Ireland’s No to Lisbon: What are the causes?
The Portuguese capital city, pictured to the left, will no longer have a treaty named after it.
Three points need to be made to explain this. The first is nothing to do with the EU as such. Partisan dealignment is the process, which since the 1970s, has led to voters becoming more disloyal and more “available” on the electoral market for new political forces. Citizens are less involved directly in party politics. Political parties have lost their mass memberships, as well as becoming centralised and professionalised. All of this means that in referendums, citizens are more likely to abstain and less likely loyally to follow cues from “trusted” party leaders about how to vote. Gratitude to the EU for all it has done for Ireland to be able to escape from the Third World in the 1970s is therefore not sufficient.
Second, we are frequently told that the No voters did not read or understand the Treaty, therefore it could not have been a vote against those reforms of the EU. By the same token, however, a Yes vote would be equally invalid. The 47% who voted Yes in Ireland certainly hadn’t read the Treaty either and did not know about what they were voting in favour.
The third point is that the real motivation for the No vote was therefore dissatisfaction with the domestic performance of the Irish government (a similarly relevant phenomenon in France in 2005), ignorance of the treaty, and, most significantly, the unpopularity of the EU. This unpopularity is due to economic “rationality” (as seen by the voters), including fear of globalisation, immigration, EU enlargement, and the threat to agriculture and a secure economy. It is also due to fear of the irrational: tax rises, abortion, and militarisation, none of which feature in the Lisbon Treaty but upon which the No campaign made headway.
Dr Giacomo Benedetto
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Reader Comments (9)
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Interesting article.
What will be the future of Europe now? Check this article from Michael Berendt. A good analysis of the current situation where the EU stands.
http://michaelberendt.blogactiv.eu/2008/06/18/enlargement-in-doubt-as-ireland-scuppers-the-lisbon-treaty/
Ireland in the 1970s was not Third World merely lacking in capital to develop. Only in the 1980s when the government agreed to create a low tax liberalised economy did the Celtic Tiger occur. All the transfers from the EU had no effect in the 1970s and 1980s. In any case the value of the fishing rights signed over to the EU more than paid for the so called largesse of the EU to Ireland. So all in all the EU has been a decidely mixed blessing for Ireland. Lisbon was a wake up call. The EU will only survive as a free trade zone without aspirations to world power status.
500 million Europeans are taken in hostage by 862,415 Irish (less than 0.2% of the European population) - in the name of democracy. According to the elitist representative democrats this is the direct democrat's fault, i.e. the "uneducated and unteachable people". This disrespect makes the current EU-catastrophe even worse.
Because: in a democracy the tool democracy can only be always right. In Ireland it was however employed wrongly. For voting for a purely internal-Irish problem without European dimension an Irish referendum would doubtlessly have been the correct instrument. For a pan-European concern however, only the pan-European referendum can be the correct means. This would be the correct level, and only then the right sovereign is speaking. No matter what the result will be, YES or NO, only via this way the right has spoken the right.
In the EU the sovereign are the 500 million Europeans - and not a slight Irish referendum's majority. Regarding the current archaic principle of unanimity it could even appear more bizarrely: even Malta or Cyprus could by their 315,000 resp. 500,000 eligible voters bring the EU to a final halt. Good gracious!
No matter whether for or against the EU: we should not be lead by a handful of nationalists. For important matters we do need a pan-European referendum! The Treaty of Lisbon would have given us this power! Although its fate is uncertain at the moment, we have to become active for the EU's future, i.e. our future. Let us demand a pan-European referendum for all important EU-matters, such as enlargement, environmental issues, the future election of EU president etc. There is the possibility to stand up in an organized way and to vote at the citizens' platform: www.we-change-europe.eu. Let's change Europe - now!
yes defenatly these are the causes.
Excellent site cep.rhul.ac.uk and I am really pleased to see you have what I am actually looking for here: this .. as it's taken me literally 3 hours and 33 minutes of searching the web to find you (just kidding!) so I shall be pleased to become a regular visitor :)
Message to Ireland about Lisbon treaty: vote NO:
Lisbon treaty seems to be totally strange and deleting democracy or human rights?
http://conservativehome.blogs.com/centreright/2008/01/lisbon-treaty-c.html
I’ve read an article which states that police gets rights to shoot people in some situations.
