From: "Rebecca Peoples" <wellsfargo-AT-tinet.ie>
Subject: M-I: Re: Irish Presidential election
Date: Wed, 29 Oct 1997 20:56:20 -0800


Some observations on the presidential campaign in the Irish Republic.

Tomorrow  there is to be a Presidential election in Ireland. There are
five Presidential hopefuls: Mary McAleese, Mary Banotti, Dana, Adi
Roche and Derek Nally. According to most o fthe opinion polls McAleese
is tipped to win. She is a right wing Catholic academic with a very
close relationship to the Catholic hierachy. 

Despite the office of presidency being mainly ceremonial race itself
has had a decidedly political character. 

The contest has been primarily between the Fianna Fail and the Fine
Gael candidates. It has been reduced to a contest between two forms of
bourgeois nationalism. The nationalism that places greater rhetorical
emphasis on the aspiration of achieving a 32 county Irish republic and
the nationalism that supports the continuation of the thirty two county
republic with improved relations between the 26 and the 6 county
states. The former demonstrates a greater interest in the concerns of
the Catholic population in the north. Essentially there obtains only a
marginal difference between the two parties. The former laying greater
emphasis on republican rhetoric and the latter less. Both are
essentially happy with the status quo.

Consequently the debate has been a false one. It has been a debate
centred around   rhetoric and posturing. Even at that the former party
has presented this positon in a rather craven suppressed way. It lacks
even the confidence to present its token republicanism in an explicit
form. This is how little confidence it has in its own images. 

Indeed in many ways its politics on the surface are that of posturing,
images, hints and innuendo. In this way FF presents itself as a
multifaceted populist organisation: all things to all people. In this
way republican minded voters are seduced into voting for it. Less
republican minded voters, on the other hand, are seduced into voting
for it because of their belief that it is only mildly and thereby
sufficiently and harmlessly republican.

FG, on the other hand, wants to present itself as the party of the high
moral ground. The party that personifies moral disdain for anything
tainted with Provo terrorism and intolerance towards the bigoted
unionism. It seeks to present itself as the party that is most
understanding and accommodating to unionism. The party with whom
unionists can best do business. The party that can be nationalist and
yet unionist at the same time. The party of the two sides. In this way
they present themselves as the party that can best achieve political
and institutional reconciliation of nationalism and unionism.

FG wants to present itself as the good guy. The party of the high moral
ground, the party free from corruption. Conversely they seek to present
Fianna Fail as the amoral and corrupt party that is not concerned with
the complexities of the national question and thereby demonstrates
insensitivity to Unionism.

However the point is that there is essentially no difference between
the two political parties. They are both bourgeois partitionist
parties. They are both free from the mytical moral ground. The
differences being presented to us then are one's of perception rather
than policy. Difference of image, rhetoric and style. In a sense both
parties are Celtic myths: identity politics.

Regarding the national question, economics, social issues and security
there is no essential difference between them. Consequently to make
themselves electable they must artificially manufacture surface
differences. This is analogous to brand difference of commerce.

Both parties, in terms of their immediate interests, are merely
concerned with securing political power as a means of gaining a greater
share of the booty. Capitalism is essentially indifferent as to which
of the parties take power. Their primary function for  capital is that
of sustaining capitalism by deception: creating the illusion of choice.
In addition competition between the two parties keeps them, in some
ways, on their toes. It makes it harder for them while in power to grow
so corrupt and authoritarian that the masses loose confidence in them.
It also means that if any one of the parties makes a mess of things
there is in existence a government in exile waiting to step into its
place. This then serves to protect the system and guarantee capital's
continued existence.

The individual parties have to justify their existence by manufacturing
false differences, surface difference that is not real difference at
all.

In the presidential election Fine Gael led by John Bruton devised a
presidential strategy designed to put Mary Banotti in the Park. The
strategy was to "taint" Fianna Fail's presidential candidate by
mispresenting her as crypto terrorist. Bruton's remarks  on Adam's
support for McAleesse formed part of this ground plan. The leaks that
followed formed further links in the plan together with Banotti's
xenophobic remarks about McAleese which she latter retracted because of
their conter-productive nature. They hoped that the alliance that
existed between FG and elements  within the media etc would assist in
the implementation or development of this strategy. It, in short,
entailed a grandiose smear campaign against MacAleese. The intention
was by means of this strategy to manipulate the electorate in the
interests of its own proviincialism.

Dovetailing with this the plan entailed the exposure of   McAleese as
fraudulent in her images as a Robinson clone (Mary Robinson was the
former President of Ireland) by exposing  social conservatism (which
includes her very close relationship to the Catholic hierarchy) which
she sought to conceal. It was McAleese's attempt to play down her
nationalism and social conservatism that made further encouraged Bruton
to launch this particualr Fine Gael strategy. Fianna Fail's strategy of
presenting its presidential candidate as a figure of the centre made
her more vulnerable to this  strategy. It was Bruton's purpose to
discredit her as a figure of the centre by establishing the perception
of her as friend and supporter of Gerry Adams.

By means of this strategy Bruton and his allies hoped to polarise the
political situation whereby the anti-McAleese voter would rally in
behind the Banotti Presidential candidate abandoning the Nelly and Rote
candidates. It may have succeeded in doing this in some measure.
However it was not successful enough to overcome the hardening of FF
support around the FF candidate. It, in a sense, succeeded in
polarising the political situation over the presidential campaign.
However it was McAleese that benefited mainly form the strategy. Bruton
and his allies turned out to be  McAleese's best ally.

As it turned out the entire exercise backfired. If anything the smear
campaign by both Bruton and his allies in the media supported, in
effect, by Democratic Left and the Labour Party failed miserably and
may have even increased her popularity.

Through Owen Harris, Bruton's unoffical spin doctor and the former's
ally.  John Caden (both ex Workers' Party "apparatchiks") who was to
serve as Derek Nally's handler it was hoped that Nally as independent
presidential candidate he would be used to fill out the strategy.
However when Nally discovered how he was bieng manipulated as an
anti-McAleese candidate he ditched Caden et al.

The significance of the anti-McAleese strategy was the massive way in
which McAleese's relationship to nationalist politics and ideology was
over-exaggerated and  whipped up into virtual hysteria. There existed a
broad front that extended right across the spectrum into the print and
broadcasting media. What this event acutely  exposed was the less than
innocent role of the media in influencing politics and public opinion.
The so called  print media's "objective" commentators revealed their 
narrow political character in the significant role played by them in
creating an hostile environment for McAleese. However the electorate
bought little, if any, of this. This is a evidnence of  the mass
media's failure in manipulating the minds and emotions of the
electorate. However had it proved successful it wold have been a great
coup for Fine Gael.

Yet, as I have already said, the divisions generated over the
presidential campaign is a phoney campaign since there is little
essential difference between the two candidates of the two leading
political parties. And even if there are differences they will count
for hardly anything within the extreme political constraints imposed by
the virtually sinecure office of the Presidency.

Ultimately the politics infusing the presidential race are a
development of the political struggle between FG and FF. FG have as
their strategy the ousting of the Ahern government as a means by which
they can return to power either in or out of coalition. They  hope to
achieve this by means of the strategy of discrediting the Ahern
government. By discrediting the government they hope to increase
tension between the coalition partners while also encouraging tension
within both parties. In this way they hope to split open the current
government and at the same time weaken the coalition partners. In that
way they struggle to create the political conditions that will
eventually make possible a Fine Gael government.  Consequently the
political old political mould will be have been broken and a new
political landscape created whereby FG hope to achieve their kind of
modern Ireland.

Rebecca










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