Defining events

Power, resistance and identity in twenty-first-century Ireland

Fiona Dukelow, Rosie Meade, Fiona Dukelow, Rosie Meade

• Publisher: Manchester University Press
• Year: 2016
• Print ISBN: 9780719090578
• eBook ISBN: 9781847799906
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Political History & Theory
• Index: Politics & International Relations

This book re-visits and re-thinks some recent defining events in Irish society. Each chapter focuses on an event that has occurred since the start of the twenty first century. Some were high profile, some were 'fringe' events, others were widely discussed in popular culture at the time. A number of chapters focus on key moments of protest and popular mobilisation. All of the events covered provide rich insights into the dynamics of Irish society; exposing underlying and complex issues of identity, power and resistance that animate public debate. The book ultimately encourages readers to question the sources of, limits and obstacles to change in contemporary Ireland. The book brings together critical commentators from a diverse range of social science disciplines. These writers make important contributions to intellectual life and discourse about social, economic and cultural issues in today's Ireland. This makes for an original, timely and genuinely inter-disciplinary text.

1

Introduction

Rosie Meade and Fiona Dukelow

Defining events, critical theory and contemporary Ireland

It is easy to slip into caricature and hyperbole when reflecting on Irish society during the first decade of the twenty-first century. Writing in 2014, we continue to wrestle with the political, financial and social legacies of boom and bust that bookended the period. After several years of being lauded as the growth model to follow, and as recession and austerity were normalised in the Republic, it became commonplace in political and public discourse to claim this was ‘payback’ for the consumerist excesses of those years. In 2010 the then Minister for Finance Brian Lenihan (RTÉ, 2010) articulated it thus: ‘I accept that I have to take responsibility as a member of the governing party during that period for what happened, but let’s be fair about it, we all partied’ (emphasis added). A few months later, in April 2011, a report into the causes of the Irish banking crisis pointed to a similar malaise in popular attitudes and behaviour:

[T]he way Irish households, investors, banks and public authorities voluntarily reacted to foreign and domestic developments was probably not very different to that in other countries now experiencing financial problems. However, the extent to which large parts of Irish society were willing to let the good times roll on until the very last minute (a feature of the financial mania) may have been exceptional. (Nyberg, 2011:ii, emphasis added)

This suggestion of a collective or generalised frenzy also entered Taoiseach Enda Kenny’s comments at the World Economic Forum in Davos when he observed that ‘people went mad borrowing’: a remark that contrasted somewhat starkly with his earlier ‘State of the Nation’ style pronouncement that the people were ‘not responsible for this crisis’ (Scally, 2012).

Aside from evading more structural or internationalist analyses of Ireland’s economy and society during that decade, these narratives oversimplify ‘the’ public mood at the time. They infer that there was little in the way of dissent in Ireland, that conflicts over economic, cultural or social policy were not a notable feature of Irish society, and that alternative ways of thinking and being were not practised by social movements, community groups and individuals across the state. They also exceptionalise the period, framing it as an extraordinary rupture with what went before; so that by some it is regarded as signifying the overdue abandonment of outmoded allegiances while for others there is nostalgia for the ‘purer’ or more authentic values of the past.

