On Friday Irish voters went to the polls to vote on whether to change the Constitution to allow same-sex marriage. Yesterday the count revealed an overwhelming majority had voted 'Yes', making it the first country to bring about this change by popular vote. Ireland has long been perceived as a conservative country, with very good reason. Between 1922 and the 1937 Constitution there were 19 pieces of legislation or major commissions concerning the regulation of sexuality and gender (see
Table 1 in this paper I co-wrote with Una Crowley a few years ago). Over the past forty years these have slowly been undone. For example, the marriage bar was lifted in 1973, contraceptives became freely available to purchase in 1985, homosexuality was decriminalised in 1993, and divorce became legal in 1996 (only by 9000 votes). Friday was another large step forward to a more liberal, equal and secular society. And it felt like one of those days where history was in the making.
My posts this week
Review of
The Lady from Zagreb by Philip Kerr
New paper: Solutions, Strategies and Frictions in Civic Hacking
Review of
The Hanging Valley by Peter Robinson
New paper: The politics and praxis of building urban dashboards
Home to vote
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