ABSTRACT
Between the years 1879 and 1881, Irish peasants engaged their landlords in a bitter war over proprietary rights, also known as the "land question." The Land War is also the story of how the Irish peasantry became a class for themselves and how they affected the course of Irish history. The Great Famine of 1845-1849 marks a structural turning point in Irish history. The famine had a profound impact on the structure of Irish agriculture. Until about 1876, Irish agriculture prospered. Irish tenants already faced a difficult process of economic reproduction in the decades after the Great Famine. The combination of agricultural crisis and exploitative relations of production forced the Irish peasantry to fight for its material survival, but it did not determine the form that struggle would take. Obstructionism was taken up by a handful of Irish MPs, most notably Charles Stewart Parnell, and had been developed into an effective political weapon by 1877.
