‘Legislating for economic development: Irish fisheries as a case study in the limitations of ‘Improvement’

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Abstract

This article explores the limits of the culture of improvement in eighteenth-century Ireland, through the first case study of Irish fishery legislation. It suggests that the many laws and bills dedicated to 'improving' the Irish fishing industry were in fact protectionist and self-serving in orientation, up until at least the very late eighteenth-century. It also argues that the backers of this legislation used the cult that had built up around the idea of improvement in order to lend their schemes moral legitimacy, which they were able to do because it was by its very nature a protean concept.
Original languageEnglish
Title of host publicationThe Eighteenth-Century Composite State: Representative Institutions in Ireland and Europe, 1689-1800
EditorsDavid Hayton, James Kelly, John Bergin
PublisherPalgrave Macmillan
Pages136-159
ISBN (Print)9780230231597
Publication statusPublished (in print/issue) - 13 May 2010

Keywords

  • Irish Parliament
  • Legislation
  • Improvement
  • Economic development
  • eighteenth century
  • fisheries
  • fishing

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