured along the traditional lines of comparative foreign policy.
* Introduces the historical context and presents the policy-making processes and actors.
*Themed chapters address context, contemporary policy issues and future challenges in relation to Ireland’s foreign policy across a number of critical areas.
* Discusses the challenges posed to Ireland’s foreign policy in the international system and through its membership of the European Union.
* Case studies that focus on a specific period or issue are used throughout the text and are illustrating the larger themes within Irish foreign policy.
* Written in an open and accessible style by leading academic analysts and practitioners of Irish foreign policy.
About the authors

Michael Kennedy
Dr Michael Kennedy has for almost three decades written and published widely on modern Irish history, in particular on Irish military and diplomatic history and on Irish foreign policy. He has been the executive editor of the RIA's Documents on Irish Foreign Policy series and head of the DIFP series since 1997. Previously he lectured in Irish and European history at Queen's University, Belfast and received his doctorate from the NUI in 1994 on the early history of Ireland’s relationship with the League of Nations. Michael appears regularly on television and radio discussing aspects of Irish history ranging from lighthouses to embassies to the history of curry houses in Dublin. Michael is a former member of the Irish Manuscripts Commission, a Research Associate of the Centre for Contemporary Irish History, Trinity College, Dublin and was a Visiting Professor at Liverpool Hope University from 2009 to 2018. He was also formerly an adjunct Professor of History at University College Dublin. He is the co-author (with John Gibney and Kate O'Malley) of Ireland: a voice among the nations (Royal Irish Academy, 2019), and (with Daniel Ayiotis and John Gibney) of The Emergency: A visual history of the Irish Defence Forces during the Second World War, 1939-1945 (Eastwood, 2019).

Ben Tonra
Ben Tonra is Associate Professor of International Relations at the UCD School of Politics and International Relations. He has published on Irish foreign policy and EU foreign security and defence policy.

John Doyle
Prof. John Doyle is Dean of the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences in DCU and the founding Director of the Institute for International Conflict Resolution and Reconstruction (IICRR). He has been the lead PI on two Marie Curie European Training Networks on the post-Soviet region (TENSIONS AND CASPIAN) and has taken part in several studies of comparative peace processes, including two EU funded projects, which brought academics from India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Afghanistan together for a series of workshops, in New Delhi, Brussels and at DCU, examining both European examples such as Northern Ireland and the Balkans and South Asian cases including Kashmir, Sri Lanka, Nepal, the Indian North East and Afghanistan. He is editor of Irish Studies and International Affairs and his work on conflict resolution and foreign policy has also been published among other places in the Journal of Common Market Studies, International Peacekeeping and Ethnopolitics.

Noel Dorr
Noel Dorr is a former secretary-general of the Department of Foreign Affairs and served as the Irish ambassador to the United Kingdom and the United Nations. He is a Member of the Royal Irish Academy and the former Chairman of the Academy's Committee on International Affairs. He has published widely on Irish foreign policy.
Related News & Events

Interview with 'Irish Sporting Lives' editors Terry Clavin and Turlough O'Riordan (Books Ireland Magazine)
Forgotten heroes, unforgettable failures, the tragic, talented lives cut short – would they feel disappointed to be lost to the archives or do they think they expected to end up there at all?
PublicationsDictionary of Irish Biography
RIA Publications at Research Open Day
Join us on 4 October to learn more about our publishing house and the work we publish.
PublicationsPublic Engagement
Academy Research Open Day
Join us on 4 October to learn more about our research projects, library and publications
LibraryIrish History OnlinePublicationsDictionary of Irish BiographyDictionary of Medieval Latin from Celtic SourcesDigital Repository of IrelandDocuments on Irish Foreign PolicyFoclóir Stairiúil na GaeilgeIrish Historic Towns AtlasGrangegorman HistoriesPublic EngagementARINS - Analysis and Research: Ireland North and SouthEducational Resources


