It is gratifying to note the steady emergence of scholarly works on the subject of the history of Irish foreign relations. Although general histories of twentieth-century Ireland still make only passing reference to Irish foreign affairs, since the publication of Dermot Keogh's Ireland and Europe, 1919–1948 (1988) a number of monographs and biographies have opened the door to an appreciation of Ireland's role in the international community. Gerard Keown has built on these special studies and on original documents in the Irish National Archives to produce The First of the Small Nations: The Beginnings of Irish Foreign Policy in the Interwar Years, 1919–1932, a very welcome overview of early Irish foreign policy. While Keown's title gives the years 1919 to 1932, in fact he begins in the nineteenth century, discussing Fenian objectives and early Sinn Fein efforts. Keown is able to contrast these early projects with statements by John Redmond during the period when Home Rule appeared to be on the verge of implementation, wherein Ireland would remain a dynamic participant in the British Empire without seeking to shape a separate foreign policy. The burdens of the First World War, the repercussions of the 1916 Rising, and the effects of the Conscription Crisis of 1918 effectively undercut the Home Rule idea and reshaped Sinn Fein along much more independent lines. Indeed, Keown's title, First of the Small Nations, comes from a 1917 Sinn Fein pamphlet arguing that Ireland's claim to nationhood preceded that of several of the modern European states.

Of course, the Irish Republican Brotherhood and the Clan na Gael in the United States undertook their own foreign policy, attempting to work with Germany prior to 1916 and hoping subsequently to establish some recognizable presence in the United States. The Sinn Fein electoral victory in December 1918, the meeting of Dail Eireann in January 1919, and Eamon de Valera's extended trip to the United States in 1919 and 1920 marked a formal assertion of an independent foreign policy. The Dail government sent “envoys” to the Paris Peace Conference and several European capitals, as well as to the United States. These envoys claimed recognition as the representatives of an elected government and on the basis of the Allied war aims to protect small nations. None of these envoys, nor de Valera himself, were able to secure the diplomatic recognition of any of the world powers, but they were successful in raising funds for the Dail and in generating extensive favorable publicity. This international notoriety, together with the fighting of the War for Independence, may have hastened the British government's willingness to open talks that ultimately led to the Anglo-Irish Treaty in December 1921. Keown is very good in identifying the problem faced by the Dail in the winter and spring of 1922, when attitudes towards the Treaty split the government and left many of the old Dail envoys in the anti-Treaty faction. When the new Irish Free State government came into being in December 1922, it found its representatives challenged by envoys of the Irish Republic in cities like Paris and New York. One reaction was to scale back the overseas offices.

Keown follows the thesis put forward by Michael Kennedy that the Free State, once established, pursued foreign relations in three interconnected areas: membership in the League of Nations, participation in Commonwealth affairs, and bilateral diplomatic relations. The Irish Free State joined the League as soon as it was able. On 10 September 1923, William T. Cosgrave led the Irish delegation to Geneva, where the Free State was given a warm reception. League membership was important in the post-Civil War circumstances while the anti-Treaty faction questioned the legitimacy of the Free State. By definition, the league accepted only those entities that constituted independent states. The Irish Free State was, therefore, an independent state. On the other hand, the Free State's Dominion status signaled to the anti-Treaty faction that Ireland was still a British colony. Keown follows David Harkness in skillfully guiding the reader through the series of Imperial Conferences in 1923, 1926, and 1930, in the course of which the independence and sovereignty of the Dominions was carefully defined. In 1921 or 1923, one might ask how independent from Britain a Dominion might be. However, as Keown shows, the Irish Free State, working with Canada and South Africa, was able to extract a guaranty in the language of the Balfour Declaration in 1926 that the Dominions were “autonomous communities within the British Empire, equal in status, in no way subordinate” to the British government (170). This definition was entrenched in legislation in the Statute of Westminster in December 1931. Irish Free State bilateral relations were established by the diplomatic recognition extended by the United States in 1924. An Irish minister presented his credential to President Calvin Coolidge on 8 October 1924, and a U.S. counterpart was sent to Dublin in July 1927, to great fanfare. This was the first occasion of a Dominion government having diplomatic relations with a foreign power. In 1929 diplomatic relations were opened with France, Germany, and the Vatican.

Although years ago Conor Cruise O'Brien suggested that Irish foreign policy was largely focused on the symbolism of independence, Keown makes a convincing argument that the architects of Irish foreign policy, George Gavan Duffy, Desmond Fitzgerald, and Patrick McGilligan, emphasized a kind of Irish exceptionalism. Although the first of the small nations, Ireland was an ancient nation; although largely English speaking, Ireland was European; although not a colonial power, Ireland was a “mother country” with an enormous diaspora in North America, South Africa, and Australasia. Ireland had a role in international affairs, Keown shows, speaking on behalf of small nations, supporting adherence to international law, and advocating the settlement of disputes though arbitration. In short, Irish foreign policy was about more than projecting the symbols of independence. Ireland, Keown says, had an important message for the international community.