Sign in. It’s quick, free and it’s up to you.
An account is an optional way to support the work we do. Find out more.
On Friday, US-based publisher Niall O’Dowd announced he was withdrawing from the Irish presidential race. Perhaps it’s because we expect emigrants to help solve our problems, but give nothing in return, argues Noreen Bowden.
THIS SUMMER, SEVEN of my friends are emigrating. They include: a returned emigrant in his 40s, back several years from the US but now job-hunting in Berlin; a couple in their late 30s and their two young children, heading to a new job for him in the UK; a man in his 70s who believes his retirement savings will last longer in Spain than in Ireland; and a friend in his late 40s who is moving back home to Colorado, facing an uncertain future after 20 years of living in Galway.
I’m going myself: packing up after nearly a decade and a half in Ireland, going back to spend a year back in graduate school in Boston. My own story of emigration and return will continue on its twisty way. I’m the daughter of a Castlebar woman who left in the 1950s and a Kilkenny man who became a New York City bus driver after emigrating in the 1960s. I’ve been living in Ireland since 1997, and I suspect I’ll be back.
Earlier this month, Fergus O’Rourke wrote on TheJournal.ie that “in Ireland, emigration is pretty universally regarded as A Bad Thing”. I’d dispute that. In Ireland emigration really isn’t “universally regarded” as any one thing at all. Our relationship with the phenomenon is complex, deeply individual and often contradictory.
During the boom times, the notion that involuntary emigration was a bad thing was a safe concept for the government to express, even at the highest levels: Bertie Ahern declared the ending of involuntary emigration as one of his top achievements. No one really questioned the nearly 20,000 Irish people a year who were still leaving: with an unemployment rate hovering at around four per cent, and the Australian year a rite of passage for many, it seemed reasonable to assume that those who left were enjoying the fruits of a global boom. For those that weren’t, the Irish government was upping the spending on Irish welfare abroad.
When times are tough, however, the public discourse around emigration tends to diverge. It’s then – while TV news programmes tug at the heartstrings with images of teary mothers at the airport, stories of entire classes of graduating nurses being hired by UK hospitals, and tales of fathers leaving families to take contracts in London or Dubai that will enable them to send home the mortgage – that we hear the calls to embrace our renewed status as an emigrant nation. The loudest of these voices tend to belong to those who feel no urge to move themselves.
In the 1980s, Brian Lenihan Snr’s “We can’t all live on a small island” seemed to sum up governmental complacency. During the current crisis, it was former Tánaiste Mary Coughlan who highlighted the government’s non-response to rising emigration figures: she claimed young people were emigrating because “they want to enjoy themselves. That’s what young people are entitled to do.”
While some surely were emigrating to enjoy themselves, it seems unlikely that the amount of fun to be had out there was rising with the emigration rate as global economic fortunes declined.
Journalist Karlin Lillington wrote a piece in the Irish Times, calling for a reconsideration of emigration (as if it hadn’t already happened among policy-makers). She unselfconsciously echoed Brian Lenihan’s 1980s comments in proclaiming:
The idea that this small land mass can provide jobs for its entire population doesn’t make sense – and even if it did, having everybody employed here would be an extremely limited and dead-end economic vision.
Lillington wasn’t just hearkening back to the 1980s with her comments. Her words were rooted in the notion that the diaspora is out there to be harnessed for our economic ends. That the more educated, talented people we have working on our behalf around the world, the better off we’ll be. By now the idea of ‘harnessing the diaspora’ is so widespread in Ireland that it makes the occasional student protests against ‘brain drain’ sound strangely old-fashioned. We don’t do brain drain anymore. It’s called brain circulation now, and it rests on the notion that our most qualified emigrants will either return or make their foreign-gained experience available for Ireland’s benefit.
