Society

Human virtue was absent, and the only creatures he truly loved were his dogs: Lorraine Courtney discovers that Otto von Bismarck was an appalling human being.

The new, and first, Minister for Children, Frances Fitzgerald, had fighting words about the new protection and welfare agency  - it would end 'the procrastination, the deception and evasion that has allowed abusers go unpunished'. Sara Burke looks behind the rhetoric

That one should ascribe collective negative stereotypes to an entire group of people because of the actions of a few is well accepted as damaging and undesirable. However the Irish state is directly and indirectly involved in this practice through facilitation of the practice of ethnic profiling.

Yesterday marked not only the 100th anniversary of International Women's Day but the launch of a global campaign to mobilise support for an International Labour Organisation (ILO) Convention for decent work and rights for domestic workers. By Alison Spillane

Launching the campaign, Siobhán O'Donoghue, director of the Migrant Rights Centre Ireland (MRCI), said the new government should lead the international campaign and establish best-practice instead of waiting for other countries to make the first move.

Why are there so few women philosophers? Have women been too busy hanging up washing and sorting socks? A wonderful luxury, philosophy's place on the hierarchy of needs depends on whether you are female and if there is good drying weather. But if we ask why there so few women on Irish stamps then the answer is less tangible than the Beaufort scale.

[Pictured: Four Irish stamps from 2004 that honour the Irish Nobel Prize winners for Literature ]

Irish society is characterised by significant and persistent inequalities. Wealth is highly concentrated, income is poorly distributed, publicly funded services are being diminished. Irish biodiversity and ecosystems are under increasing pressure. Greenhouse gas emissions are starting to grow again. Yet equality and environmental sustainability remain at the margins of political decision-making, writes Siobhan O'Donoghue of Claiming Our Future.

A notable feature of election 2011 was the fate of numerous Irish political dynasties - Lemass-Haughey, Hanafin, Andrews, the narrow escape for the Lenihan and Cowen names. Owen O’Shea’s new book, Heirs to the Kingdom, examines how a handful of families have kept control of political power in Kerry since the War of Independence, and asks if this really serves the interest of the Irish people. Edward O'Hare has read it.

The release of the film adaptation of Kazuo Ishiguro's bestselling novel Never Let Me Go (2005), and the current reissue of the novel itself, makes it timely to consider the moral questions raised by cloning. By Joseph Mahon.

The novel describes a post-war society whose scientists have been commissioned to furnish a supply of cloned human beings to be used as life-saving organ generators for the rest of the population. The clones who feature in the novel have a pleasing childhood and adolescence at a remote rural boarding school called Hailsham, in England.

The O'Callaghan Hotel Group came under severe criticism today following allegations that it attempted to force five migrant workers to sign new employment contracts at the reduced national minimum wage. The women, who are all from Eastern Europe and who have worked for the Davenport Hotel in Dublin's city centre for four to six years, refused to sign the contracts and were taken off the hotel roster. By Christina Finn

Approximately 4,000 student nurses and midwives took to the streets of the capital today to protest against Government plans to phase out and eventually eliminate their pay. By Alison Spillane

Today's protest marked the second phase of a campaign of resistance launched last week by student nurses and midwives in conjunction with the Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation (INMO), Siptu, and the Union of Students in Ireland (USI).

[Pictured: Student nurses Niamh Murphy and Alice Taylor at today's protest]