1879–1914 was a pivotal period in modern Ireland, and Fergus Campbell joins other historians in looking more deeply at its distinctiveness. The changes that accelerated from 1914 were directed not only at the British government in Whitehall and Westminster but at the governing elite centered on Dublin Castle. Campbell focuses on the top echelon of Irish society, the wielders of influence and decision makers; this social and political stratum appeared most impervious to the changes that resulted in a nationalist, Free State government in 1922. The late Lawrence McBride's work on the growing presence of Catholics in the Irish administration in the decades before 1914 (described in his The Greening of Dublin Castle [1991]) is a point of reference for Campbell. But rather than make a direct challenge to or revision of McBride's work, Campbell reframes the question and takes a different approach. McBride looked broadly at the public-sector personnel who administered Ireland in the run-up to the war of independence, while Campbell concentrates on what he credibly defines as the Irish “establishment”: “those individuals who wielded a great deal power on the basis of their control of or access to critical resources (economic, political, religious, and bureaucratic), which meant that their decisions affected many peoples’ lives” (5). He compiles and systematically analyzes a great deal of useful data in an accessible format.

Campbell's approach, which is based on in-depth analyses of 1,200 biographies of members of the establishment for the years 1881 and 1911, uses a mix of methods to conduct a longitudinal analysis. Not everyone will accept this method. There is an inherent danger in relying on snapshots of data separated by thirty years, which could produce isolated anomalies and obscure important details. And, usually, at least three data points are required to document a trend. But, despite these potential weaknesses, Campbell draws a very plausible, persuasive picture of the Irish establishment and deepens our understanding of otherwise familiar territory. He makes good use, for example, of the literature on nineteenth-century Irish landlords to show how their inability to provide local leadership contributed to a growing state role that benefited Irish Catholics through more equitable and democratic structures. The valuable chapter on Ireland's business elite demonstrates that little changed between 1881 and 1911, except, perhaps, that it was even more severely divided along sectarian lines, with a disproportionately large Episcopalian sector. But, in a compelling analysis, Campbell shows that the religious elites (at the episcopal or Presbyterian moderator level) were more “open” to advancement, within the respective denominations, than other segments of the establishment. Also, the Home Rule movement and the rise of the Irish Parliamentary Party (IPP) helped to push Protestant congregations closer theologically and politically, making the period 1879–1914 one of ever greater “separation, segregation and sectarianism between the protestant and catholic churches in Ireland” (294), a process that was intensified by Protestant alienation from the state's efforts to ally with (and secure the loyalty of) the Catholic middle class.

In his examination of the Royal Irish Constabulary (RIC), Campbell extends our understanding of the police officer corps, a subject that I examined in some depth in my “Irish Constabulary Officers, 1837–1922” (Irish Economic and Social History [2005]) by concentrating only on the most senior ranks: county inspectors and the small number of senior, constabulary-wide positions. Campbell's analysis uses in-depth biographical research on individual RIC officers to show that, by 1911, the RIC senior ranks remained stubbornly Protestant. The argument very much stands on its own, so it is surprising to see my findings (based on a census of eighty-five years of officers’ records) criticized as too optimistic, for failing to note the persistent lack of mobility for Catholic officers in the most senior ranks. My study also found that Catholic advancement largely ended at the county inspector level, but Campbell overlooks the pertinent passages. I place limited advancement to county inspector in the context of continuing advantages for officers appointed as cadets, who, throughout the RIC's history, were disproportionately Protestant and “benefited from longer officer careers that enhanced the opportunity for varied professional experiences and notice at headquarters and in establishment networks.” My conclusion that the initial religious advantage for Protestant cadets did not permanently disadvantage Catholics, mostly older men who came from the ranks, is appropriately qualified: “The influence of religion and political influence can certainly not be discounted at the county inspector rank” (42). Despite a contrived disagreement, the differences between us are that Campbell develops a more detailed picture of RIC county inspectors in 1881 and 1911 and does not recognize the Constabulary's development from gendarmerie origins to a largely civil policing role by 1914 (102–3).

Campbell's concluding chapter highlights an underlying tension in an exclusive focus on the “establishment” at a time when, as he documents, its importance was diminishing and “a middle sector of Irish society … had been almost totally colonized by Irish catholics” (303). Few would doubt that the highest echelon of Irish society was resistant to democratic and Irish Catholic change, but the conclusion demonstrates how difficult it is to treat the establishment separately from the rest of a “greening” Irish civic society. Indeed, by 1914, “power had already changed hands” (303). The chapters on politics, particularly the analysis of the IPP, and religion, help to underline the fact that, by the early twentieth century, the establishment was hardly unitary, with limited ability to maintain residual Protestant ascendancy. Campbell's approach adds new perspective and texture to our understanding of early twentieth-century Ireland and, in doing so, leaves Lawrence McBride's broader conclusions about the extent and character of pre-independence change generally intact. The originality of the approach and the range of sources cited make it unfortunate that The Irish Establishment does not include a bibliography. Still, Campbell provides a well-written, thoroughly argued study of the pre-independence segment of Irish society that certainly saw itself as “the establishment.”