Posted on behalf of John Coakley and Jennifer Todd Blog from the Special Issue of Irish Political Studies: Breaking patterns of conflict in Northern Ireland: the British and Irish states The British and Irish governments were central to the move to peace in Northern Ireland. Their negotiations and mutual agreements, their cooperation and coordinated stances…
*Declaration of interest: I am the research director of the Convention (in a voluntary capacity). Last weekend, the Constitutional Convention completed its work. At its closing dinner last Saturday, the snappy slogan on the menu summed things up well: ‘100 members, 10 meetings, 1 constitution’. With a budget of some €900,000 and a deadline of…
The first annual report of the highly influential Electoral Integrity Project has just been published (see here). Professor Pippa Norris and her colleagues have carried out an extensive survey of the electoral process across the world’s democracies over the past few years. Ireland’s last election (2011) preceded this project so it was not included on…
After the Irish people chose to retain the Seanad last year, the focus has now shifted to the question of reform. The government has announced its intention to reform the University franchise as allowed by the 1978 amendment to the Constitution. The main campaigning platform for Seanad retention, Democracy Matters, has embarked on a new…
Elaine Byrne 3 February 2014 The European Commission published its first Anti-Corruption report today. Information on the Eurobarometer polls and summaries of each country can be found here The Ireland chapter is here. The report makes a number of observations across different sectors of Irish public life. It has commended the government for the reforms it…
Elaine Byrne 31 January 2014 An exchange between the Chair of the Standards in Public Office Commission recently the Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government, Mr. Phil Hogan T.D., with regard to the draft guidelines on political finance largely went by unnoticed. Just as unnoticed were the implications of the far-reaching Electoral (Political Funding) Act 2012. …
Posted on behalf of the RIA Venue: Academy House Date: Tuesday 4 February 2014, 11.00-18.00 Following the recent referendum in which the Irish people rejected the proposal to abolish Seanad Éireann, the question of possible directions for reform has emerged as a significant theme in discussion of political change. The aim of this discussion seminar…
Posted on behalf of Senator Fidelma Healy Eames The Reform Alliance is looking for ideas on reform in advance of the conference Saturday. http://www.reformalliance.ie/your-reform/ The reforms will be tweeted on a big screen live throughout the sessions and we will also provide space for attendees to tweet their own ideas live on the day with…
The fallout from the Seanad referendum continues. Various groups (most prominent among them Democracy Matters), political parties (notably Fianna Fáil) and prominent individuals such as Michael McDowell are clamouring for the government to introduce legislation to allow for the direct election of the next Seanad. An editorial in today’s Irish Times makes supportive noises in…
Adrian Kavanagh, 9th/25th January/22nd February 2014 The trends of varying results across two polls published on the same date, as evidenced with the 26th January polls, is evident again with those to be published on 23rd February. The Sunday Business Post-Red C poll (23rd February) estimated party support levels as follows (and relative to the previous such poll): Fine…
Irish Politics Forum 