Britain, United States and Australia : some comparative reflections.

This article reports on the summary of the paper Britain, United States and Australia: Some Comparative Reflections, presented at Irish in British History conference held on March 12, 1992 in Liverpool, England. For the Liverpool-Irish, sectarian and ethnic associational culture offered identity, pride and protection to workers without access to exclusive or institutionalised forms of class-based organised labour. For the Catholic Irish this cultural provision was fostered first in the pub, later by the parish. Building upon their ethnic networks, Irish-Americans constructed a labour movement which was essentially instrumental, offering protection against the vicissitudes of industrial America, an approach endorsed by Irish-American women, numerically preponderant by the late nineteenth century.