Post by Vanessa Liston The controversy over the Central Access Scheme (CAS) in Kilkenny city has raised some important issues about local democracy in Ireland. One of these concerns the link between elected representatives and citizens. On the one hand those who, for different reasons oppose the scheme, claim that democracy is dead. Councilors do…

  Prof. Eduardo Silva, Tulane University, this year’s Maynooth University Distinguished Visiting Scholar. Posted on behalf of Dr. Barry Cannon and Dr. Mary P. Murphy, National University of Ireland Maynooth. This blog presents the arguments from a paper published in Irish Political Studies by the authors. Free access to the paper is available for the…

Posted on behalf of Dr Siobhan O’Sullivan, School of Applied Social Studies University College Cork, Dr Amy Healy, NUI Maynooth, and Prof Michael Breen, Faculty of Arts, Mary Immaculate College, University of Limerick. This blog presents the arguments from a paper published in Irish Political Studies by the authors. Free access to the paper is…

Support for Fine Gael and Labour has declined from a combined 38% early this year to 27.5% now. This represents the (joint) largest loss for the government parties in a calendar year since the coalition took office in 2011. In 2011 the coalition lost 10% of the vote, in 2012 7.5% and in 2013 1.5%.…

Dr. Mel Farrell, 3 December 2014 The Great Depression helped create the party system that dominated Irish politics for eighty years, the Great Recession may be about to force a new way in Irish politics. After the 2011 general election, what newly elected Taoiseach Enda Kenny described as a ‘Democratic Revolution’, shook the foundations of Ireland’s…

Elaine Byrne 21/11/14 The Council of Europe (GRECO) today published it’s fourth evaluation round report on corruption in Ireland. Corruption prevention in respect of members of parliament, judges and prosecutors  contains eleven recommendations. The recommendations are a timely intervention into the debate on political reform – much of which campaigners for reform have been advocating for some time. No…

A new poll by Millward Brown came out this weekend, with headline figures of 26% for Sinn Féin and 22% for Fine Gael. This let many news outlets to conclude that Sinn Féin is now the biggest party in the Republic. But this conclusion cannot be drawn from the Millward Brown poll, based on 991…

Election Institutions and Electoral Integrity 16 October 2014 NUI Merrion Square All Welcome. Please email t.reidy@ucc.ie to confirm attendance (for catering purposes).   10.00 – 11.15              Evaluating Electoral Institutions and Administration Andrew Reynolds, (University of North Carolina) (co-authors: Jorgen Elklit and Pippa Norris) Why Electoral Integrity Matters: Measurement and Consequences Carolien VanHam (University of…

Many of you have noticed that politicalreform.ie has been down since July. I’d like to say that it was in preparation of a major relaunch, but it wasn’t. It was a failure of too many people involved in running the site, and none of us taking responsibility. A catalogue of unpaid bills, misunderstandings and amateurism…

Originally posted on Irish Elections: Geography, Facts and Analyses:
Adrian Kavanagh, 13th September 2014 (still being updated!) The latest in the series of Red C polls has brought good news especially for Fine Gael and Sinn Fein. While Labour sees a one percentage point increase in the party’s poll levels, this is well off the levels of…