Higgins has resorted to tiresome name-calling of the reactionary left, including their favourite term of abuse ‘neoliberal’
Irish Times – 19 Sept. 2013
President Michael D Higgins should understand the limitations of the role
of president and, more specifically, not to use it as a platform to advance his
radical far left political agenda.
President
Michael D Higgins gave a speech on
economics at Dublin City University last week.
Among many other things, he posed questions about the discipline in the
post-crisis age and sought to “explore the contemporary possibilities for
developing ethical arts of economic
government”.
While the
Constitution gives him no role in economic government, it is perfectly
appropriate for a largely figurehead, non-executive president to raise such
matters, including discussing “possibilities” – note the plural – around ethics
and economic governance. Providing thought leadership is exactly what such a
president should do.
But that is not what President Higgins did last week. Instead, his speech
was highly ideological and one-sided. It exclusively extolled far left-of-centre
thinkers, including some quite extreme figures. All non-leftists mentioned were
implicitly traduced. Worst of all, it excluded the majority who occupy the
middle ground and who carry little or no ideological
baggage.
Before critiquing
what the President said in detail, let me say that I gave President Higgins my
first preference vote when he ran for the State’s highest office. I did so
because, of the contenders in with a chance of election, he was the least bad of
the bunch. He is a cerebral man and, as a lifelong politician, he might have
been expected to understand the limitations of the role and, more specifically,
not to use it as a platform to advance a political
agenda.
Unfortunately, he has dashed
that hope.
His interventions have become increasingly political and
partisan. Last week’s speech
illustrated this in a number of ways.
The company one
keeps says a lot about a person. That is as true in intellectual life as it is
in social life. President Higgins keeps only one kind of intellectual company.
Those mentioned approvingly at DCU included Ernst Bloch, Jean-Paul Fitoussi,
Michel Foucault, Jürgen Habermas,
David Harvey, Ruth Levitas, Philip Mirowski, Jamie Peck, William Morris, R H Tawney and Edmond Villey. The only Irish
person quoted (other than himself) was Kathleen Lynch, an equality studies
academic in UCD. All are very firmly on the left of the political
spectrum.
‘Neoliberal’ scaremongering
As if the political hue of all those cited approvingly in the speech was not enough to demonstrate bias, President Higgins resorted to the tiresome name-calling of the reactionary left. Their favourite term of abuse is “neoliberal”, a label slapped on those whose views on the relative roles of market and state differ from theirs.
Because nobody
anywhere defines himself/herself as “neoliberal”, this makes dialogue impossible
and the making of conspiracy myths all too easy, as the President illustrated
well in his speech.
“Neoliberalism
has, from the first meetings of Ludwig Von Mises, Hayek and Milton Friedman, been a conscious
ideological project” he said, adding that it “does make assumptions about human
nature and the good society. Yet these are rarely stated”. Given that nobody
claims to be a “neoliberal” it is hardly surprising that they are rarely
stated.
The setting up of
an us-versus-neoliberals contest is not only divisive, it is grossly
reductionist. Most people support both competitive markets and state-organised
redistribution. The choice is not binary. To the chagrin of hardline ideologues
on both the left and free market right, Ireland and peer countries have a
mix of market and state in economic life.
Among the most
pernicious comments in the speech was this: “we must endeavour to restore the commitment to reducing
poverty and economic inequality as a project that is at the very heart of public
action” (my emphasis).
This a thinly
veiled and highly political accusation that previous governments and/or society
generally once shared that commitment, but have since moved away from it. The
claim is as nonsensical as it is unsubstantiated. All the evidence contradicts
it. By far the single biggest item of public expenditure is the welfare system.
Much of the rest goes on publicly providing health and education
services.
Further,
most of the public expenditure growth in the half-decade to 2008 that was funded
by the property bubble has been maintained since. Now it is funded by new taxes
and future taxes (in the form of borrowing). The
comment is an insult to the much reduced numbers at work who have sacrificed a
lot more of their incomes (in taxation) to support the increased number of those
who are not working.
The President is moving into dangerous territory with his increasingly
politicized and partisan interventions. He should think carefully about where
the path he appears intent on taking will lead his
presidency.
Comment:
Michael D.
Higgins has, for many years, been a very outspoken proponent of radical
socialist political views. He has also been a relentless critic of
United
States foreign policy and our free market
economy. He participated in, and in some cases organized, the reprehensible
protests against refueling stopovers at Shannon Airport by aircraft transporting our American military
personnel to and from Iraq
and Afghanistan. It was only a matter of
time before he would inject his radical socialist views into his speeches even
though the Irish Constitution prohibits its president from becoming involved in
partisan politics. It appears that he has clearly violated this requirement and
shamed himself and the very prestigious office that he holds.
Jack Meehan,
National President Emeritus
Ancient Order of
Hibernians in America
Proud Citizen of
the United States of America
and Ireland
