Sinn Féin Republican Youth Returns To Better Known Title, Ógra Shinn Féin

Like many observers of the minutiae of Irish politics, I was somewhat puzzled by Sinn Féin’s decision in 2012 to change the name of its well-known young person’s wing, Ógra Shinn Féin, to the more unwieldy Sinn Féin Republican Youth, complete with an utterly anodyne new logo. The logic, apparently, was to create a more attractive brand for would-be campus politicos and left-leaning hipsters, free of the radical associations of the past (hence the dropping of the party name in some branding). Of course, the group was originally founded in 1997 as Sinn Féin Youth before switching to the fully Irish ÓSF title in 1998. Now the pendulum has swung back again, with the organisation restyling itself over the last couple of months as the far better known, and frankly more memorable, Ógra Shinn Féin. That, coincidentally perhaps, puts it on the same linguistic ground as Éistigí, the relatively new and surprisingly active youth branch of the rival party, Saoradh.

Interesting.