It may have been Mary Robinson who started the celebration of the diaspora in Ireland in the 1990s, but her embrace was soon followed by the phenomenon of diaspora engagement for economic purposes. Irish policy-makers realised we were on to something. Our diaspora had achieved mythic proportions: we have the biggest, most loyal diaspora of them all – or so we imagine. Never mind that the figure of 70million is a dubious extrapolation based on census results recording anyone who reports any Irish ancestry. No matter: our Green Army of 70 million (or 80 or 100 million, as the figure has been variously reported in recent months) is surely just awaiting the word from commanding officers back home to unleash their economic might.
The Irish establishment has responded enthusiastically. Former Taoiseach Brian Cowen eagerly talked up the diaspora as a “huge and willing resource” when he launched the Smart Economy strategy in 2010. Enda Kenny was thinking similarly when he announced the initiative in which diaspora members would be paid for job creation. During the crisis, the notion that the diaspora could save us from our financial fate has loomed large. There seems to be no limit to what we can ask of our loyal foot soldiers abroad.
And yet we see the limits of our gratitude when we see the reaction to Irish-born, New York-based publisher Niall O’Dowd’s interest in seeking the Irish presidency. There were plenty of voices pointing out that O’Dowd isn’t really one of us any more. The Irish Times ran an unintentionally comical article from the Northern Ireland-born, New York-resident Walter Ellis, who plaintively opined that O’Dowd “would not get my vote”. No surprise there, as Ellis is as disenfranchised as O’Dowd. Irish Times editors thoughtfully appended to the article the text of the US oath of allegiance taken by immigrants when they became US citizens. They did not add that the Irish government does not recognise such oaths as a renunciation of Irish citizenship.
O’Dowd was willing to be the good Irishman abroad as president, acting as a travelling salesman for the country. He appeared earnest in his intention to spread the pro-business, tourism-friendly gospel of Brand Ireland. This won’t stop his critics. Article 2 of our constitution may grant O’Dowd full entitlement to membership in the Irish Nation as an Irish citizen, but the court of popular opinion in Ireland won’t. Once you go, your money, your contacts, and your expertise are welcome. Your presence in the political system is not.
Because that’s one of the curious things about the establishment view of emigration: while today’s politicians are relatively unconcerned about emigration, it’s the emigrants themselves they’re not too sure about. Almost every other developed nation in the world (and a long and growing list of developing ones) allows its ex-pats to vote – partly because they realise political engagement is part of the deal if they want to reap the economic benefits of their diasporas. Not so Ireland: our political classes distrust our emigrants – perhaps because they realise that it will be a lot harder to maintain that cavalier attitude toward the departure of thousands of people in tough economic times if the departed retain a political voice.
And emigrants like O’Dowd have been willing to go along with this bad bargain – for too long, I would argue. O’Dowd contemplated running in an election he won’t be allowed to vote in, and showed no interest in even protesting his own disenfranchisement. O’Dowd has worked tirelessly on behalf of Ireland, for several decades. Yet he and the other three million Irish citizens abroad are refused what the vast majority of other developed nations offer: a voice in their home country.
How long with the establishment be able to keep a lid on the political aspirations of the Irish abroad? I believe it will be this generation of emigrants who will force the change. Today’s young people are too connected, self-confident and politically aware to content themselves with donning the green jersey while being deprived of the kind of voice that almost any other EU nation would give them. The old arguments against giving emigrants the vote just don’t work any more, and today’s Irish abroad are become increasingly aware of the reality that emigrant voting is now an international democratic norm.
It’s up to the Irish establishment to take up the challenge of facilitating political participation for all our citizens. For too long, the establishment has been too relaxed about the price their fellow citizens paid when they leave Ireland in bad economic times. Perhaps the cavalier pronouncements on emigration will be a little harder to make when they are accountable to those who’ve left.
Noreen Bowden has been engaged in emigrant issues for twenty years and is the former director of the Emigrant Advice Network. She writes about emigration and diaspora at her website, GlobalIrish.ie.
To embed this post, copy the code below on your site
Just under 1600 words. Not a single one of them was “tax”. That’s why.
