Eoin Drea is senior research officer at the Wilfried Martens Centre for European Studies and a research fellow at Trinity College, Dublin.
Forget the furor about the rise of Ireland’s left-wing Sinn Féin or the return of classic centrist chameleon party Fianna Fáil. Disregard, even, the likely removal of Prime Minister Leo Varadkar’s Fine Gael from government after nine years in power.
The most important thing about Ireland’s upcoming general election is what nobody’s talking about: Ireland’s future in a Britain-less European Union.
Long hailed as the poster boy for the EU’s particular type of economic success — a small, flexible economy matched with a young, liberal, multiethnic population — Ireland has been a soothing, centrist narrative for a Eurocrat crowd tired of political extremes. Brexit, too, thrust Ireland and the EU closer together.
But not even Brexit-induced European solidarity will be able to (in the long run) mask the realities of Ireland’s increasingly anomalous position in Europe.
Ireland has a deregulated, highly flexible global economy that lacks the comprehensive social protections of its continental counterparts.
Amazingly for a country so defined by Europe in recent years — from the 2010 bailout to Britain jumping ship — Ireland has not confronted the deep contradictions at the heart of its intertwined relationships with Washington, London and Brussels.
With Britain gone and the EU increasingly dominated by Paris and Berlin, Ireland is an economic outlier: the EU’s only purely globalist country — the last Anglo-Saxon standing.
Ireland — a net contributor to the EU budget — has a deregulated, highly flexible global economy that lacks the comprehensive social protections of continental counterparts such as the Netherlands or Denmark.
Its domestic policy choice has succeeded in turning the country into a lean, mean, foreign direct investment-attracting machine — a state with fully privatized child care and a social security model based on alleviating poverty (through very low-level payments) rather than the income replacement principle favored by most continental states.
Ireland has lost an important partner on the EU stage — Britain | Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images
This economic model stands in stark contrast to the creeping centralism unleashed from the Elysée and now roaming wild without London (or a forceful Berlin) to dam it.
The real danger for Ireland is that it has lost its partner on the EU stage and has not had a longer-term debate on Ireland’s relationship with Europe that is sorely needed.
In this context, the short-termism of national politics represented by Fianna Fáil’s soft populism and Sinn Féin’s hard socialism is particularly damaging, as it draws focus away from this urgent task.
Ireland should be thinking about hammering out existential compromises on corporate and digital taxation, data protection and the further centralization of the eurozone. It needs a coherent, post-Brexit strategy in Europe, and its people are desperate for a more stable, more sustainable economy.
The time has come for Ireland to finally make a choice on how it plans to constructively contribute to the future of the EU, rather than being defined by its unwavering opposition to EU proposals on tax harmonization.
Europe would benefit from Ireland setting out a realist, global trading approach to further European integration.
Dublin should set forth a positive vision for a slimmer, competitive, less centralized, more globalist, English-speaking EU. Ireland also needs to extend her charms further to the north and east of the EU in its search for like-minded partners.
With Britain now out of the mix, Europe too would benefit from an engaged Ireland setting out a realist, global trading approach to further European integration.
Brexit placed (an initially nervous) Dublin at the core of EU decision-making. Now that the Brexit curtain has fallen, Ireland needs to work harder to stay center stage — and make sure it continues to be heard.