Cox, Laurence (2007) Building utopia here and now? Left and working-class utopias in Ireland. Ecopolotics Online Journal, 1 (1). pp. 123-132.

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Abstract

While a powerful strand of both environmental and religious utopianism has been to construct purpose-built communities “somewhere else”, usually in rural settings, a combination of lack of resources and doubts about the strategic usefulness of such projects has led most working-class or left utopias to have a different focus. Typically, these latter grew within the struggle to meet everyday needs, in the course of political campaigns or at the highpoint of society-wide struggles, and were understood strategically, as part of a broader struggle for change. This article explores some aspects of left and working-class utopias in Ireland across the 20th century, and attempts to relate them to broader theoretical questions about working-class self-organisation and strategies for social change.

Item Type:	Article
Keywords:	utopias; class; Ireland; social movements;
Academic Unit:	Faculty of Social Sciences > Sociology
Item ID:	915
Depositing User:	Dr. Laurence Cox
Date Deposited:	26 Feb 2008
Journal or Publication Title:	Ecopolotics Online Journal
Publisher:	Greenhouse Publishing Ireland / www.micromarketing .ie
Refereed:	Yes
URI:	http://www.irishecopoliticsonline.com/
Use Licence:	This item is available under a Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial Share Alike Licence (CC BY-NC-SA). Details of this licence are available here

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