Orange Order Project

Eric Kaufmann's Orange Order Page

Dr. Eric P. Kaufmann, Birkbeck College, University of London, UK
e.kaufmann@bbk.ac.uk

My interest in Orangeism originally sprang from my explorations into English-Canadian identity. This uncovered the tremendous influence played by the Orange Order in Canadian life in the period 1830-1970. My curiosity was also sparked by Philip Buckner (now of Institute for Commonwealth Studies, London) who comes from a British-Loyalist Toronto background: 'I wonder what ever happened to the Orange Order in Toronto - they used to run the place'. My research on the subject began with a series of smaller grants in 1999 and soon extended to Northern Ireland, where Executive Officer George Patton (now of Ulster Scots Agency) was extremely accommodating. I was then fortunate enough to win two ESRC awards which allowed me to research and write on this subject during 2001-5. More details on my most recent ESRC project, a joint grant with Professor Henry Patterson of University of Ulster ('The Decline of the Loyal Family?: Popular Unionism and the Devolution Process') under the rubric of the ESRC's Devolution and Constitutional Change programme, may be found here. The research resulted in my new books, The Orange Order: A Contemporary Northern Irish History (Oxford University Press, April 2007), and, with Henry Patterson, Unionism and Orangeism in Northern Ireland since 1945: the decline of the loyal family (Manchester University Press, May '07), as well as a number of other books, papers, photos, maps, datasets and articles.

Books