Some emigrants do pay taxes, David – yet it doesn’t give them any right to vote. And we don’t require the payment of taxes here to vote – we don’t disenfranchise, for example, net recipients of taxation (like public servants or welfare recipients). Plus you can declare yourself non-resident for the purpose of taxation and keep your vote for a minimum of three years (and it’s a bit hazy on whether you’ll actually lose it after that).
There is no developed nation in the world that requires the payment of taxation by expats in order to vote. The US, in fact, is the only developed nation in the world that requires all its expats to file taxes on income earned abroad (and only those earning above $90k need to pay). Yet nearly every developed nation in the world allows their expats to vote, and plenty of developing ones as well.
Why do you think Ireland should be the only developed country in the entire world that would require the payment of taxes in exchange for a vote? Would you at least favour the right to vote for emigrants who do pay taxes? Because that would be more than we’ve got now.
If that’s how it works, where is my vote David?
Why should someone who is likely to up and leave and return to their own country or indeed move onto another country, get a say on how this country should be run in the future? Would Emigrants know enough about the countries political system to make a sound judgement on who will be at the wheel?
Case in point….when things were good here the Eastern Europeans flocked here. Now things are bad they are leaving. I speak from experience because I made lots of friends from Eastern Europe who are now telling me they are leaving because “its just no good here anymore” or “my hours are cut in half and I cant afford to live here anymore” etc etc
A poll on this perhaps? Should Emigrates be given the right to vote? I vote No.
Emigrant: A person who leaves their own country to settle permanently in another. So an Irish person going to America/UK/US is an emigrant.
Immigrant: A person who comes to live permanently in a foreign country. The Eastern Europeans you mention coming here to Ireland are immigrants.
Thanks for the English lesson Ryan. I know the difference between the two. In order to be an Immigrant one has to become an Emigrant from their original place of inhabitance. If an Irish person Emigrates they should not be given the right to vote. Likewise if somebody Immigrates to Ireland they should not be given the right to vote. That’s my opinion on it. I hope that makes it more clear.
Allow me to point out something in you post…..what’s the difference between America and the US?
While theory giving a vote to the Irish abroad sounds laudable in practice I would have some difficulty with it. I have uncles in the UK, UAE and Australia who come back to Ireland maybe once a year or less for anywhere between 1 to 4 weeks and while they do keep up to speed via the internet the simple fact of the matter is that they are living in a foreign country (entirely by choice ) and so would not have a day to day understanding of what is gong on at home. To put it another way I live in a town 10 miles from where I grew up yet I only go back there to visit a friend maybe once every 2 months. I haven’t been out socially there in 10 years. As a result of this i don’t see why I should have an absentee vote in town council elections or anything else that affects the locals as I don’t know what issues are important to them. The village has changed dramatically since I grew up there and there are many changes since I left but to my mind I still have a picture of the village from 1990.
Perhaps one solution to this is to allow people a vote for a set period, say 5 years, to take into account short term emigration. This would allow people to have an input into home affairs while the person is abroad gaining experience or making their fortune. After that I feel that people lose touch with things as they are just not around to see things as they are on the ground. This is no fault of their own it is just the way that life is. Reading one or two websites of Irish news while living in Sydney is no substitution for meeting people on your street everyday, watching the news, reading the papers or just having a drink down your local.
“Perhaps one solution to this is to allow people a vote for a set period, say 5 years, to take into account short term emigration. This would allow people to have an input into home affairs while the person is abroad gaining experience or making their fortune”
I agree 100% with this. I believe that is what they do here in Canda. I’m here for 3 years hoping things will ‘blow over’ at home so I can return. I’d like to have an input into resolving the issues that influenced my leaving home.
It is a shocking indictment of our education system and outlook, that most Irish born emigrants go to other mono/Anglophone countries rather than within the Community/union we have been part of the last 40 years.
Most Irish born emigrants (70%) move to countries within the EU, majority obviously to UK. Remaining 30% go to US, Australia, etc. Because English is our language and it’s the 2nd most used dialect in the world might have something to do with it too.
