The Irish Potato Famine: Indifferent Colonial Rule as Genocide

By Daniel W. Richer

Daniel Richer is a second-year student at Albany Law School. He grew up in Clarence, NY, and he graduated from the State University of New York at Fredonia where he majored in History and Political Science.

After receiving his bachelor’s degree, Dan worked as a litigation paralegal at a personal injury firm in Buffalo. Since attending law school, he has continued to pursue personal injury law while enjoying the numerous fields of study offered at Albany Law.  

Since the conclusion of World War II, the term “genocide” has been used to describe acts taken by governments with the intent of eliminating a particular class of people. These acts are typically rooted out of prejudice against another group’s race, national origin, or religion.

However, the extent to which the term “genocide” has been used in reference to deliberate inactions of governments is generally limited. Such inactions may be indifference to a group living within a ruling state’s political boundaries as evidenced by certain policy initiatives. Consequently, certain inactions of governments—particularly in the wake of humanitarian crises—have often resulted in the severe exacerbation of disease, mass starvation, and death. Thus, in comparison to systemic acts taken by governments complicit in genocide, inactions may similarly be rooted out of prejudice against another group’s religion, national origin, or social character.

Historically, the nation of Ireland remained the victim of severe poverty, colonialism, and political subjugation for centuries. This repression can ultimately be traced back to its function as a British colony and later through its incorporation by Parliament into the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. In turn, its role as a population was almost entirely based upon the social and economic aspirations of the British Empire, resulting in little political and economic opportunism. Though the island persisted as an ill-equipped nation of people, Ireland was left with minimal institutional structures in place capable of responding to a potential humanitarian crisis. This became particularly evident in the wake of the Irish Potato Famine--a period of scarcity and mass starvation left beyond the control of the people whom it most severely impacted.

This paper seeks to address whether the inactions of the British government at the time of the Potato Famine constituted genocide against the people of Ireland.

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