The Sustainable Nation

Liam Leonard

• Publisher: Emerald Publishing Limited
• Year: 2017
• ISBN:
  9781787434592
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Environment & Energy Policy
• Index: Politics & International Relations

Drawing on almost 20 years of Liam Leonard's research in the field, The Sustainable Nation: Politics, Economy and Justice provides a detailed case study of a modern European state's tumultuous development through first decades of the Millennium. As the Republic of Ireland experienced an initial phase of accelerated growth, followed by a dramatic economic downturn, the nation's attempts to expand its infrastructure was met with resistance from communities concerned about local environments. The Sustainable Nation: Politics, Economy and Justice looks at some of the conflicts that emerged as part of the Irish people's attempts to achieve a sustainable form of development. Other issues such as the rise of a multicultural and globalized society as well as issues of social justice are also explored within this study. This book represents a culmination of Leonard's research on Ireland which began at the turn of the Millennium. The book provides an in depth and up to date study on Ireland's growth and the substantial changes experienced there during the last two decades.

CHAPTER 1

INTRODUCTION: THE IRISH STATE, FROM BOOM TO BAILOUT TO BREXIT

This volume of the Advances in Sustainability and Environmental Justice examines events which occurred in the Republic of Ireland in the early decades of the Millennium. These years have proved to be tumultuous for Ireland, with major events such as the Peace Process, the economic boom and subsequent collapse of the Irish economy, the bailout plan of the International Monetary Fund (IMF). More recently, the United Kingdom’s decision to leave the European Union has their Irish neighbours with an island divided North and South by an EU border. Plans in June 2017 for a coalition between the Conservatives and the Democratic Unionist Party of Northern Ireland, which goes against the spirit of the Good Friday Agreement, add to a disruptive air of uncertainty in the Republic. The main focus of this book is the response to policy processes which have occurred within the context of these dramatic changes.

Essentially, the book can be divided into three main sections, Politics, Economy and Justice. The book will provide an examination and analysis of the infrastructural development and social justice strategies and subsequent community responses in the Republic of Ireland, over recent decades. We can understand the subtext of development policies in Ireland in the context of the nation’s transition from a rights-based service policy model into a rationalised entity which reflects the prevailing outlook of neo-liberal governments globally. The impact of this neo-liberal/neo-corporatist policy framework has been outlined by Phelan and Norris (2008), where they write of the linkages between the prevailing policy model and the impact on poorer communities in Dublin. The community responses which emerge in reaction to the exclusion and concern caused by a corrosive form of ‘social partnership’ can also be understood in this light, as environmental disputes about energy policies and communities, transport policy and heritage, waste management policy and pollution, and development and water supplies reflect an ongoing concern with the impact of reckless development on communities, environments and the political process.

After decades of economic stagnation, the Irish state embraced the dualistic agendas of neo-liberalism and neo-corporatism to create the economic basis for the multinational-led development that came to be synonymous with the boom decade of the ‘Celtic Tiger’. In addition, the state prioritised unfettered (or unregulated) infrastructural development as a response to the social needs of communities traditionally marginalised by high levels of unemployment and emigration. We can understand the consequences of this shift from the provision of a service-based social policy platform into that of a policy framework which promotes industrial concerns in the context of the Irish state’s prevailing neo-liberal model, which has resulted in a social partnership model where the industrial lobby holds sway, dominating successive populist governments with the support of compliant trade unions.

One result of this has seen areas traditionally marginalised due to the deprivation of poverty, unemployment and emigration, embarking on collective action responses in defence of communities or environments (Leonard, 2008). In many ways, it has been the manner in which rural communities have been neglected by the state over the decades before the Celtic Tiger which has created the pool of discontent from which campaigns of opposition to state policy have emerged. The resultant tension between environmental and developmental considerations has created a conflict where ‘the state should mediate to promote the common good’ (Allen, 2007, p. xvii). However, in the Irish case, the demands of industry have gained prevalence over those of local communities excluded from neo-corporatist arrangements, with a series of community-based environmental protests occurring as a result in recent years.

These disputes have occurred against a backdrop of rapid economic growth, with communities now experiencing a change of lifestyle, with an increasingly flexible workforce now reliant on commuting to and from industrial centres, as housing has come to be priced out of the budgets of many in the population, including those migrants who have come to Ireland in search of employment. Even the protection of the trade unions has come to be diminished, owing to neo-corporate demands on social policy:

In Ireland, pressure for flexibility and work intensity comes directly through social partnership agreements. Whereas in the past workers were granted pay rises in response to rising rates of inflation, today they must first show ‘verifiable’ improvements in productivity to get a pay rise … outside of the world of work the corporations want to hollow out what is left of social rights or the social wage. (Allen, 2007, p. 11)

Such demands have placed a strain on the traditional ‘social capital’ which had been the bedrock of community life in rural Ireland, as families become caught up in a cycle of overtime, commuting and crèches. At the same time, the remaining vestiges of a welfare state have been all but replaced with a regime of a privatised health industry. The mistreatment of immigrants in the workforce has led to unions becoming concerned about a ‘race to the bottom’ in relation to the work and welfare practice of the neo-liberal state (Allen, 2007, pp. 36–37). Ultimately, there is increased uncertainty as to whether prosperity has come at too high of a price:

The urgent question concerns the relationship between economic and cultural modernisation: is being happier the realisation of the good life? Does the Celtic Tiger represent an improvement in our overall quality of life, or moral bankruptcy and spiritual dereliction? (Kuhling & Keohane, 2007, p. 4)

This transition from policies aimed at providing services to those embedded in industrial practice is reflected in the Irish environmental policy agendas. These policy frameworks had originally been devised in order to prevent pollution and regulate industry, but have subsequently come to facilitate corporations and economic growth.