Because when ye go, ye see what normal western countries are run like, and that would never suit FF or FG or more importantly. 50% of the people born in Ireland have had to emigrate, we have been on the verge of bankruptcy 4 times and yet people still keeping voting for tweedledum and tweedledee, still complain about them and their failed policies.
Emigration represents a lost investment of about 250m euros a week in this state. No country can survive it but in Ireland, if you dissent or want to have a fair crack at it, then you have traditionally been told feck off by the Govt. or the church.
Noreen, NIall O’Dowd here, thank you for a thoughtful and well written article. Within a week of announcing was running the IrishTimes had two hostile articles and the Sunday Independent one. I think we Irish abroad threaten the status quo in a way that is quite surprising. There is enormous ambivalence about emigrant,s unlike say Israel which utterly embraces its Diaspora The notion that I am less of anIrishman because I have lived abroad had never once occurred to me. Yet it was thrown at me in the Times, Sunday Times, Sunday Independent etc.
In a nutshell Ireland has been self governing forabout 90 years during that time there has been about ten years max of good government and emigrant has continued to cascade on a thirty year cycle, 20s 50s 80s andnow again.It tells its own story and why the failure to look outwards continues,especially among the power elites . involuntary emigration they know represents their own failure.
Hi Niall, thanks for the nice words! I agree with you that we need to resolve the ambivalence about the Irish abroad. I think many Irish people here who have never lived abroad both misunderstand and underestimate the level of good will that the Irish abroad maintain for Ireland.
I think that as the economic crisis continues, and we continue to rely on help from our diaspora, there’s going to be a need for real leadership to transform this relationship. I have a hard time believing that our people abroad are going to continue to be such a reliable source of support as they become more aware of this ambivalence. And I assume that this ambivalence will only become more obvious to the Irish abroad as they step up their efforts to assist in this crisis.
I’m optimistic that we’ll pull it together, but it’s not going to be easy. The vote is just one part of it, though it’s an essential one. How much longer can we ask more of our emigrants than any other European nation does, while depriving them of the voice that any other EU nation would give them?
Great article Noreen. I agree all Irish citizens should be able to participate. I like the idea above of a limited time period though – or perhaps an emigrants ‘constituency’.
I’m pretty open on how the details should be worked out, but I do think emigrant constituencies are worth exploring. It’s how it’s done in Italy and France, for example. I think emigrants do have specific issues, such as consular protection, spousal immigration rules, diaspora policy, and emigrant welfare, that affect them in ways that don’t affect other Irish citizens.
Of course emigrants intending to return are most likely to be concerned with economic policies in the same way that resident citizens will be.
A time limit is more problematic to me, because I believe voting should be based on citizenship, which doesn’t expire after 5 or 10 or any other arbitrary number of years. There are relatively few countries that impose time limits – in the EU, I believe it’s only Germany (25 years), the UK (15 years) and Denmark (2 years). The UK’s limit is being challenged in both the High Court in London and in the European Court of Human Rights, by two separate individuals. One is asserting that it’s a limitation on his right to freely live and work anywhere in the EU as a European citizen. I suspect he’ll win his case.
I forgot to mention on the tax issue. I have spent literally hundreds of thousand on salaries of Irish employees of my companys based in Ireland over the past thirty years of publishing and paid more tax I’d say than most Irish people
You would have got my vote
Interesting piece. Personally I think it is a lot more basic or fundamental than what you outline here.
The ‘emigrants don’t pay tax so they shouldn’t be able to vote’ argument is a weak one at best.
Plenty of people living in Ireland don’t pay tax. Using tax payment as a criteria for allowing a vote immediately removes the most basic of rights from many elderly, disabled, long term ill, unemployed, and stay at home parents. This argument from intelligent people baffles me.
Or is it just about the money, could they pay a one off fee? 100, 500, a grand, five grand? How much does a vote cost these days in progressive Ireland?
