‘In what orbit we shall find ourselves, no one could predict’: institutional reform, the university merger and ecclesiastical influence on Irish higher education in the 1960s

Abstract

AbstractThis paper explores the persistence of ecclesiastical influence on higher education in Ireland during an era of far-reaching policy change in the 1960s. The extensive interaction between political and official elites and the Catholic bishops offers a fascinating insight into the complex and contested process of policy formulation during an era of transformation in higher education. This study offers a re-interpretation of Whyte’s thesis that the Irish bishops displayed a ‘new flexibility’ in their response to governmental policy initiatives during this period, especially the initiative for university merger launched by Donogh O’Malley in 1967. Catholic prelates, notably John Charles McQuaid, the influential archbishop of Dublin, were pursuing a traditional Catholic religious and socio-political agenda in higher education, which sought not so much to accommodate new official initiatives as to shape such reforms in the ideological direction favoured by the bishops. McQuaid in particular enjoyed exceptional access to policy-makers and was an indispensable partner in launching the initiative for the university merger. The eventual failure of the merger, which was influenced by the successful resistance of academic elites and the declining significance of religious divisions in higher education, underlined the limits of ecclesiastical power in a rapidly changing society.