A New Multilingual Ireland and Schooling in the Gaeltacht: 1998 to the Present

Abstract

Developments in relation to education in general in Ireland for the years considered in the previous chapter, and particularly in relation to education in the Gaeltacht, took place during one of bleakest times in the history of the State. Yet, by 2000, the nation had become one of the wealthiest in the world, unemployment stood at 4 per cent and income tax levels were almost 50 per cent less than they had been in the 1980s. Within another eight years, the country became the most indebted state in the European Union following the global financial crisis. It took until the start of 2015 for a series of austerity measure introduced in the interim, to lead eventually to economic growth and low unemployment. Developments in relation to the place of the Irish language in the nation continued throughout both the high and low periods of the country’s economy noted above. As detailed in the previous chapter in relation to the years 1967 to 1998, some of these developments related to the place of the Irish language in Irish society generally, while others related to social, economic, and Irish language developments in the Gaeltacht, and others yet again related to the place of Irish in the education system across the country. This chapter now addresses each of these developments in relation to the period from 1998 to the present.