The Irish Times special coverage: How Irish women won the vote

The long road to equality The Irish Times by Mary Robinson Their struggle is our struggle: Women’s empowerment will progress only through their involvement in political processes and in shaping constitutions that guarantee the equal rights of all citizens

Women’s work The Irish Times by Caitriona Clear Women often wielded authority at home 100 years ago, but as public figures in professions such as teaching and nursing they were becoming much more common In 1905, Mary Ann Kelly persuaded her adoring husband to sell his Kilkenny farm and buy her a drapery shop in Rathangan, Co Kildare. She was not unusual in her aspiration. The number of women drapers in their own right (not the wives of male drapers) rose by 40 per cent between 1891 and 1911.

Feminism now The Irish Times by Susan McKay More to play for: Many women are unwilling to call themselves feminists but would be appalled to give up the rights won by their predecessors. Feminism is a “deeply subversive vision” said poet Catherine Phil MacCarthy, who had been invited, in an imaginative move, by the Irish Feminist Network to open its 2012 conference on Feminist Activism in Ireland, Past Present and Future. As MacCarthy spoke the simmering among angry young women in the room was wonderful.