Even after the near-collapse of the modernizing project in the 1980s, amid the resumption of mass emigration and with the Troubles still grinding grimly onwards, Irish people remained weirdly delighted with their membership of this turbulent nation. In 1990, an average of 38 per cent of Europeans said they were ‘very proud’ of their country. More than twice that proportion – an astonishing 78 per cent – of Irish people were very proud to be Irish.
