Real Debate Needed

The trawl of today’s papers yielded one other nugget, a call in the backroom column of the Post for clearer debate in the new year; less sniping and populism and a more concerted effort to educate voters on the policies of particular parties. Such a call is hard to say no to, and for the most part it seems essential if the 2007 election is not to become one characterised by apathy, image and spin.

However, I think it unlikely that the parties will be capable of dragging themselves too far from the current state which melds debate uncomfortably with populism, sniping, soundbites and no little silliness. Fianna Fail have managed to garner a vote from everywhere and until such time as any real fracturing of the electorate takes place—as it could do next May/June—real debate is difficult to achieve.

Fianna Fail are in principle pro-everything. Depending on who is calling for it, how loudly they do it and what stage of the electoral cycle it is, they are willing to carry out a great deal. This stems from a beneficial cross-class vote, one assiduously cultivated by appealing to the average voter. The effect of this has been that other parties ape the successful animal in the jungle and attempt to cultivate a cross-class vote. I’ve written about this before.

The effect of this is that, by and large, the major parties agree on most things, bar the minor details. The issues where there is genuine division generally do get thrashed out in a decent fashion—relatively speaking—while the small differences between policy necessitate thunder and bluster to cover the difference. The smaller parties are, of necessity, more distinctive and it remains to be seen how successful they will be in turning a debate by their willingness to represent and advocate a particular outcome which the major parties may shy away from.

Perhaps I am being pessimistic, but the prospects of real debate are slow moving, a changing political culture is perhaps moving towards it, but until parties begin to track toward independent ideas and positions it may still be that the election is won by the party with the most mud slung.