How bad would it have to get?

Many thanks to the person who forwarded to me “Where are the Pots and Pans? Collective Responses in Ireland to Neoliberalization in a Time of Crisis: Learning from Latin America”, written by Barry Cannon and Mary P. Murphy of NUIM and available free for download here…

Its central question is why have the much more aggressive responses seen elsewhere during the socio-economic crisis of the last half decade and more not been replicated in Ireland. The abstract gives a real sense of the thrust of the piece:

ABSTRACT Since 2008, Ireland has experienced a profound multi-faceted crisis, stemming from the collapse of the financial and property sectors. Despite enduring six years of neoliberal austerity measures in response to this situation, popular protest has been muted. Using Silva’s [(2009) Challenging Neoliberalism in Latin America (Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press)] framework of analysis of popular responses in Latin America to that region’s debt crisis of the 1980s and 1990s, this article seeks to investigate why this has been the case. We assess how the crisis is being framed among popular and civil society groups, and whether increased associational and collective power is developing. In doing so, we look at processes of intra-group cooperation, cross-group cooperation and framing and brokerage mechanisms. We then ask, where such processes exist, if they can lead to a comprehensive challenge to the neoliberal policies currently being implemented, as happened in much of Latin America. We conclude that the crisis has not yet reached sufficient depth or longevity to foster a more robust popular response, but propose that analysis of similar processes in Latin America can help us understand better why this is the case, not just in Ireland, but in other countries of Europe experiencing similar situations.

It is an effective overview of the period and the framework used is quite persuasive. And there’s a lot of thought provoking points, not least the following:

Furthermore, as noted above, neoliberalism and free market ideology have largely been internalized by Irish people. Although faith in neoliberal institutions has been badly shaken (Edelman, 2014) progressive groups have had difficulty popularizing ideas about alternatives to austerity, not helped by a largely neoliberalized mainstream media (Mercille, 2014) using narrow, pro-market and divisive framing mechanisms (Cawley, 2011).

And:

Despite unresolved high levels of individual and collective indebtedness, increased deprivation as a growing feature in the middle class2 and extensive political and socio-economic exclusion created by economic volatility, we argue, relative to Latin America, the crisis simply has not been grave enough to cause a ‘double movement’ with sufficient force to provoke a change of course. Meanwhile, the power of indigenous Irish proneoliberal forces augmented by their international allies, particularly in the ‘troika’ of the EC, ECB and IMF, has remained far stronger than that of contending forces.

And as to the left or the TU’s? Cannon and Murphy point too the co-optation of the latter for the most part and

Lack of capacity can be explained by the nature of Irish social power and how it is organized, in particular the state and market structures which constrain and shape such agency and their position in the wider global structure. It can also be accounted for due to more local fragmentary and sectarian tendencies within the Irish Left and the reactive and conservative natures of Irish NGOs.

It also notes some of the most reactionary aspects of the state/government/orthodoxy response to the crisis – for example, massively prioritising cuts over tax increases or the dismantling of the ability of the state itself to properly track the impacts of its own policies on citizens.

If people can read it it would be well worth the effort. It’s not very long and yet it manages to succinctly outline many (perhaps most) of the elements within the socio-political context and their interactions.

If their arguments are correct it raises a further question. How bad would things have to get before we would see the level of dislocation with the political system we have seen elsewhere? Any thoughts?