Insanity and the Insane in Post-Famine Ireland

Ireland was the location of the earliest comprehensive public provision for the care and control of the mentally ill. Between 1817 and 1870 the British government in Ireland directed the establishment of 22 district lunatic asylums throughout the country. Initially welcomed, discontent with the institutions grew with the growth of asylum admissions after the Famine and the failure of the asylum to restore more than a small proportion of inmates to society. Political battles between central and local government developed on the question of financial and administrative responsibility for the mentally ill. Originally published in 1981, this book examines the crisis through an analysis of the social function and context of the asylum. Institutionalisation of a growing proportion of the Irish population proceeded particularly through judicial committal. A law which had been intended only for the detention of the ‘dangerous lunatic’ became the routine mode of dealing with a variety of ills from alcoholism to domestic violence.