The argument of ‘I don’t want them speaking for me’ also doesn’t stand up to analysis. Someone else’s vote isn’t supposed to speak for you, it speaks for the voter, that’s the point of democracy, no? All citizens have one vote to use as they wish, whether or not it’s how anyone else would wish it to be used. Yes the issues concerning an Irish citizen working in a bar in Sydney, or in IT in Dusseldorf, or in finance in London differ from those of a young family living in the Dublin commuter belt, but so do the issues concerning West Cork farmers, pub owners in Galway, or a postman in Donegal.
Security of postal ballots should also not be an issue, there is no reason why a consulate in Bucharest or embassy in the Hague couldn’t provide as secure a voting station as a primary school in Dunmanway or community centre in Tullamore.
Myself, I live & work outside Ireland, within the EU, where Irish governments have been promoting commercial and economic interaction for forty years. Where every Irish citizen can freely travel and work, often by choice, often due to having none. We are encouraged to go abroad, do business, spread our good reputation, learn skills, but as soon as you do you lose one of your most fundamental rights. The decisions of one government can send someone abroad for work, and by default removing their ability to influence any situation that would allow them to return.
Instead of taking the rights from Irish citizens, why not be more sensible on who can have the privilege of becoming one?
It’s simply not true that emigrants are unaffected by election results and government policies here in Ireland.
Just as a few examples –
— if an emigrant has left because of bad economic conditions, and hopes to return home to a job and a house someday, then they will be directly affected by policies affected things like jobs growth and house prices.
— If an emigrant leaves and meets a partner abroad, their ability to return will be affected by spousal immigration policies.
— If an emigrant leaves and has to come back (to take care of an elderly parent, say, or just to find work) whether or not they will be able to access any state help will be affected by social welfare policies (the Habitual Residence Condition, for example, has resulted in the refusal of state benefits to thousands of returning emigrants, even though those of us working with emigrants at the time of its implementation were assured it would not affect them.)
Those who are not intending to return immediately are also affected:
— Emigrants who have inherited family homes back in Ireland are liable for the tax on non-primary residences, so they are being taxed without having a say.
— Emigrants are also affected by broadcasting policy – many nations provide broadcast services for their overseas citizens. Ireland promised to provide a TV service to the Irish in the UK by March 2009. This isn’t happening, despite many requests from the Irish community there. (This isn’t just a luxury service -this kind of service can be a great link with home for isolated and vulnerable people.)
— Emigrants are also affected by policies regarding emigrant welfare abroad. (FF, to their credit, substantially upped this level of spending, although not to the level recommended in the government’s own task force report.)
— Emigrants are also affected by policies regarding consular protection – which can turn into a life-or-death situation as we’ve seen recently in places like Libya.
— Some emigrants are entitled to the pension for the time they worked in Ireland, so they are affected by any changes being made to this.
Most people living in Ireland pay no attention to how any of these issues affect the Irish abroad! That’s why Irish citizens overseas need to be allowed to have a say in the political system. They very much do have to live with the consequences of political decisions in Ireland.
So if you’ve left family behind, you don’t get a say on how you would like the country run for them?
So much for family first…
Great article! With the access to instant news and information there is nothing stopping a person overseas from making an informed vote. I have been living overseas now for a long time and would really like to at least have the right to vote in the Irish Presidential elections. While some people are never going back home the majority in my experience head back home eventually and should have at least a small voice in the country.
Brainwave: Ask the diaspora to pay a small tax in return for a vote. We need money and they have it. After the ESB, etc., what else have we got to sell?! Anyway, great article Noreen, surprised you dignified the cockroach’s one-liner with a response…
Excellent article, Noreen. It’s amazing how threatened some Irish are by the notion of emmigrats having a vote. The old whiff of superiority surrounding those who had to leave versus those who could afford to stay lingers. Eventually Ireland will join the rest of the democratic world and extend the franchise to all its citizens regradless of where they happen to be on polling day. We will then look back as a society with the same sense of shame that we have now when we consider that once females were not allowed to vote.
