The book addresses the question of whether, in an age of internationalisation and globalisation, cultural differences are still relevant to German-Irish corporate relationships? The first three chapters establish the theoretical framework for the analysis by exploring the notion of culture, profiling the business cultures of both countries, and examining existing approaches to the study of parent company-foreign subsidiary relationships. In the following three chapters, using interviews carried out with two sample groups (fifteen German parent companies and fourteen of their Irish operations; seven Irish parent companies and nine of their German operations), the parent companies in both groups are examined to see whether they demonstrate characteristics which are in keeping with their national business cultures. Their foreign operations are then analysed as is the parent company-foreign subsidiary relationship to determine whether any parent company influences are visible. The general approaches adopted by the two groups of parent companies to their foreign operations are compared and contrasted. Finally differences in national attitudes and values are identified and their impact assessed.

This edited monograph sets out to track the course of change in both Ireland and Germany and in Irish-German relations over the last 20 years. 1989 marked the 40th year since the establishment of the Federal Republic of Germany - the same year saw the toppling of the Berlin wall and with it the fall of the Iron Curtain. In Ireland, 1989 was a year nestled within a period of high unemployment and poor economic performance. Yet within a few years, a transformation occurred that brought unprecedented change, economically and socially. Therefore, symbolically speaking, a number of walls fell in Ireland that brought new spaces, if not freedoms - increased standards of living and better living conditions for many, new confidence in Self, and greater openness and tolerance for the Other within a society that had been predominantly monocultural for much of the twentieth century. The tenor of this book is one which charts, analyses, discusses and celebrates transition and change in Ireland, in Germany and in the relationship between Ireland and Germany in the hugely significant period of the last twenty years.

A collection of scholarly articles and essays by dancers and scholars of ethnochoreology, dance studies, drama studies, cultural studies, literature, and architecture, Dance and Modernism in Irish and German Literature and Culture: Connections in Motion explores Irish-German connections through dance in choreographic processes and on stage, in literary texts, dance documentation, film, and architecture from the 1920s to today. The contributors discuss modernism, with a specific focus on modern dance, and its impact on different art forms and discourses in Irish and German culture. Within this framework, dance is regarded both as a motif and a specific form of spatial movement, which allows for the transgression of medial and disciplinary boundaries as well as gender, social, or cultural differences. Part 1 of the collection focuses on Irish-German cultural connections made through dance, while part 2 studies the role of dance in Irish and German literature, visual art, and architecture.

This book is an in-depth examination of the relations between Ireland and the former East Germany between the end of the Second World War and the fall of the Berlin Wall. It explores political, diplomatic, economic, media and cultural issues. The long and tortuous process of establishing diplomatic relations is unique in the annals of diplomatic history. Central in this study are the activities of the Stasi. They show how and where East German intelligence obtained information on Ireland and Northern Ireland and also what kind of information was gathered. A particularly interesting aspect of the book is the monitoring of the activities of the Irish Republican Army and the Irish National Liberation Army and their campaigns against the British army in West Germany. The Stasi had infiltrated West German security services and knew about Irish suspects and their contacts with West German terrorist groups. East German Intelligence and Ireland, 1949–90 makes an original contribution to diplomatic, intelligence, terrorist and Cold War studies.

This groundbreaking book is an indispensable contribution to appreciating the dilemmas facing Ireland in the ‘age of Brexit’. Encompassing an exhaustive account, it traces the relationship between Ireland and FRG by drawing on original material from both. It critiques depictions of Irish-German relations as peculiarly affable and explores the problems presented by trade, Britain, neutrality, NATO, Northern Ireland and the Cold War. The work contends the German ‘economic miracle’ was a vital stimulus for Ireland’s tardy retreat from protectionism. It maintains that Ireland’s reorientation was informed by lessons gleaned from Irish-German trade relations as well as a budding recognition of the potential offered by German industrial investment. This granted Germany weighty influence over the shape and direction of Ireland.