I’m sorry to be missing all the excitement of this year in Ireland, what with the presidential election and all, but I’ll be back before long. In the meantime, my academic programme is a really wonderful experience – I’m studying alongside 200 other students from all over the world (something like 70 countries – including students from India, China, Japan, Egypt, the UK, Ethiopia, Croatia, Norway, Canada, Ivory Coast, Israel, Palestine, Nigeria, and lots more). Among our ranks are former (and future) government ministers, social entrepreneurs, soldiers, diplomats, technology consultants, journalists, college professors and many more interesting people of all sorts.

I was surprised to find that I seem to be the only one of the 1,000 students in the entire Kennedy School who has arrived from Ireland – though I have found two other Irish graduate students here at Harvard, both in the Graduate School of Education, one a teacher freshly arrived from Meath, the other a long-time resident of San Francisco.

While I’m here I’m studying things like economics, leadership, negotiations, advocacy, and policy change. So far, it feels like a wonderful gift, and I feel really lucky to be part of this class.

I’m still following all the events in Ireland, though I’ve been too busy to post of late. As I settle in I’ll be able to post a bit, although I’ll likely be quieter than usual on here until I graduate in May.

It is time to think and act anew. Irish officials must implement solutions quickly, before it’s too late, redouble efforts at creating wealth in emerging companies and harness the untapped resources of the Irish diaspora.

There is much talk of this vast diaspora, but its resources are not being utilised. Until the Irish leadership sees that taoiseachs delivering platitudes and bowls of shamrocks will not substitute for meaningful engagement, it never will be utilised.

His first two suggestions are focused on economic development:

Merge IDA, Enterprise Ireland and other agencies involved in economic development into one agency, name a leader, maybe an American chief executive like Craig Barrett, and support innovation, jobs and company formation. Then measure performance, not press releases;

Put whatever resources you can muster into worldwide venture capital funds that have a link beyond the monetary to Ireland, a real eco-system, and make the creation of companies, not reports, their core product;

The most interesting of the suggestions is the last:

Instead of abolishing the Seanad, select members who serve at no salary but chosen only from the Irish diaspora. From Silicon Valley select the likes of Craig Barrett, John Hartnett, founder of the ITLG and the Wilde Angel Fund, Conrad Burke of Innovalight and John O Ryan, the inventor behind the dynamic Rovi Corporate.

Add in Maria Shriver, Gabriel Byrne, Chuck Feeney, Niall O’Dowd and Declan Kelly too. And then from across the US, Australia, Canada and globally pick more such people and use them. Don’t lose them in a jumble of compliments and forums. As I once noted, I often found more wisdom in a conversation over a pint in McDaid’s or an hour at San Jose’s Irish Innovation Center than a day of speeches at Farmleigh. Implement, implement, implement as if your future depended on it – for it surely do.

I appreciate the spirit behind this suggestion: there are many in the diaspora who are willing and able to take a philanthropic approach to Ireland, and who would surely do us much good. I also appreciate the desire for greater engagement that is driving this idea, the generosity and good will among the diaspora that it highlights, and the innovative approach that is so sorely needed in rethinking the relationship between Ireland and the Irish abroad.

But I think it’s a highly problematic idea, for the following reasons:

1. Appointing, rather than electing, more representatives to the Seanad would reinforce the undemocratic nature of that body.
2. Asking people to serve in an unpaid capacity will ensure that only those of significant means will be able to do so. Not every talented person is wealthy enough to do substantial amounts of unpaid work.
3. These kinds of appointments would reinforce one of the most fundamental distortions in Irish society: the distinction between the insiders and the outsiders. One of the keys to the way the potential for success is often unleashed in the Irish abroad is that when Irish people leave, they often find themselves less bound by the restrictions of class and connection. Recent efforts to implement top-down networks and give government greater access to the most successful of the Irish abroad are aimed at establishing a hierarchy among the Irish abroad that the establishment here understand and are more comfortable with. This is not a step forward.

All the same, we’re blessed here in Ireland, in having a large international base of people around the globe who are interested in assisting us. We haven’t got the relationship right yet, but the more ideas we can throw around the better. I believe that we should favour those ideas that move us toward greater equality and more democratic representation of all of our citizens.

“I definitely and absolutely believe that Irish people living outside of the country should be able to decide who the next President of the country is. The old saying of ‘no representation without taxation’ may apply to a general election but there is no real basis for it in terms of electing a President in this instance.”

He added:

“The Presidency is removed from Government, the executive and the area of taxation so giving Irish people abroad a voice would be a great thing, the right thing. It would keep us all organically connected and I feel very strongly that the vote should be extended to all Irish people everywhere whether they’re in Ireland or not.”

