This book attempts to come up with a redraft, for 2016, of the 1916 Proclamation, which was read outside the GPO, at the beginning of the Easter rebellion. As such, it attempts to sum up for the present time, as the authors of the original document purported to do for their time , what the Irish people believe about themselves and what they aspire to achieve by collective independent action.
Gerard O Neill is well qualified to answer the first of these two questions. He is a leading market researcher, who makes his living using sophisticated techniques to find what the Irish people believe and want, or at least what they are prepared to tell a researcher they believe and want.
Many things have changed since 1916. Before the rebellion in 1915, Padraig Pearse wrote that
“War is not more terrible that the evils it will end...war is a terrible thing but it is not an evil thing. It is the things that make war necessary that are evil”.
The author does not say so, but I do not believe many Irish people today would agree with Pearse’s view of war, knowing as we now do many things about war that he may not have known in 1915. As far as Pearse’s belief that war can be used to end evil is concerned, it has to be noted that the Irish people did not then, and do not even now, believe that Ireland could, or should, have taken part in the war against Hitler, notwithstanding the obvious evil of his regime.
Ireland is immensely more prosperous than it was in 1916.
Irish incomes then were at about the Western European average. Now, notwithstanding the recession, they are above the European average.
9 out of 10 Irish people said in 2009 that they were satisfied with their lives, as against 8 out of 10 in the rest of the EU.
Even allowing for inflation, Irish income per head is 24 times what it was in 1966. An amazing statistic, which put our present financial troubles into proportion.
O Neill questions whether Irish people will continue to be as obsessed, as they have been, with owning their own home. There is 85% home ownership here as against 65% in the EU as a whole. He says, reasonably, that if a thing is scarce people will want to own one, rather than rent it. Homes will not be scarce in the Ireland of 2016, so people will increasingly tend to rent rather than buy.
The book also deals with the role of religion in Ireland. The original Proclamation said that the rebels were acting “in the name of God and of the dead generations”. He concludes that Ireland remains more religious than most countries and that what is happening today is not so much a secularisation as a” declericalisation” of the country.
He argues, rightly in my view, that many of the characteristics that make Ireland attractive, like tolerance and interest in other people, are derived from our Christian heritage, a heritage that teaches us to see other people as unique individuals rather than just as members of classes, races, nations or other such categories. It would have been interesting if the author had explored whether a Christian inspired value system can survive a decline in religious practice.
Gerard O Neill grew up in Northern Ireland in the 1960s and 1970s among a nationalist community that, in his words, saw the creation of Northern Ireland as “ unwarranted compromise; a short term solution that was unsustainable in the long term”.
He says the ratification of the Good Friday Agreement in both parts of Ireland has brought that argument to an end. Or has it?
He himself speculates in this book about what might happen in the, to my mind unlikely, event that the 2011 census in Northern Ireland shows there is a Catholic majority in the population . Under the relevant legislation, the Northern Ireland Secretary may direct the holding of a poll to decide if a majority there want it to cease to be a part of the United Kingdom. There would also have to a poll in the Republic.
One can imagine pressure developing in some quarters to hold a poll, if a census were to show a Catholic majority. Indeed if the UK Government failed to hold a poll it would open to the accusation of betraying the spirit of the Good Friday Agreement compromise.
Having raised this scenario, Gerard O Neill then goes on to say that, in terms of practical planning, it is getting no thought at all in Dublin, Belfast, or London. He fails to say whether he thinks this is wise or not. One would expect, having raised an issue like this, that he would have teased it out a lot more.
Northern Ireland is still very heavily dependent on the British Exchequer and on public sector jobs. Meanwhile the Republic has moved , suddenly, from being a country with a low debt, to one whose debt is heading rapidly toward 100% of its GDP, and which will have to reduce the size of its own public sector. Britain has financial problems too and probably would not be able to help with transitional payments if a majority in Northern Ireland decided they wanted to leave the UK.
These realities are not explored at all in this book, which is surprising given that the author himself brought up the possibility of a poll for a United Ireland. Nor does he explore likely reactions on this side of the border, if the financial situation remains as financially difficult as it is now. It may not arise after the 2011 census, but it could happen after another census
In a sense, this is what is frustrating about this book. The author is well read, stimulating and original. He raises a lot of neglected questions, but then fails to follow them all to a full conclusion.
Book Review for the Irish Examiner.
Title; 2016, A New Proclamation for a New Generation
Author; Gerard O Neill
Publisher; Mercier Press
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