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March, 1992
Irish Green Party speaker visits Southern California.
By Mike Feinstein, U.S. Greens International Working Group.
Published in Green Synthesis, San Pedro, California.
March 1st, 1992
This past January, Irish Green Party member Vincent MacDowell visited Los Angeles. Vincent is the
party's speaker on issues concerning Northern Ireland and Britain.
While in Los Angeles, Vincent spoke at a house party of about
25 local Greens, taped a segment on Pacifica radio station KPFK's
"Green Perspectives", and attended a meeting of the newly-ballot
status Green Party of California. Many of Vincent's comments during these appearances were especially
relevant to the challenges facing U.S. Greens as they pursue electoral
activity and seek ballot status in more and more states.
Irish Green Party started out as an ecology group about 10 years ago. For about 8 years they existed primarily as a pressure group. According to MacDowell, "we had little philosophical discussions that went far into the night, but we didn't have a great deal of political impact. We could make a lot of noise, we could put forth splendid positions on public affairs and on pollution and the parties in power would accept these positions and say "yes, we'll do something about that." But they wouldn't do a damn thing about it when it came to the crunch. So we decided that we would have to get into the structures, to get into the parliament and the county councils and expose what is going on, turn aside the whole viel of secrecy and have a totally open system of government."
In 1989 the Irish Green Party ran a candidate from Dublin named
Roger Garland for the national parliament and much to their surprise,
he won. This motivated the Greens to tightened up their organization
and implement a real structure. They set up an advisory group
which meets each week to discuss legislation, advise Garland,
and then together write appropriate party position statements.
They also established a system of spokespersons dealing with each
area of public activity.
In 1991 the Greens ran for about 30 seats in various county councils
around Ireland. They won 16, including several in both Dublin
city and county. What made them so successful, according to MacDowell,
was their grounding in local communities. For several years before
the elections "we had a very high profile in residents' associations,
tenants' associations, trade unions, and parent-teacher-associations.
Anywhere there are people we are there-we are like the leaven
in the mass, we cause the dough to rise".
Once in office, one of their first and most spectacular achievements
was to block the building of a huge new freeway that would have
required the demolition of several Dublin neighborhoods. In its
place, the Greens argued for and achieved the passing of a modern
electric light rail system that will be completed within 5-6 years.
This system is projected to get 2/3 of the cars off the road,
help clean the air, and impact future land use pattern towards
a more human scale.
Next year, it appears likely that in the national elections, the
Greens may do well enough in the Irish system of proportional
representation that they will hold the swing votes necessary to
form the government. For many Greens, this recalls the "fundi-realo"
or "fundamentalist vs. realist" debate associated most strongly
with the German Greens. This debate questions whether Greens can participate in a government
whose policies they are mostly opposed to and not be corrupted
by the compromises this participation demands.
To this MacDowell responded "we are conscious of Lord Acton's
dictum that "all power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely".
He argued that the Irish Greens would help form a government if
they could get agreement with the other parties upon a common
platform of realizable, tactical goals. While this common platform
may not be as far-reaching as the Greens own, MacDowell argued
that in this way "as our influence grows, we can certainly have
more and more of a Green program implemented by governments that
are not Green, but are dependent upon Green support".
MacDowell cautioned that the Irish Greens would seek this agreement
upon a common platform rather than being bought off by the offer
of a cabinet position. In this they looked as a role model to
the Tasmanian (Australia) Green Party, which in holding the balance of power in their own recent coalition
government, eschewed a cabinet position in favor of a 99-point
platform accord with the Labor Party. "we won't take office as
cabinet members because that would commit us to the life of the
government." Acknowledging that an executive position would require
the Greens to enforce laws they disagree with, MacDowell added
that "by supporting the government from outside, as soon as they
renege or rat on their promises we can say goodbye." The only
time the Green would take an executive position, he said, would
be if they won outright control of the government with more than
50% of the goal, or possibly if they were in coalition solely
with the Irish Labor Party, with whom the Greens share much, particularly
in regards to civil rights and liberties
On Northern Ireland affairs, the Irish Greens are, according to
MacDowell, "Jeffersonian democrats. We don't believe in kings
and queens and aristocrats. We believe political power comes from
the people.". The Greens are opposed to the British occupation,
however, they do not support the violent activity of the Irish
Republican Army (IRA), which they think self-defeating. The Greens
want an all-Ireland republic and believe that the majority of
the British people and 2/3 of the British government wants to
withdraws from Northern Ireland. The Greens strategy is one of
non-violent solidarity with working people in both Northern Ireland
and Britain. They believe that a strong civil rights campaign
in both parts of Ireland can progressively diffuse tension and
bring the two sides closer together.
As far as European affairs, the Irish Greens feel there are attractive features about a European federal union, like how greater economic integration can help prevent war between countries like France and Germany. However, the Greens share the critique of many other European Greens (see "The European Community, Eastern Europe, and the European Greens", Mike Feinstein, in Green Synthesis, Spring, 1991) that the way the Common Market of the European Community (EC) is being put together threatens to institutionalize destructive economic practices at the expense of the ecology, social and labor standards, and ultimately the sovereignty of the various peoples of Europe.
Ireland, for example, has a long tradition of neutrality. The recent December, 1991 EC Summit Treaty in Maastricht, Holland established a common EC defense policy, which the Irish Greens feel will be an aggresive war policy against the Third World from the point of view of the rich countries of Northern Europe. "We are adamantly opposed to a European Army," MacDowell said, "and to a single, central European Bank that will decide the interest rates for each country, irrespective of the states of their economies and social conditions."
Ireland, together with Denmark, is in unique positions as far as the other 10 EC nations are concerns in that the EC Maastricht Treaty cannot simply be accepted by their national legislatures, but instead has to be accepted by the people via a national referendum. Since the EC Treaty has to be accepted by all 12 EC nations to come into practice, the Irish Greens feel that they may be able to influence the Irish people to block the treaty. Their hope then for the future will be to modify the EC, to open it up and make the European Parliament more democratic, to make the Common Market more responsive to ecological and social needs, and to move the EC away from its increasingly militaristic orientation.
There is a lively debate among European Greens as to the extent that the EC can be modified (see "The European Green Coordination", Mike Feinstein, Green Letter, Fall 1991). While acknowledging the deep problems with the present EC, MacDowell said that like the law of gravity, the EC exists and one cannot ignore it. He listed two hopes for change. First, many countries with a orientation of neutrality, like the Scandinavian countries and Switzerland and Austria, have applied or are planning to apply for EC membership. Once inside the EC, these countries may be able to influence the EC for the better. Second, MacDowell predicted the Greens will do very well in the 1994 European Parliamentary elections. He expects the Greens in Ireland, for example, to win 3 out of Ireland's 15 EC seats. A strong Green Group in the European Parliament (EP), he hopes, can demand change.