Senator Norris has spoken in the Seanad in favour of emigrant voting rights in the past. His emphasis on the issue of taxation is puzzling, however, given that

• no other developed nation besides the US taxes its expats on money earned abroad (The US required the payment of taxation on foreign-earned income long before it granted voting rights to expats – and voting is not conditional on the payment of taxes),
• the payment of taxation is not required for voting rights for Irish residents,
• some emigrants do pay taxes, and
• the requirement of the payment of taxes in exchange for a vote is a profoundly undemocratic principle that calls for a return to the time when only men of property could vote.

There is some irony in the fact that Senator Norris was visiting the US in part to fundraise for his campaign: it’s another indicator of the way Ireland and various segments of Irish society regularly seek economic aid from the diaspora. It might not be taxation, but it’s invaluable.

If Irish emigrants were given the vote in presidential elections, it would surely benefit the effervescent, high-profile Senator Norris. It’s just a shame to see even a long-time supporter of emigrant voting rights can be influenced by a perspective that would link taxation and voting in a way that  appears to hold no weight anywhere else in the developed world.

On Wednesday, Sinn Fein TD Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin South Central) asked the following question:

The Taoiseach made a pre-election promise on political reform to give voting rights to the diaspora for the presidential election. Will the Government consider fast tracking legislation to afford a right to Irish citizens living in Ireland, but outside the 26 Counties, to participate in the election of the first citizen?

The response from Taoiseach Enda Kenny? Eight disappointing words:

“There is no legislation promised in this area.”

This despite the fact that in the 2011 general election, Fine Gael included this commitment in their manifesto:

Fine Gael will reduce the voting age to 17 and give eligible citizens the right to vote at Irish embassies in the Presidential election. If this experiment is deemed a success Fine Gael will consider extending this practice to general elections.

This commitment, while vague in its lack of specification as to who the “eligible citizens” were, was a clear signal of intent to allow voting rights for citizens abroad. Comments from politicians such as Simon Coveney seemed at the time to indicate that Fine Gael actually meant it.

The formulation of this commitment in the programme for government, however, was disappointing. In the programme, the government bounced the issue of embassy voting to the proposed Constitutional Convention, saying

We will refer to the Constitutional Convention the issue of reducing the Voting Age to 17 and giving citizens the right to vote at Irish embassies in the presidential election.

This despite the fact that there is currently no constitutional prohibition on voting rights for the Irish abroad.

Meanwhile, Ireland remains the only country in the EU with no option for emigrant voting, and the number of countries allowing their emigrants to vote continues to grow. Every week, it seems, brings news of another country committed to facilitating their expats to vote, with Haiti and Nigeria being among the latest to announce upcoming implementations of diaspora voting.

From the Irish Independent comes this one:

The number of calls to 11850 directory enquiries seeking contacts for sales training is up 114 per cent in the year, adding evidence to our other entrepreneurship indicator that the spirit of enterprise is alive and well in Ireland! However, emigration is very much a growing characteristic of the nation, with relocation queries bumping up 140 per cent.

Colm Harmon, Professor of Economics at Australian National University and also at University College Dublin, notes the scale of the accelerating Irish migration to Australia:

The Irish are now the third largest migrant group in absolute terms for employer sponsored (457) visas, and proportional to our population by a large way the biggest migrant group in this category.

Ireland is sending about one-third the total numbers the UK is sending – with 20 times the population! More Irish are arriving on 457s then the total from the entire rest of the European continent.

The increase in this number year on year is about one-third more than the increase of UK or other Europeans, so the share is growing.

Professor Harmon asserts – correctly, I believe – that the future for most of these emigrants will be in their adopted country, due to the Ireland’s bleak economic prospects. He then makes two assertions I’d disagree with:

1. That these emigrants “won’t have a role” in Ireland’s economic recovery.
2. That “this may be the first Irish migrant cohort to Australia who won’t be looking over their shoulders at the old country, won’t have the sense of attachment that previous generations held.”

On the first point, I suspect we’ll be asking our emigrants for much in the future. One could say, for example, that even by taking themselves out of the dole queues that these young people have already started doing their bit for Ireland’s economic recovery. In the future, they’ll be contributing through a variety of means, as emigrants always have. I’ve heard of emigrants sending money home to support younger brothers and sisters, to name just the most direct (and traditional) channel of economic support. But in the future there will also be business networking, diaspora-related FDI, visits home, green-flag-flying, and those who will return home to transform “brain drain” into “brain circulation”.

On the second point, I’m not sure how this generation of Facebookers, Tweeters and Skypers will be any less attached to Ireland than the generations whose main contact with Ireland was a dwindling exchange of letters sent over on a slow boat.

