The Left has often been accused of not understanding economics properly. So it’s been no small pleasure over the last year to see the guardians of neo-liberal orthodoxy thrashing around helplessly in a bid to explain the financial meltdown, while radical critics like David Harvey and Robert Brenner have provided by far the best guide [...]

[Dear Reader, last week I went on holiday by accident. As a result I missed not one but two Manuel posts. This is the second one. The first, and funnier one, can be read over on Coddle Pot. Thanks & Regards. DB]
The wise people of Limerick have spotted Our Lady hiding in a tree! It [...]

Income is not a determinator of class, and to think of class in such terms is to miss the point that class is a social relation, not a category. Income, however, can be used as an indicator of class relations, as wage levels are usually, although not always, related to the types of positions people [...]

[This is an edited version of an article which first appeared in Football Studies 11, 1 (2008). The article itself is based on a paper which was presented at the 2005 Irish Sport History Conference.]
In 1955 the Irish political, cultural, and religious establishment found itself challenged by an unusual and reluctant opponent: The Football [...]

During the Great Depression, the British King announced he was cancelling the purchase of a royal yacht as a gesture of sympathy towards his beleaguered subjects. John Maynard Keynes claimed this was misguided. Instead of cancelling the order for his yacht, Keynes said the King should have purchased two yachts. His line of reasoning was [...]

The Irish Times can claim it is stimulating debate on important issues. After all, didn’t one of their columnists provoke debate on the ‘generosity’ or otherwise of our social welfare system? And isn’t that same columnist provoking a debate on job subsidies? What I find curious is the mode of provocation: rather than investigation, examination [...]

Micheal Taft of Notes on the Front (and ILR) was taking part in a Prime Time panel discussion last night about our ever increasing deficit and whether we have reached the bottom. Also on the  panel were Dan O’Brien, Senior Economist, Economist Intelligence unit, and Jim Power, Chief economist, Friends First.
Visit the Prime Time home [...]

Tony Judt, writing in 2006 used the phrase ‘useful idiots’ to describe a new cohort of American liberals who were happy to use their considerable intellectual reputations to endorse the morally repugnant actions of the US Administration in the Middle East. The phrase came to mind, perhaps uncharitably, while reading Sli Eile’s response in the [...]