It is a rare thing indeed for an outsider to gain an insight into the very core of a Civil Service department. In this personal account, the workings of the Land Commission over a period of forty-five years are laid bare by one of its former principal officers.

Though at times a difficult read, this is a valuable historical document. It recounts the detail of the implementation of one of the great national ideals: the restoration of the land of Ireland to the people of Ireland. This process, initiated under British rule, came to fruition after the founding of the State. The efficiency and equity with which it was done - the acquisition and re-allocation of many thousands of acres of that most contentious commodity, land - must rank as one of the great unsung achievements of Irish government.

What strikes one is the absolute integrity, not only of the process itself, but of the vast majority of the people charged with its implementation. The Minister, for example, was expressly forbidden from having any say in re-allocation. Erskine Childers, when Minister for Lands, was none too popular with his fellow TDs when he sought to point this out to their constituents. The Land Commissioners themselves were prohibited from ruling on any matter in a county where they had ties by blood or marriage.

The author comes across as a fine example of the Irish Civil Servant at his best: honest and conscientious, constantly aiming for efficient administration, politic rather than political, with a comprehensive knowledge of his department and an interest in and understanding of his hard-working staff. He has a creditable if rather old-fashioned discretion with regard to naming individuals and is scrupulously correct when it comes to facts and figures, stating explicitly where his memory fails him or where, in times gone by, he felt his judgement was in error.

His story, however has its villains: the wily, self-important Secretary and his Assistant Secretary - the hatchet man, as the author has no compunction in calling him. We are given an incisive account of how a cunning Secretary of a department can manipulate his Minister, thwart the initiative and good work of his staff, and finally undermine the very Department of which he was the self-proclaimed permanent civil head. The author recounts a number of instances of bad management at the highest level, resulting, in one case, in the loss to the exchequer of a possible £146 million. The loss to the small farmer due to the lack of consultation at top management level was also considerable.

The book contains many interesting anecdotes and important insights and has over forty appendices and tables. One of these is a report on one of the Land Commission's finest achievements: the setting up of the Meath Gaeltacht in the 1930s. If we are to understand how this country is run - and gain some knowledge of the blessings and curses inflicted on us by the dictatorship of the Departmental Secretary - then many an honest and detailed memoir of this kind will have to be written.

Liam Mac Coil is a novelist and critic.