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Top Irish columnist calls for Diaspora votes in Irish presidential elections
Posted on Tuesday, October 18, 2011 at 06:40 AM
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| Fintan O'Toole |
O'Toole, perhaps Ireland's most influential columnist wrote " The one thing we’ve really learned from the campaign is this: that we should never do this again."
He was referring to the 'Seinfeld' nature of the election which is really not about issues but about personalities.
Instead O'Toole argued for expanding the nature of the electorate dramatically.
"The good news is that just two tiny things have to change: the electorate and the office. One way of making a presidential election meaningful is to make its weakness a strength. The presidency has no day-to-day power. But precisely because it has no day-to-day power, it can offer at least a partial solution to a genuine Irish dilemma.
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" The dilemma is this: the history of emigration and the consequences of partition mean that we have a mismatch between the population of the State on the one side and “the Irish people” on the other. There are millions of Irish citizens outside of the State who identify very closely with it: Northern nationalists, recent emigrants and the wider Irish diaspora.
Giving such people a vote in general elections runs up against the old “no representation without taxation” argument. That argument has never been fully teased out, but in any case it does not apply to an office that has no influence over decisions on tax and spending."
"Allowing all Irish citizens, wherever they live, to vote in the presidential election would make that election much more interesting. It wouldn’t just be another ballot, it would be a different kind of democracy."
O'Toole stated that the only meaningful Irish presidential election was the 1990 contest between Mary Robinson and Brian Lenihan.
"Here were two very substantial figures in Irish public life who provided stark contrasts, not just in gender, but in manner, language and ideology. There was a real clash of cultures in which the choice to be made was of some consequence for the way Ireland saw itself and the way it was seen around the world. The election wasn’t just full of human drama. It felt epic."
See more: News from Ireland, Irish American
6 Comments
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pilib04 | Oct 18, 2011, 05:09 PM EDT
Only if the diaspora is going to give up their vote in elections in the countries they currently reside. No one should be allowed to vote in countries where they do not pay taxes!
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joycean | Oct 18, 2011, 03:59 PM EDT
This seems to be the most interesting aspect of this election, beginning with the BIG debate about whether Niall "O'Dowd should be allowed to be to run, and evolving into a discussion of who should be allowed to vote. Obviously, emigrants like Liam, living temporarily outside the country should. These ballots don't have to be paper that has to be physically transported, although most countries have done that for years. As far as others who are emigrants or Diaspora who qualify for citizenship, why not? I think it would be a much better way of retaining contact than Certificates of Irish Heritage.
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greensod | Oct 18, 2011, 03:28 PM EDT
Amen.
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lokionline | Oct 18, 2011, 01:59 PM EDT
Giving Irish Citizens the right to vote in an Irish presidential election hardly seems like a radical idea. Many countries now extend voting rights to citizens living in other countries.
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Liam3494 | Oct 18, 2011, 09:48 AM EDT
I agree with the idea up to a point. As a temporary emigrant, spending three years in Argentina, but still getting paid in Ireland, I am denied the right to vote in any election,(They have never even heard of Postal Voting back home). I still pay my taxes back home, so I don't even fall under the no representation with taxation argument. I am well aware that there are many in similar positions to myself, and many who have recently left home to work abroad due to the economy.
I don't believe you can open the election up to everyone who "claims" Irish heritage, as we all know that many links are tenuous and go back 160 years or more, even here in Argentina there are some 300,000 who claim Irish roots - This would be a step too far - But those of us born in Ireland, should have the right to vote in our own elections, and the Constitutional Committee when it meets next year, should look into this matter as one of urgent need of reform.
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