Where I do agree wholeheartedly, however, is with Professor Harmon’s suggestion that this is an important cohort to study. He says:

If I can make one appeal, I would urge the very many successful Irish-Australians – or even Irish in Australia – to consider endowing the costs of capturing the experiences of this group through research and understanding the life trajectory of this group compared to those that came before them, and those that remained in Ireland.

I would love to see such a study, but I’d love to make it global. How does the experience of being Irish in Galway differ from that of being Irish in Beijing or Toronto or Dubai? Imagine being able to explore similarities and differences in issues of mental and physical health, longevity, happiness, family life, engagement with Ireland – you name it.

See Professor Harmon’s entire article at theconversation.edu.au.

It’s emerged now that the contract for the project hasn’t been signed, although the company chosen for the project, Fexco, was announced several months ago. Current Minister for Foreign Affairs Eamon Gilmore gave an update through a written answer to a Dáil question. Here’s the exchange (via kildarestreet.com):

The speculation is partly driven by a call from Senator Darragh O’Brien to do so. Earlier this month, he said:

“The global Irish community can play a significant role in Ireland’s economic recovery and should be given a national voice.  With 60 million people worldwide claiming Irish heritage and 40 million of those in the United States alone I think it is extremely important that the Taoiseach uses his upcoming appointments to the Seanad to nominate a representative of the Irish Diaspora.”

“This is something Mr. Kenny himself has called for in the past and he is now in a unique position to deliver it.  Fianna Fáil will support such a nomination and I believe many people across all parties would also be supportive of the move.”

This isn’t a new suggestion, but even this extremely modest form of political representation for emigrants has been a tough one for Irish politicians to take on. For example, the Seanad’s sub-committee on reform of the Seanad gave this rather lukewarm recommendation in their 2004 report:

The Sub-Committee is therefore of the view that the Taoiseach, when selecting his nominees for the Seanad, should include people who can represent the interests and perspectives of both emigrants and immigrants.

More importantly, Labour and Fine Gael, in their joint policy document, “Caring for the Irish Abroad”, published in 2006, said, “We support emigrant representation in Seanad Eireann for Irish communities overseas”. There is no corresponding commitment in their programme for government, however.

The idea has been reported with some enthusiasm in the Irish press abroad. For example New York’s Irish Echo gave the idea a broad welcome, but suggested it might not go far enough:

Taoiseach Enda Kenny, in New York this week, is poised to nominate 11 members of Seanad Eireann. It has been suggested that one of them be a representative from the diaspora. Kenny himself was proposing three Senate members representing the diaspora just a few years back so it will be interesting to see what happens.

Just one seems like a bit of a back hand to the global Irish economy. None at all would be seen by some as a kick in the transom.

The editorial asks who might be a likely candidate, then posits rather modestly,  “There are certainly a few possible contenders, one of them being the Irish Lobby for Immigration Reform’s Ciaran Staunton.”

In fact, the Irish Echo’s editor, Ray O’Hanlon, had been widely tipped back in 2006 and 2007 to be the first diaspora senator (as I wrote at the time). Back then, O’Hanlon had been in talks with Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael to be an agreed candidate to replace Fine Gael Senator Jim Higgins who was to step down because of his role as MEP. Senator Higgins had said at the time he would be willing to resign if there could be an agreed candidate representing the diaspora. The deal was hinging on an agreement from Fianna Fail not to contest the seat in a by-election. I don’t know precisely what scuppered the plan, but it all came to naught, and Ireland’s diaspora remains unrepresented to this day.

Of course, the relevance of all this speculation may be rather short-lived, given the Government’s enthusiasm for abolishing the Seanad altogether. In any case, it’s disappointing to see how easy it is for Irish politicians to support diaspora representation when they are out of power, as Fine Gael/Labour did and Fianna Fail does now. Here’s hoping that the current Government will take the history-making first step toward incorporating diaspora voices into our political system.

I’ll post up some more thoughts on this later, but in the meantime, here’s the press release from the Department of Foreign Affairs, issued 3 May:

The Tánaiste and Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade, Mr Eamon Gilmore, T.D., announced today that the Government will host a second Global Irish Economic Forum in Dublin Castle on 7-8 October, 2011. The Tánaiste decided to proceed with holding the Forum this year given the important contribution it can make towards building Ireland’s reputation among the international Irish business community.

The primary purposes of the 2011 Forum will be to:

• Engage fully with the Irish Diaspora in developing Ireland’s global business and trade relations;
• Discuss face-to-face the Government’s  priorities for economic renewal with key members of the international business community;
• Strengthen ties with the Irish Diaspora as a key part of the Government’s efforts to restore Ireland’s international reputation abroad.

