Chapter 1 of this book presented a detailed account of the public health or total consumption model of alcohol issues which has been developed and promoted since the 1970s by international researchers, with the institutional support of the WHO. It also discussed cultural, economic and political obstacles to the implementation of such public health-based alcohol policy, and the folly of assuming that public policymaking in this sphere is an essentially rational or ‘evidence-based’ process. In order to provide a context for a detailed consideration of how Irish policymakers have responded in recent decades to these WHO policy recommendations (which will be presented in Chapter 4), this chapter will review a range of political events, cultural trends and influential personalities pertaining to Irish alcohol issues over the past two centuries.