Having enjoyed the benefits of the economic growth associated with the Celtic Tiger boom of the last decade, communities in Ireland are beginning to witness the downside of accelerated growth. Offshoots of rapid development such as hyper-consumption, a buoyant property market and increased car ownership led to further demand for critical infrastructure such as roads, waste management sites and water treatment facilities. Such was the link between growth and infrastructure that those communities which voiced concerns about projects were deemed to be backward thinking and against progress. An understanding of these issues can be derived from an examination of the community responses to infrastructural projects that came to be perceived as threats to locals and their health and environment, or to the heritage of the nation itself.

Prior to this, political groupings had supported a number of environmental community movements which had mobilised against infrastructural projects in rural and suburban areas. The book examines some of these contentious disputes, including issues surrounding the municipal provision of water and attempts to develop a gas installation and pipeline in the west of Ireland. Such movements became characteristic in an Ireland that was experiencing accelerated growth in the early decades of this century. While many welcomed growth, some warned of an economy which was overheating and which excluded many, including the poor, women’s groups and community groups concerned for their local environments (Leonard, 2008).

This increase in marginalisation is examined in the book’s final chapters, as issues of justice and injustice are discussed. These chapters look at Ireland’s increased multiculturalism, and the need to develop new perspectives to create an inclusive Ireland. In addition, approaches to restorative justice and imprisonment are examined, as part of attempts to create what this author has titled ‘Sustainable Justice’ (Leonard & Kenny, 2010).

This book represents a culmination of my research on Ireland which began at the turn of the Millennium. Whilst some of the issues here have been published in part in journals, books and articles through different formats, this book has given me an opportunity to revisit, revise and distil my work on Ireland from the last two decades. These have indeed been tumultuous changes in Ireland over these years, from the Peace Process through to the 100th anniversary of the Easter Rising in 2016. One wonders what rebel leaders such as Padraig Pearse, James Connolly, Constance Markievicz and Michael Collins would think of the current political establishment in Ireland, which has succumbed to austerity and neo-liberal corporatism rather than embracing their communities and resources in a sustainable manner.

And as the Advances in Sustainability and Environmental Justice comes of age with this, its 21st volume, I have been pleased to see the series grow through the years examined in this book. I am certain that the series will continue to grow and explore relevant issues in sustainability for many years to come.

REFERENCES

Allen, K. (2007). The corporate takeover of Ireland. Dublin: Irish Academic Press Ltd.

Kuhling, C., & Keohane, C. (2007). Cosmopolitan Ireland: Globalisation and quality of life. London: Pluto Press.

Leonard, L. (2008). The environmental movement in Ireland. Dordrecht: Springer.

Leonard, L., & Kenny, P. (2010). Sustainable justice & the community advances in ecopolitics. Advances in ecopolitics (Vol. 6). Bingley/Bradford: Emerald.

Phelan, E., & Norris, M. (2008). Neo-corporatist governance of homeless services in Dublin: Reconceptualization, incorporation and exclusion. Critical Social Policy, 28(1), 51–73.

CHAPTER 2

ECONOMY AND RESISTANCE*

ABSTRACT

Ireland has witnessed a succession of community-based protests in recent years. Issues have included water charges, refuse collection taxes, infrastructural developments, incinerators, dumps and toxic industries. This chapter will argue that the basis for these disputes is the Irish state’s neo-liberal and neo-corporatist policy framework, which favours accelerated and reckless infrastructural development while excluding community concerns about health and environmental issues. The chapter will also examine the use of communications technologies, which form a large part of the modern economy, as a tool for community resistance.

Keywords: Community activism; exclusion; infrastructural development; communications technologies; media; social partnership

*Some of this article was originally published in Leonard (2009).

INTRODUCTION

Late 2016 witnessed the takeover of Apollo House, a large building in the centre of Dublin City, in protest of the city’s increase in homelessness and poverty. Apollo House was held by the National Assets Management Agency (NAMA) on behalf of the Irish state, and represented the fallacy of Ireland’s ruling elite which had presided over. Those involved in the takeover were musicians, artists, writers, activists and radicals, mirroring the backgrounds of the leaders of the 1916 Rising against British Rule, which the Irish government had spent millions on while enforcing austerity measures on behalf of the International Monetary Fund (IMF). The path to austerity and the Irish state’s bailout of its financial sector followed on from successive scandals involving major Irish institutions such as the political, religious, banking and business sectors.