These kind of things are totalitarian politics.
It also probably stops right to go on strike.
http://www.no2lisbon.ie/en/press-centre/entry/160
And all this in whole Europe …
It is sad to notice that all other countries have accepted this treaty, but many governments have not even given people chance to vote about it.
Irish government has given you this right,…anyway it is really strange that Ireland maybe votes again about this, and only after few months?(or 2009?)
EU elite needs this YES, and they have ordered new voting?
If this is true it shows how horrible secret elite rules EU, and what can we expect from the future?
Lisbon treaty is basically giving ‘Gestapo’-laws to EU-government, if needed?
And they seem to need those laws fast?
Vote NO, and save the world?
F.ex. in many european countries media and politicians has almost 100% ignored discussions about this subject, and people are not even aware about whole thing?
It is also good to remember that USA has now similar ‘martial laws’ there, after 11th september 2001… ?
EU security officials decide about all security matters of whole EU?
Also there is some things which makes it very difficult for normal people to complain and get things corrected if there is wrongful handlings?
I hope I am wrong, but this whole thing , and how it has been handled seems really wrong? And it is not a democratic way to handle politics.?
http://www.europeanfoundation.org/docs/Treaty%20of%20Lisbon.htm
ps. this writing may include errors.
-Tore Toivicco
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Now also EU web-cencorship?
http://www.masternewmedia.org/europe-under-internet-censorship-threat-new-eu-telecom-package/
Give us back our democracy!
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Besked om Lissabon-traktaten:
Lissabon-traktaten synes at være helt mærkeligt og sletter demokrati eller menneskerettigheder?
http://conservativehome.blogs.com/centreright/2008/01/lisbon-treaty-c.html
politiet får ret til at skyde folk i nogle situationer?
Disse slags ting er totalitære politik.
Det sandsynligvis også stopper ret til at gå i strejke.
http://www.no2lisbon.ie/en/press-centre/entry/160
Og alt dette i hele Europa …
Det er trist at bemærke, at alle andre lande har godkendt denne traktat, men mange regeringer har ikke engang givet folk chancen for at stemme om det.
Irske regering har givet dig denne ret, … alligevel det er virkelig mærkeligt, at Irland måske stemmer igen om dette, og først efter nogle måneder? (Eller 2009?)
EU-eliten behov denne JA, og de har bestilt nye afstemningssystem?
Hvis dette er sandt, som det ser ud, hvor forfærdelig hemmelighed elite regler EU, og hvad kan vi forvente af fremtiden?
Lissabon-traktat er grundlæggende og giver ‘Gestapo’-lovgivning til EU-regering, hvis det er nødvendigt?
Og de synes at have behov for disse love hurtigt?
Stem nej, og red verden?
Eksempel i mange europæiske lande, medier og politikere har næsten 100% ignoreres diskussioner om dette emne, og folk ikke engang er klar over alt?
Det er også godt at huske på, at USA nu har lignende ‘martial lov’ der, efter den 11 september 2001 …?
EU beslutter om alle sikkerhedsspørgsmål i hele EU?
Der er også nogle ting, som gør det meget vanskeligt for almindelige mennesker til at klage og få tingene korrigeret, hvis der er ulovlige handlinger?
Jeg håber, jeg tager fejl, men det hele, og hvordan den er blevet håndteret synes virkelig galt? Og det er ikke en demokratisk måde at håndtere politik.?
http://www.europeanfoundation.org/docs/Treaty% 20of% 20Lisbon.htm
ps. denne skrivelse kan indeholde fejl.
-Tore Toivicco
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Nu også EU web-cencorship?
http://www.masternewmedia.org/europe-under-internet-censorship-threat-new-eu-telecom-package/
Giv os vores demokrati tilbage!
What a bizarre reply. I guess that the Lisbon Treaty also gives the Commission the power to produce straight bananas and square tomatoes.
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