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Re-evaluating Irish national security policy: affordable threats?

This book constitutes the first major academic investigation of Irish national security policy in the history of the state. It provides a theoretically informed analysis of the re-evaluation of Irish national security ordered by Ireland’s Taoiseach (Prime Minister) on September 11 2001, and the decisions taken as a consequence of it in the following seven years. In doing so it draws on unprecedented access to Ireland’s police, security and intelligence agencies; over twenty senior personnel agreed to be interviewed. Questions are raised over the effectiveness of the Garda Síochána (Ireland’s police and security agency), the relative absence of naval and airborne defence, and the impact on national security of the policy imperative to transform the Defence Forces, particularly the army, for more robust missions overseas. The book also considers the securitisation of Irish immigration policy despite international evidence suggesting the potential for radicalisation in socially marginalised western communities. The author demonstrates the importance of three conceptual models to the analysis of national security policy: historical institutionalism, governmental politics and threat evaluation. The Irish Naval Service made the book mandatory reading for all officers. Research for the book was supported by the Irish Research Council for the Humanities and Social Sciences (IRCHSS), which graded the project as Alpha* - Outstanding.