Ireland had soon succumbed to the politics of privilege once the uprising against British rule and subsequent Civil War had ended in 1922. The new political elites in the Irish Free State and their successors after the Republic of Ireland came into being in 1949 were characterised by a deep conservatism, and austere politics, social repression and massive waves of emigration were the norm in Ireland. Even the phase of economic growth experienced in the short-lived “Celtic Tiger” years between 1996 and 2004 were built on a house of sand, as corruption between the political and industrial sector led to an economic collapse, leading to the departure of a new wave of young Irish emigrants to destinations across the globe.

As Irish development theorist Peader Kirby (2006, p. 182) has put it:

For all the illusion of success, Ireland flies on one wing as long as it allows (indeed, actually actively fosters through public policy) the enrichment of an elite and the marginalisation of growing numbers of its citizens from the benefits of economic growth.

The accelerated and reckless nature of Irish development which emerged from this tryst has resulted in a series of protests by communities concerned about environmental and health risks posed by this policy direction which has arisen under the auspices of neo-liberal ‘social partnership’, but represents in reality the triumph of neo-liberalism, naked greed and which led to poor planning and lax regulatory practices.

Essentially, we can understand the subtext of social policy in Ireland in the context of a transition of social and environmental policy from a rights-based service into a rationalised entity which reflects the prevailing outlook of Ireland’s neo-liberal government and its neo-corporatist ‘partnership’ model. The impact of this neo-liberal/neo-corporatist policy framework has been highlighted by Phelan and Norris (2008), where they write of the linkages between the prevailing policy model and the impact on individual services such as services for the homeless in Dublin. The community responses which emerge in reaction to the exclusion and concern caused by a corrosive form of ‘social partnership’ can also be understood in this light, as environmental disputes about resource policy and communities, transport policy and heritage, waste management policy and pollution, and development and water supplies reflect an ongoing concern with the impact of reckless development on communities, environments and the political process.

As the following section will show, the Irish public’s ability to mobilise around communications technologies became a significant part of community group resistance to austerity.

THE ECONOMY, MEDIA AND RESISTANCE

A notable feature of the post-bailout political landscape in Ireland has been the increasing incidents of confrontation between communities and elites. These conflicts have occurred in the wake of the declining relevance of the traditional left-right dichotomy, and have been exemplified by the campaigns of opposition led by community groups against the state and corporate sectors. One notable area of economic activity which has also been utilised by community movements is the use of communications technologies. The use of text, internet and media technologies by protest groups has facilitated the growth of a network of committed activists, who provide scientific and technological expertise to like-minded protests around the globe. By exploring campaign’s use of media and internet technologies, we can understand the significance of new approaches taken by grassroots groups as part of their resistance to state, corporate and institutional actors. The community’s ability to utilise communications technologies to forge links with local and global anti-movements provides evidence of the extensive nature of the links available to grassroots groups.

Communication technologies enhance protest movements by providing leverage and influence for grassroots groups in an era characterised by knowledge flows and technocratic expertise. Internet linkages facilitate innovative approaches to political opportunity structures for movements through emergent features of protest that create a new nexus of capabilities in the globalised era. These cycles of protest of new social movements have come to be underpinned by the onset of interactive knowledge flows, networked alliances, improved tactical approaches and advanced mobilisational capabilities through the development of diverse protest strategies.

The use of internet technology as a basis for support between disparate protest groups is strategically augmented by the utilisation of media networks eager for a steady supply of presentable items on potential ecological crises for their ceaseless broadcasts. The web has become a vehicle for the dissemination of the various components of the environmental movement: academic and scientific expertise, political strategies, legal frameworks and the location of globalised support networks. By facilitating the spread of information which enhances campaigns of protest, the new technologies of communication have become a vital tool in the arsenal of various Irish protest groups advocating for the homeless or for water rights and other areas of social and environmental justice.

Castells defines internet technologies as a ‘privileged tool for acting, informing, recruiting, organising and counter-dominating’ (2001, p. 137). Through the application of communication technologies, localised environmental movements can link with similar groups on a global basis, learning from the hard earned experiences of previous campaigns. This has transformed the once-isolated pockets of environmental resistance into a world-wide movement able to challenge transnational corporate polluters, in the place of regional campaigns of resistance. The increasing reliance on communication technologies by environmental groups has seen a transformation in activists’ profiles; changing from the politically dogmatic campaigner to that of a media-friendly professional with a high level of expertise in a related field. This use of expertise has created what Castells has called ‘the new dynamics of ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Chapter 1 Introduction: The Irish State, from Boom to Bailout to Brexit
• Chapter 2 Economy and Resistance☆
• Chapter 3 Conservation
• Chapter 4 Water☆
• Chapter 5 Resources☆
• Chapter 6 Energy☆
• Chapter 7 Crime☆
• Chapter 8 Multiculturalism
• Chapter 9 Restorative Justice
• Chapter 10 Prisons
• Index