MacBride, Sean (1904–88), son of Maud
Gonne and John
MacBride. He had a long and chequered career as a radical republican, a barrister, a politician, and a human rights and peace campaigner. He joined the
Irish Republican Army during the
Anglo‐Irish War. Although remaining a prominent figure in the organization after the
Irish Civil War, he learned towards the use of political means and was involved in several political projects in the inter‐war period. He became IRA chief of staff in 1936 but left the movement after the enactment of the
constitution of 1937, which he felt satisfied republican demands. He then took up life as a barrister and soon won a national reputation for defending republicans. He founded
Clann na Poblachta in 1946 and was minister for external affairs in the first
interparty government 1948–51. He caused the fall of the second interparty government in 1957 over its handling of the IRA campaign in the north (see
border campaign). He subsequently failed to be re‐elected and left politics in 1961, after which he became deeply involved in human rights and peace organizations. He was secretary‐general of the International Commission of Jurists (1963–70), and chairman of Amnesty International (1961–74). He was awarded the Nobel peace prize in 1974 and the Lenin peace prize in 1977. He formulated the MacBride principles, aimed at eliminating discrimination by employers against Catholics in Northern Ireland.
Although eulogized in later life as an international jurist and statesman, he was an ineffectual leader and often a controversial figure, both for republican hard men, who mistrusted his intellectual and political inclinations, and for more constitutional‐minded sections of society, because of his radicalism.
Joost Augusteijn