This book analyses and critiques Irish society in the early twenty-first century, but seeks to do so by consciously avoiding myth-making and generalisation. Its authors, through a combination of rigorous theorisation and dedicated attention to ‘defining events’, profile struggles, controversies and antinomies that challenge easy acceptance of the one big narrative. We invite readers to revisit and rethink twelve events that span the years 2001–9. Some were high profile at the time and still occupy a prominent place in public consciousness today: for example, the bank guarantee of 2008 and the publication in 2009 of the Ryan Report continue to generate media coverage and frame understandings of or responses to emergent social issues. Some chapters focus on what might be regarded as ‘fringe’ events, which attracted comparatively less attention – the birth of Indymedia.ie perhaps; while others consider events in popular culture, such as reaction to the publication of Donal Óg Cusack’s autobiography or the opening of the Dundrum shopping centre. At first glance these chapters may seem to have little scope for either comparison or commonality, but their authors show that in their individual ways all of these events reveal crucial intersections of structural power and resistance in contemporary Ireland. Irrespective of their status on the mediascape or in folk-memory we argue that these events are important happenings in their own right and merit the kind of considered analysis that is presented here. Clearly this book seeks to stretch our often-taken-for-granted expectations of what the word ‘event’ means. Against a backdrop of 24-hour news feeds, insomniac social media, and a constant barrage of information spliced with entertainment, events appear in an apparently endless procession. Each one is represented as a ‘spectacle’, seemingly disconnected from that which goes before and that which follows, and all destined to be replaced in time by other, newer events. In 1967 Guy Debord designated the modern era as a ‘society of the spectacle’; ‘the whole life of those societies in which modern conditions of production prevail presents itself as an immense accumulation of spectacles. All that once was directly lived has become mere representation’ (1967/1995:12). Such tendencies are most apparent in the domains of media and celebrity but reflect something more profound; the spectacle ‘is the very heart of society’s real unreality’, it ‘epitomizes the prevailing model of social life’ (ibid.:13). Depth and subtlety of analysis are sacrificed in the name of speed and newsworthiness while complexity is ironed out in the making of society’s images of itself.

Against such tendencies, this book simply asks that we slow our responses down, that we take stock of contexts and contradictions, that, in a word, we think ‘dialectically’. Rather than represent these twelve events as self-contained episodes, we try to adopt a longer and deeper view of their significance. Therefore, chapters (re)open debates about the valuation of national resources or the heritage landscape; changing conceptions of sexual identity and citizenship; the fragility of trust in church, state and public institutions; the nature of economic growth and stability; the remaking of place in the name of consumerism or ‘progress’; and the pluralised forms that resistance takes in twenty-first-century Ireland. Contributors show how the events carry traces of both social structure and human agency. They were shaped by overarching political, economic, social and cultural currents; but they were also responses to proposals, protests, advocacy and demands that have been articulated by a broad spectrum of social actors.

This series of ‘defining events’ is analysed with reference to a range of disciplinary traditions in the social sciences. Rather than celebrate uncritically or damn unequivocally, contributors reflect on three central questions. What is the relative influence of hegemonic and oppositional discourses or ideas? What are the various conceptions of identity, progress or truth that inform the actions of those involved? To what extent do events break with or show continuities with the past? This latter question does not propose a retreat into ‘political cynicism’ (Giroux, 2004:131), the assumption that nothing can or will change, or that resistance always and inevitably re-energises existing power configurations. Instead it acknowledges that ‘democracy has to be struggled over even in the most appalling crisis of political agency’ (ibid.). This makes it imperative to clear-headedly track victories and defeats, be they consequences of policy-making, legislative change, lifestyle or life choice, public demonstration or media action.

We appreciate the necessary partiality of this approach: different events could have been selected and alternative interpretations could be brought to bear on those being reviewed. Indeed, we hope that readers will suggest other events that are equally or more worthy of analysis, because it is our intention to prompt debate and renewed understandings of what might constitute a politically or socially significant event. Dramatic effect or transformative outcomes are not the only measures. As a totality, this volume suggests that significance can be reflected in both disruptions and continuities in prevailing discourses and forms of action. More troublingly, it can also be reflected in the absence of wider publicity, particularly when dominant power and social arrangements trivialise or obscure social cleavages.

