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CrisisJam #8
Contents
Since the foundation of the state, no matter how corrupt or incompetent, Fianna Fáil's ability to command loyalty, to bounce back and even to engender in the electorate a strange kind of sly regard for their own brown envelope crookedness seemed permanent. Last week's election has been called everything from a democratic revolution to a mandate for austerity. Whether you're inclined to view elections as a democratic right or a hollow spectacle, there is no denying that at least on the level of the zeitgeist, the obliteration of Fianna Fáil and the rise of the right and the left is pretty significant. This week's CrisisJam provides some analysis of the week that was.
- Beyond counting bad apples - Dara McHugh
- Toward a left majority? - Harry Browne
- 'The Plan is the Plan' - Dan Finn
- Time to reject 'careful now' economics - Andy Storey
- The Irish left comes of age - Sinead Kennedy
- The last of the Dublin rogues? - Donal Fallon
- Where next? A British perspective - Omayr Rehmaan Ghani
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Welcome to CrisisJam #8
Since the foundation of the state, no matter how corrupt or incompetent, Fianna Fáil’s ability to command loyalty, to bounce back and even to engender in the electorate a strange kind of sly regard for their own brown envelope crookedness seemed permanent. Last week’s election has been called everything from a democratic revolution to a mandate for austerity. Whether you’re inclined to view elections as a democratic right or a hollow spectacle, there is no denying that at least on the l... |
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Beyond counting bad apples
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Reform and tax-tinkering can seem feeble when stacked up beside the overhwleming structural and social inequalities in Irish society. Did the ballot box riot of 2011 merely channel genuine anger into a cosmetic shift from one party’s austerity to another? The Irish crisis will not be solved by this election or the next, argues Dara McHugh.
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Toward a left majority?
One of the more interesting questions to be asked about this election is: Where did all the Fianna Fáilers go? Not, it seems, to H&M to buy themselves blue shirts. Having crunched the numbers, Harry Browne finds that much of the Fianna Fáil vote went left, a result that gives the lie to talk of a solidly conservative centre-right majority in Ireland.
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'The Plan is the Plan'
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In last week's General Election, fewer than one in five people who cast a ballot lent their support to the outgoing parties of government. While widely cast as a 'democratic revolution', this outcome will in fact barely alter the disastrous course upon which we are set. As the reactionaries in Fine Gael eye up potential Ministries, the prospect for ordinary Irish people is further austerity measures driven by a 'bailout' that may be altered a little in terms of detail but will remain t... |
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Time to reject 'careful now' economics
When it comes to debt, Ireland still has cards left to play and time left in which to play them. Once again showing us that there are economic alternatives, Andy Storey argues that our Father Ted approach to economics is giving Wall Street a good laugh.
According to Central Bank Governor Patrick Honohan on RTÉ's Prime Time, Irish debt is now largely owed to the public sector (i.e., European taxpayers) rather than to private agents. In other words, as adverted to previously, the debt is on... |
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The Irish left comes of age
One of the more eye-catching trends in last week’s General Election was the emergence of the radical left as a viable political force. The success of five candidates from the United Left Alliance was arguably the most significant expression of a radicalisation of the Irish electorate. Here Sinéad Kennedy examines the potential of the ULA and suggests that the recent electoral successes mark an historic opportunity for the advance of the Irish left.
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The last of the Dublin rogues?
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Of all Fianna Fáil's defeats in the elections, perhaps the one of greatest historical significance was its being wiped off the map of the capital city, with only one utterly discredited TD remaining. Being a 'Dublin rogue' was once enough for the loyal city's population to forgive just about anything, but that knowing regard is gone. Donal Fallon gives us a sense of the historical significance of the Dublin defeat.
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Where next? A British perspective
With a stronger Labour tradition and a stronger right-wing tradition, there are many lessons to be learned from our nearest geographical neighbours. Today, with a conservative leadership and a vibrant student resistance movement, Ceasefire’s Omayr Rehmaan Ghani gives us a valuable British perspective on the limitations and possibilities that may lie ahead.
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Towards a more equal society - An introduction to CrisisJam's International Women's Day special
| When Constance Markievicz became the first woman elected to parliament it was hailed as a great victory for Irish women. While the women themselves were jubilant the irony was not lost on them as the feminist paper the Irish Citizen remarked, "Under the new dispensation the majority sex in Ireland has secured one representative. This is the measure of our boasted sex equality."
Fast forward 90 years or so and one would expect to find a vastly different scenario in Dáil Eireann. Y ... |
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