Speaking after today’s Government meeting during which the initiative was approved, Mr Gilmore said:

“The Government recognises the valuable role the global Irish can play in Ireland’s economic recovery.  This Forum will provide an opportunity for us to meet with key members of the Diaspora and to discuss our priorities for economic renewal, job creation and the restoration of Ireland’s reputation abroad.”

Invitations will issue shortly to members of the Global Irish Network, which was established after the first Global Irish Economic Forum held at Farmleigh House in September, 2009.  The Network now consists of over 300 of the most influential Irish and Irish-connected individuals abroad, all of whom have demonstrated a strong affiliation with Ireland and have a record of high achievement in international business or in assisting in the promotion of Ireland.

In addition to the Network members, a small number of senior Irish based individuals from the business and cultural worlds will be invited.  The Taoiseach, Tánaiste, Cabinet Ministers and senior representatives from Government Departments and State Agencies will also attend.

Referring to the important role played by the Global Irish Network, the Tánaiste noted:

“Based across 37 countries, Network members provide Ireland with an invaluable resource of international expertise from which we can draw as we work towards economic recovery.  In the year since its inception, members have worked closely with the Government and State Agencies in promoting Ireland’s economic, cultural and tourism messages in key markets.  The Network is an important partner in our ongoing efforts to restore our international reputation”.
“This Forum will be the first time the entire Network has come together and the Taoiseach and I are looking forward to welcoming them all to Dublin for a frank and intensive exchange of ideas”.

Dr Marc Scully completed his PhD thesis, “Discourses of Authenticity and National Identity among the Irish Diaspora in England”, in the Open University’s Psychology Department last year. He spoke last week at the second annual Conference on Social Psychology in Ireland (C-SPI) in the University of Limerick.

According to a UL press release, Dr Scully is now exploring how “his findings might apply to the emerging ‘third great wave’ of post-war emigrants now leaving for England and elsewhere.”

He believes that the changing nature of emigration is enabling a shift toward bi-located lives:

“There’s every indication that recent emigrants are, at least psychologically and in some cases practically, living in two countries simultaneously and are embracing this as an increasingly normal way of living.

This will have implications for the political aspirations of the Irish abroad:

Therefore, the calls for emigrant voting rights which were so prominent before the election are unlikely to go away, as advances in communications have allowed emigrants to continue to be part of the national conversation in ways that weren’t possible with previous generations – the emphasis placed on transnational knowledge and experiences by this cohort means that they will want to continue to have a say, and this will need to be addressed as an aspect of political reform.”

This calls to mind a recent experience I had, in which I spoke on a radio show about issues of emigrant voting rights and emigration. Another of the show’s guests, a rep from the London Irish Centre, made the point that he was not in favour of emigrant voting rights, believing that people should vote in the location where they worked and spent their everyday realities. He went on to suggest that there were few things sadder than some of the older people he’d met who had spent decades in England but had never adjusted to the fact.

I was a bit surprised by the way he connected the voting rights issue with the plight of disadvantaged Irish people who had been unable to settle in London and didn’t quite know how to respond. I’ve thought since that that was a particularly curious argument against emigrant voting rights: obviously the situation of 1950s and1960s-era emigrants caught in that kind of limbo between two cultures wasn’t caused by anything to do with emigrants having a vote – because, of course, they didn’t have a vote in Ireland then and still don’t now.

I don’t believe that Official Ireland’s explicit rejection of its own citizens’ right to the most basic act of participation in their home country did anything to help Irish people integrate into the UK or elsewhere – and in fact, I believe that if emigrants had maintained the right to vote we wouldn’t have waited until 2002 for a Task Force on Policy Regarding Emigrants – which signalled a new attitude in our approach to the Irish abroad with the words: “We owe much to our emigrants”.

The most vulnerable of our emigrants, who were enormously helpful to Ireland’s economic development when we needed them, were allowed to languish with little thought from our politicians until this century. They were far away, their remittances were useful, and our leaders were under little pressure to listen to either their needs or any nascent political aspirations among the Irish abroad.

Things are different now. We need our Irish abroad as much as ever, but as countries all over the world seek to engage their expats not only economically but politically as well, we need to realise that we can’t expect the relationship to flourish if we’re not listening to them. We need to pay attention to Dr Scully’s assertion that the new kinds of transnational navigation being practiced by our young emigrants today will make them increasingly hard to ignore. We should be embracing this, and welcome this increased engagement as healthier for everyone.

Related link:
Marc Scully’s page on the Open University website.