Another purpose of this book is to demonstrate the relevance of theory to a critical understanding of the dynamics of life in contemporary Ireland. In so doing, it adopts what Goran Therborn (2007:79) calls an ‘ecumenical conception of theory’, which ‘sees social theory as strung between two ambitious poles: on the one hand, providing a comprehensive explanatory framework for a set of social phenomena; and on the other, something “making sense of” such phenomena’. Authors tease out the particularities of the local scene, while simultaneously recording the influence of global forces and structural contradictions. The book is also ecumenical in its recognition of the scope for deliberation and interchange between different disciplines in the social sciences. Contributors come from backgrounds in archaeology, law, sociology, philosophy, equality studies, geography, women’s studies and social policy, and their chapters are inflected by those diverse traditions. They are, nonetheless, united in a shared allegiance to critical understanding, where critique is founded on a concern to reveal and counter aspects of inequality or ideological distortion, and where writers consciously acknowledge the political commitments that inform their work.

Power

As authors draw on diverse theoretical resources to support and extend their arguments, issues of power, identity and resistance emerge as unifying themes across the text. Contributors, however, conceive of power in different ways, and so invite readers to step inside the debate about one of social science’s most contested concepts. Some authors conceive of power as a capacity (Lukes, 2005), over which elite actors in the state, legislature or mainstream media have control or privileged access. Power enables actors to impose their will on dissenting others – to drive a motorway through opposition (Conor Newman, Chapter 3), to deny some citizens the right to marry (Angela O’Connell, Chapter 4) – but it also operates surreptitiously. It distorts the agenda of public debate so that some voices are never heard in mainstream media (Margaret Gillan and Laurence Cox, Chapter 2) while others are ridiculed – as in the case of opposition to the routing of the M3 motorway – or the public is assailed by fabricated issues – such as the illusionary threats posed by migrants to the concept of Irish citizenship (Steve Garner, Chapter 5) – that undermine their capacity to recognise their real interests. These chapters highlight the extent to which the parameters of decision-making, public discourse and popular imagination are set in line with narrow and reactionary agendas. And as Angela O’Connell’s analysis of the KAL case shows, the effects of such power are simultaneously intimate and public.

Alternatively, some contributors adopt more Foucauldian conceptions of power: ‘power is everywhere; not because it embraces everything, but because it comes from everywhere’ (Foucault, 1998:92). They consider how efforts to conduct the conduct – what Foucault (2007) calls to govern – of ourselves and others do not just emanate from on-high but are expressed across the polity by actors including social movements and non-governmental organisations (NGOs). Power’s dispersed and relational qualities do not necessarily render the public sphere more democratic or egalitarian, but they do complicate our understanding of the rationalities and interests that govern contemporary Irish society. Paul Michael Garret (Chapter 7) acknowledges that Antisocial Behaviour Orders (ASBOs) were introduced and promoted by Minister for Justice Michael McDowell, but the momentum behind his legislation was generated by multiple forces: international think-tanks, policy-makers in the US and UK, and political parties that channelled constituents’ preoccupations with ‘anti- social’ conduct. Likewise Rosie Meade (Chapter 10) characterises the Older People’s Uprising as a confrontation between older people, advocacy groups and the incumbent government, yet recognises the dependencies, collaborations and compromises that structure relationships between those actors in a context where social partnership and clientelist politics have dominated. John Baker, Kathleen Lynch and Judy Walsh (Chapter 11) reflecting on government efforts to rein in the Equality Authority, remind us that the state can use its power to constrain dissenting institutions. But they too avoid crude polarisations, with the Authority on one side and the government on the other. While applauding the Authority’s significant achievements, they nonetheless point to a theoretical continuity between the model of equality it championed and that favoured by the government, the privileging of equality of opportunity.

Eoin O’Sullivan’s contribution (Chapter 12) also evokes Foucault’s notion of power as coming from everywhere. As Ireland’s confinement culture found expression in the industrial and reformatory school network, O’Sullivan observes the enactment of power across church, state and even family to manage, regulate and contain children. But again, Eoin O’Sullivan complicates our understanding of the significance of the Ryan Report and public responses to it, by questioning the popular assumption that these schools reflected a distinctly Irish pathology. He records how similar investigative processes have been undertaken elsewhere, and that they too have unearthed narratives of abuse and brutality. While mindful of the distinguishing socio-cultural characteristics of Ireland at the time, he points to a recurring ‘pathology of the institution’ which has transcended geographic and national borders.

