The Troubles and the European Community: Exploring DIFP XIV (1969-73)

Witness seminar on the latest volume of Documents in Irish Foreign Policy, covering the years 1969-73.

In this event co-hosted by The Standing Committee for International Affairs and Documents in Irish Foreign Policy, a panel of former and current officials at the Department of Foreign Affairs will reflect on the latest volume of the RIA’s Documents on Irish Foreign Policy series (volume XIV, covering the pivotal period, 1969-73). As well as discussing what the documents say about the development of Irish Government policy towards Northern Ireland and Europe, the seminar will move on to the wider question of how an understanding of past policy-making can help inform the formulation of foreign policy in the present. What role does historical reflection have in present-day foreign policy-making? Could a more robust engagement with foreign policy as an historical phenomenon help us to better navigate an ever-changing geopolitical environment? If so, what steps can we take to translate the lessons of the past into future policy?

Panellists:

• Seán Donlon (formerly Department of Foreign Affairs)
  • Seán Donlon held key roles in Ireland’s Department of Foreign Affairs, including Ambassador to the US and Secretary General. He later worked in aviation with Guinness Peat, advised Taoiseach John Bruton, and served as Chancellor of the University of Limerick. His international experience includes a term as Executive Director at the EBRD in London. From 2016 to 2022, he chaired the Press Council of Ireland.
• Noel Fahey (formerly Department of Foreign Affairs)
  • After serving in the EEC Section of the Department of Finance from 1970 to 1973, Noel Fahey served in the Department of Foreign Affairs mainly in the EEC/EU Division. He was Assistant Secretary in the EU Division from 1991 to 1997. He was Ambassador to Germany (1998-2002), the United States (2002 - 2007) and the Holy See (2007 - 2011). He retired in 2011.
• Sonja Hyland (Deputy Secretary General, Department of Foreign Affairs)
  • Sonja Hyland is the Deputy Secretary General, and head of Ireland, UK and Americas Division, in the Department of Foreign Affairs. From 2019 – 2024, she was Political Director in DFAT, overseeing Ireland’s foreign policy priorities, including Ireland’s 2021/2022 term on the United Nations Security Council, as well as security and defence policy, Middle East and Russia/Ukraine issues. She was Ambassador to Ethiopia, South Sudan, Djibouti, the African Union and the Inter-governmental Authority on Development (IGAD, the eightcountry African trade bloc) from 2017 - 2019 and Ambassador to Mexico, Cuba, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Costa Rica, Colombia, Venezuela and Peru from 2013 - 2017. She received an Eisenhower Fellowship in 2019, with a focus on the impact of demographic change in the U.S. on current and future patterns of political representation and power.
• Michael Kennedy (Executive Editor, Documents on Irish Foreign Policy)
  • Michael Kennedy is the Executive Editor of the Royal Irish Academy’s Documents on Irish Foreign Policy Research Programme. For over thirty years he has researched and published widely on Irish diplomatic history, covering broad themes such as Ireland’s membership of the League of Nations and the United Nations, cross border relations in Ireland and more focussed areas including Ireland’s second world war neutrality, Ireland’s relationship with Japan, and the military and diplomatic history of Ireland’s involvement in UN peacekeeping in Congo. He regularly appears on tv and radio discussing modern Irish history, and he is an active public historian.
• Chair: Rory Montgomery MRIA

Queries

If you have queries relating to this event, contact Martha Fitzgerald by email: m.fitzgerald@ria.ie

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