Describing women's fight for Ireland's independence from 1881 to the present day, Unmanageable Revolutionaries focuses on three Irish nationalist women's organisations - the Ladies Land League, Inghinidhe na hEireann and the Cumann na mBan. Although all three are very different, a common theme emerges - that women have never been seen as an independent force in Irish political history. Mobilised in times of crisis, they have been consistently excluded from positions of influence. This, despite minor concessions, remains true today. Now reissued with a new introduction, Unmanageable Revolutionaries remains a classic study of the role of the women's movement in modern Irish history.

Unmanageable Revolutionaries describes how Irish women (despite their frequent omission from the history books) have always played a key role in the struggle for independence. The author focuses on three pivotal Irish nationalist women's organisations the Ladies Land League, Inghinidhe na hEireann and Cumann na mBan - to show that women have always been a driving force in Irish political history.