This book also explores how power works ideologically and through policy instruments to support dominant models of capital accumulation. Fiona Dukelow (Chapter 9) discusses how neo-liberalism as both an ideology and practice continues to ‘fail forward’, despite being implicated as cause and after-effect of the global economic crisis. Since Ireland’s recession was announced in 2008, the urgency of economic stability and renewed growth has become a constant and ubiquitous refrain in the Irish public sphere. Its clarion call of austerity has ensured that neo-liberalism has been normalised within approaches to welfare delivery in particular. Indeed, even though this book seeks to explore a broad range of issues across the spectrum of human experience, it can never really escape the grasp of the economy. Events such as the bank guarantee, but also the Older People’s Uprising, the decision to build the M3 through Tara, the introduction of ASBOs, and even the Citizenship Referendum, illustrate the form and reach of contemporary capitalism. In Ireland, mainstream analysis pivots on the assumption that the mantra ‘it’s the economy stupid’ should over-determine social, environmental and cultural priorities. In this there are clear resonances with the past – the need to protect economic fundamentals long featuring as the theme in Irish policy-making – but in our era of neo-liberalism, this tendency has been amplified and accelerated. Stuart Hall (2013) has observed:

Neoliberalism’s victory has depended on the boldness and ambition of global capital, on its confidence that it can now govern not just the economy but the whole of social life. On the back of a revamped liberal political and economic theory, its champions have constructed a vision and a new common sense that have permeated society.

Unsurprisingly, perhaps, the salience of Hall’s observations is borne out in Denis Linehan’s (Chapter 6) analysis of Dundrum Town Centre and by Paul Michael Garrett on the introduction of ASBOs. Although not obviously comparable, both problematise the impact of neo-liberalism’s fellow travellers, privatisation of public space, the fetishisation of consumerist identities, and contemporary paranoia over security and order. The gating-off of public space, whether physically in shopping centres or metaphorically through ASBOs, classifies the insiders and outsiders in our economy; those with money to spend who are ready to consume and those who threaten the order of things through their deviant and risky habits.

Resistance

As Foucault (1998) observed, where there is power there is resistance, and this book analyses the interplay between those conjoined forces. Resistance has become a fashionable, and possibly hackneyed, concept in the social sciences because it redirects emphasis away from issues of ‘social control’ and ‘structure to issues of agency’ (Hollander and Einwohner, 2004:533). It replaces determinism with hope, suggesting that, at the very least, we can step up to power configurations and, maybe, face them down or overturn them. Even when actors present themselves as unwittingly or unwillingly politicised – as with Dónal Óg Cusack’s initial construction of his ‘coming out’ – the public avowal of ‘alternat...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• List of tables
• Notes on contributors
• Series editor’s foreword
• Acknowledgements
• List of abbreviations
• 1 Introduction
• 2 The birth of Indymedia.ie: a critical space for social movements in Ireland
• 3 In the way of development: Tara, the M3 and the Celtic Tiger
• 4 Carts, horses and carriages: love and (same-sex) marriage in the twenty-first century
• 5 Making ‘race’ an issue in the 2004 Irish Citizenship Referendum
• 6 ‘The centre of everything’: Ireland at the Dundrum Town Centre
• 7 ‘Taking back the neighbourhood’: the introduction of ASBOs
• 8 All that shimmers is not gold: the Garda Síochána Ombudsman Commission and Garda accountability
• 9 State to the rescue: the bank guarantee and Ireland’s financialised neo-liberal growth model
• 10 Worlds turned upside down? The Older People’s Uprising, 2008
• 11 Cutting back on equality
• 12 The Ryan Report: reformatory and industrial schools and twentieth-century Ireland
• 13 Gay in the GAA: the challenge of Dónal Óg Cusack’s ‘coming out’ to heteronormativity in contemporary Irish culture and society
• Index