ABSTRACT
This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book shows how the judiciary and its participants were key agents in supporting and challenging the legitimacy of the post-war political system based upon rule of law and social identities of Irish citizens that were meaningful within it. It examines the tensions between the ideal of equality for all citizens and the practices of gender and class inequality in the newly independent democratic state as they unfolded through discursive interactions in local courts. The book analyzes official pronouncements and citizens’ perspectives on the role of physical violence as legitimate means of punishment for children in national schools at the local level. It considers local notions of extralegal justice that were historically long-standing in rural Irish communities that continued to be practiced in the new democratic state which invested greatly in rule of law as the sole mechanism for justice in the country.
