Brendan O Leary: 5 books

The Good Friday Agreement deserved the attention the world gave it, even if it was not always accurately understood. After its ratification in two referendums, for the first time in history political institutions throughout the island of Ireland rested upon the freely given assent of majorities of...

This brilliantly innovative synthesis of narrative and analysis illuminates how British colonialism shaped the formation and political cultures of what became Northern Ireland and the Irish Free State. A Treatise on Northern Ireland, Volume I provides a somber and compelling comparative audit of the...

'A Rant and a Road Trip' chronicles an alternative holiday, you might say, a heart-on-the-sleeve road trip. Its not so much about where Brendan OLeary went, but what he found when he got there and the people he met along the way. This journal covers five weeks spent on the road, drifting from town...

Consociations are power-sharing arrangements, increasingly used to manage ethno-nationalist, ethno-linguistic, and ethno-religious conflicts. Current examples include Belgium, Bosnia, Northern Ireland, Burundi, and Iraq. Despite their growing popularity, they have begun to be challenged before human...

This landmark synthesis of political science and historical institutionalism is a detailed study of antagonistic ethnic majoritarianism. Northern Ireland was coercively created through a contested partition in 1920. Subsequently Great Britain compelled Sinn Féin's leaders to rescind the declaration...