Editor's Introduction

Abstract

Being a man has become a more complex issue in Ireland today. To quote Harry Ferguson, ‘while men were and are everywhere in Irish society, little attention was given to them as men, as gendered subjects' (2003: 1). Their emergence from (gender) invisibility is taking place in the midst of unprecedented social and economic change in Ireland. It has been suggested that present socio-cultural conditions adversely affect young people in giving rise to a sense of liminality, of living between cultures and identities (Keohane and Chambers, 2003: 48). Yet generalised explanations of change outcomes, and the crisis discourse which surrounds young men in particular, need careful examination. These accounts frequently make assumptions of causal links between change indictors and ‘negative’ outcome where none exist and rarely highlight socio-economic, age and within-gender variations. We live in a more individualistic and globally defined society than heretofore, but while the ‘moral certainties of being’ (Haywood and Mac an Ghaill, 2003) are gone, strong belief and value systems are still in evidence (Fahey, Hayes and Sinnott, 2005: 219; Cleary, 2005). Furthermore, change has had much positive impact, as reflected in high levels of satisfaction amongst Irish people (Fahey and Smyth, 2004). With so little evidence of a negative effect on people generally how has societal change become a crisis for men?