Marginal figures? - child detention in the Republic of Ireland : a history of the present

Abstract

This thesis explores the practices and systems of child detention in the Republic of Ireland with reference to the past. Methodologically and theoretically the thesis is informed by a 'history of the present' approach. Such an approach involves a disavowal of 'taken for granted' understandings through the 'problematisation' of a given subject (Castel, 1994; Dean, 1994; Foucault, 1977a). In this thesis the problem posed in the present is why the practice of child detention, albeit now marginal in numeric terms, remains a productive sphere? In other words why do sites of containment continue to emerge, and who are the subjects for whom this form of government is specified? Analytical attention is directed towards the children for whom institutionalisation (or the carceral order) continues to be the specified form. In line with the 'history of the present' method, this subject is explored through an analysis of discourse in the archive, where discourse is understood as 'the statement as it occurs in the archive' (Foucault, 1972). Here the archive analysed are the case files of young people who have been detained in three children detention schools (formerly Industrial and Reformatory schools) in the Republic of Ireland from 1970 to the present and the government reports, the parliamentary record and literature from non-governmental organisations of relevance to this area.