By Ken Carty, The University of British Columbia. Well over a decade ago now Theresa Reidy posted a blog comment asking “Referendums in Ireland, how many more can we take?” Rather than addressing the numerical question head on she went on to note how ineffective the process was as a mechanism for democratic policy-making. Few…
By Michael Gallagher 1. Previous post didn’t contain a prediction, but did observe that there were many considerations that could lead electors to a No vote while the benefits of a Yes outcome were uncertain and contested. Margin of defeat for the two proposals has taken everyone by surprise. 2. Many of the Yes advocates…
By Michael Gallagher So, the nation is (far from) convulsed by the two referendums that will take place on Friday, the ‘family amendment’ and the ‘care amendment’. (Of course, these could be seen as merely the warm-up before the really big referendum of the year, the eagerly-awaited vote on the Unified Patent Court that’s due…
By Michael Gallagher The expectation was that the same-sex marriage referendum would deliver a comfortable Yes and the vote on reducing the minimum age for the president an equally decisive No, and that’s just how it worked out. The latter achieved the distinction of delivering the lowest Yes vote (only 27 per cent) of any…
Originally posted on The Constitution Unit Blog:
During the EU referendum debate it has often been asserted that people tend to be risk averse and so vote against change in referendums. But does the evidence justify this claim? Stephen Fisher and Alan Renwick have collected data on over 250 national referendums held since 1990 and found that the change option…
The marriage referendum was an emotional roller-coaster. The reports of thousands taking boats and flights home to vote in the marriage referendum were heart-lifting. Ursula Halligan’s revelation in the last week of the marriage referendum campaign that she had hidden her sexuality from everyone, including at times herself was heart-breaking. She cited the referendum campaign…
By Michael Gallagher The expectation was that the same-sex marriage referendum would deliver a comfortable Yes and the vote on reducing the minimum age for the president an equally decisive No, and that’s just how it worked out. The latter achieved the distinction of delivering the lowest Yes vote (only 27 per cent) of any…
On Friday the Irish will vote on two issues. Both are being sold as reforms, one a social reform, the other a political reform. Both can be said to have come from the the ‘People’ via the Constitutional Convention. If polls are even broadly accurate one will pass comfortably, the other will be easily defeated.…
By Vanessa Liston (CiviQ.eu) Opinion polls are built into the fabric of our political system. We look to them as a fountain of knowledge on people’s minds, as we search for clues and cues in meandering a fractious course to the polling booth. Yet, given the outcome of the Seanad referendum, that quite dramatically violated…
Post by John Carroll During the past few weeks, we’ve heard much about the Zappone/Quinn and Crowne Seanad bills offering a roadmap for non-constitutional Seanad reform. Apparently these Bills can be the “legislative template” for Seanad reform that could be put in place within 75 days yet surprisingly few people (beyond Richard Humphreys and Eoin O’Malley) seem to…
Irish Politics Forum 