In the National Interest 2016-03-07 So, the Election of 2016 has been and gone, and after all the shouting, hashtags and mayhem, the people have left the political class of Ireland in a right pickle. Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil, two parties who's politics are as close as their names, received about the same level of support, in what was the second worst electoral result in the history of both parties. It would seem natural that they, commanding roughly 50% of the vote and well in excess of 50% of the seats in the Dáil, would come together and form a government. They still might, although that's far from clear today, and I think there aren't least four good reasons why they won't: Clientelism, The Labour Effect, Sinn Féin and Nibblers. CLIENTELISM Ireland is somewhat of an outlier in political terms, in that we somehow manage to have local equivalents of both the Tory Party _and_ the Republican Party. The reasons for this are long winded and historical, but the two traditionally big parties have more differences than might first appear, albeit their policies are strikingly similar. Between them, they are collectively responsible for the Great Collapse of 2008 and the near-decade of social deprivation which followed. Fine Gael is the party of the uber-wealthy, with enough of a soupçon of social liberalism to appear daring. Their core support outside Dublin's metro area is among large farmers and local business owners, while in Dublin they hold the 'chattering classes' in a grip the Labour Party pretends to. Fianna Fáil, on the other hand, is socially far more conservative, deriving its support from different business owners and rural middle classes. What both parties share, however, is a type of crippling Clientelism, wherein largesse is disposed by the party to the benefit of 'their' people, be that billionaire businessmen in need of additional funding, vast legal firms which need to buff up their cvs or even small businesses with excess stock of tarmacadam. Both parties rely on their Clientelism as an inherent, though unmentionable, part of their 'Brand'. Similarly, both parties rely on the historical distinction of the two parties in bestowing that patronage. You don't get government startup grants because you have a good idea - you get them because your great grandfather shot the other fellas great grandfather in the 1920s, and don't you forget it. It is difficult to see how this patronage model can possibly succeed if the two parties were to enter government together. Sharing of ministries implies a greater number of snouts at the trough, and a necessary increase in the number of disappointed constituents as a result. THE LABOUR EFFECT Particularly for Fianna Fáil, the salutary lesson of Ireland's Labour Party will not go unlearned. Ireland historically has savaged the lesser party in coalitions at the first available opportunity, albeit not on the same scale as labour's thirty seat losses of 2016. The political strategists of FF will have noted the myriad opportunities that FG took to ensure that the smaller party in the Government was the face of every cut that the last government made, forever tainting Labour as the party which would have taxed the air we breathe given the chance. FF would be hard pressed to ensure that they wouldn't receive the same treatment, remembering always that, even in good times, the smaller party in government bears the brunt of the anger, like the PDs did in 2007. FG, on the other hand, would want to continue the strategy they had last time, giving their partners in government enough rope and a chance to use it regularly. SINN FEIN When not being doctrinaire Thatcherites, both FF and FG like to pretend that they are Good Republicans. Whether giving the annual Oration at the site of the assassination of Michael Collins or the annual Oration at the grave of O'Donovan Rossa, both parties routinely pervert the meaning of the Irish Tricolour to serve their own blinkered purposes. A coalition of the two, in this centenary year of the failed Easter Rising of 1916[^1], would have the unwelcome result of leaving Sinn Féin, Ireland's pseudo-Socialist Nationalist Revanchist Party, as the official Opposition on the floor of the Dáil. It would, moreover, leave Gerry Adams, supposed one-time Commander of the Provisional IRA, as the official voice of that Opposition. The prospect of Gerry Adams, leader of the Opposition, being present on the reviewing stand as part of the official collection of worthies, taking the salute from the Official Irish Army, is something which neither of the big parties will countenance. Much of the official Irish Media coverage prior to the election ( be that RTae, the Irish Times or O'Briens not-very Independent Group) was spent on demonising Adams personally and the Sinn Féin party in general. Don't kid yourself for a second that those attacks weren't at the behest of the two fiannas, bought and paid for over the last twenty years. NIBBLERS To a certain extent, both FG and FF consider themselves true parties of the centre, throwing the odd fig of comfort to the soft-left in order to take votes. If you want proof of this, look at the vibrant youth wings of both parties in any Irish University, compared to the usually moribund Labour Youth presence. Una Mullaly recently even wrote about the huge number of LGBT youth who are bizarrely active[1] in both parties. In government together, both parties would fear the loss of that ubiquity, be it at the hands of an unlikely Labour resurgence or a far more likely broadening of Sinn Féin or the Social Democrats support base, chewing away at the soft-left support and condemning the parties to maintaining their second-worst electoral results. The threat is unlikely to be limited to the left, however, with Shane Ross' Independent Alliance being seen as a clear and present threat to both parties socially- and fiscally-conservative fractions. FG stated before the election that the issue of the 8th Amendment would be dealt with in the lifetime of this Dáil, they will be acutely aware that a faction of their support is dependent on them carrying through with this. Equally, FF stated that they would not support any change to the 8th Amendment, with the same results politically. One way or the other, Ireland is about to deal with the issue of Abortion at a general level, and I cannot see that a FG/FF coalition will want to be the ones losing votes no matter what compromise they attempt to pull off. So what happens now? For all the reasons above, I don't think we're going to see a conclusion to the government forming activity this Thursday when the Dáil reconvenes. The usually complaisant Irish media will divert attention to fripperies and irrelevancies like the Water Charges or even the personalities involved, as if FF care about Enda Kenny's position or FG can even contemplate the Law&Order party backing down on Denis' water meter contracts. Instead, after a proper period given over to 'reflection' and both parties looking at their wallets and pension funds to determine the 'national interest', I imagine we'll see FF supporting a minority FG government by way of a 'Confidence and Supply' agreement, wherein they support FG in any motions of no confidence, and lend support when FG need it on matters they can then claim as their own agenda. This neatly avoids the Labour Effect, while positioning Micheal Martin, instead of Adams, as the leader of the Opposition. The disposition of largesse will then be arranged in the Dáil bar or some other non minuted location, all the better for the widest possible claims of responsibility. In the national interest, of course. ________References_______________________________________________ [1] http://dgold.eu/b7lll ________Feetneet_________________________________________________ [^1] Ireland's equivalent of the Beer Hall Putsch, the wellspring of militant Irish nationalism. +++ENDS+++