On 22 May at the IPN’s Educational Center in Warsaw (ul. Marszałkowska 21/25) Prof. Gabriel Doherty of the School of History, University College Cork, Ireland gave an illustrated lecture on the topic of the reception accorded in Ireland to the Polish trade union ‘Solidarity’, between its foundation in the aftermath of the Gdansk shipyard strike of August 1980, and the imposition of martial law in Poland in December 1981.

Among the topics to be considered during the talk (which will utilise, among other media, contemporary Irish television footage, newspaper reports and photographs) were the policies pursued by the Irish Government towards Poland during the period in question, the response of the Irish trade union movement and left-wing political groups to the rise of ‘Solidarity’, and the reactions of the Catholic church in Ireland, other voluntary organisations (such as the Irish Red Cross), artistic groups, the Polish émigré community in the country, and of the Irish media.

Gabriel Doherty is a College Lecturer in the School of History, University College Cork. His general area of expertise is in the field of modern Irish history (from the later nineteenth century to the present day), with particular specialisms in the history of Northern Ireland, the evolution of the Irish prison system, Irish social history, the independence struggle in Ireland 1912-23, and the history of Irish-Polish relations since the nineteenth century.