Maybe if emigrants had been able to vote the current mess may never have happened. The extent of that mess is not really comprehended by those in Ireland as evidenced by comments saying it’ll turn around with a couple of years. A failure of the magnitude seen on Ireland will take a generation to turn around. Despite their tendency to blame the politicians and the banks, the people who can vote are in denial, what happened was a team effort. The voters share as much of the blame as the politicians and banks for failing to see what blind Freddy could see, that it was unsustainable, and for continuing to vote in support of it. Mind you if the fourth estate, which is the other guilty party, was not asleep at the wheel and did their job by challenging the bi-partisan economic policy of successive governments the voters might have woken from their trance, but I doubt it. Those of us living abroad could see it coming, but we could not be heard as we have no voice.
Well written article and I can see it’s instigated hardened debate but one thing has stood out, there is a consensus that outside help will somewhat deflect the status quo of the politic ” we will in our arse let an outsider in” this attitude can be seen all through Ireland, from little in bred villages right up to capital … As a people we should hang our heads in shame, we are still tipping our hats to the hierarchy and those who got a chance to rub shoulders with these thieves became thieves themselves ( messrs dolly and co) we should say it as it is, there are not enough good hard working,honest Irish people living on this island to make a difference, the cronyism, one upmanship, nest feathering at local level is still rife and the gob shites I see everyday in there entourage are equally as bad….. I am an ex soldier who for the most has been forgotten, I am not looking for any sympathy , I WILL survive but is surviving enough, we are not ABLE to look after ourselves, let the diaspora in and they will make the difference, cleanse the political gene pool and get rid of the stench of corruption ….. Do not forget my friends , that whatever party or independent you are loyal too , they are all ( maybe Boyd Barrett excluded) claiming UNVOUCHED expenses to the tune , on average of 3,500 grand a month…. So tell me what’s changed… I bid you good morning
NO REPRESENTATION WITHOUT TAXATION
Fascinating. Should your vote also be weighted by how much tax you pay? I mean if we’re going to define citizenship in financial terms it seems like a logical step.
In that case , no votes for social welfare recipients as they dont pay tax , and no votes for pensioners either , good luck with that.
I left Ireland a few years ago and I agree that I shouldn’t be allowed to vote in an Irish election/referendum…..I left, so why should I have a say in what happens there. I can vote in local and European elections in my new home and I’m fine with that, in another few years I’ll be allowed vote in general elections.
The Irish govt aren’t going to change the law,don’t you think it’s a bit silly that auld paddy and mary who left for canada in the 70s will be allowed to vote in a country they may have only returned to a handful of times?
Surely you lot that are moaning about this would be better off cutting the suffocating apron strings around your neck and rather concentrate on trying to make a go of your new opportunities abroad.
The family left behind can vote themselves dah!
1. It’s often been mentioned of what must people in other countries think of us on the way we manage our affairs. Letting emigrants vote could be a good way to gauge that.
2. Long term emigrants are generally a result of bad domestic policies . People by and large emigrate to get work and earn a living, they should be allowed voice their opinion on policies that sent them away and keep them away.
If taxation and rights to vote go hand in hand, then why, as a tax-paying economy-boosting worker who grew up in Ireland am I denied the right to vote, because I was born in another country? If this logic were to be used, then I should not have to pay tax because I’m denied the right to vote, simple as that.
What exactly do they ‘give back’, I don’t think emigrants should have a vote at home, it’s ridiculous. You need to live in the country to make a truly informed decision with regard to voting.
Looking at the government we had and still have I think even the people living in Ireland don’t have a “truly informed decision with regard to voting” ;-)
Reason they don’t vote is they don’t pay tax here. He who pays the piper and all that ; turkeys voting for Christmas . Emigrants having a vote in ireland would be a disaster . In the words of monty python “what have the diaspora ever done for us” :-)
You only have a right to vote if you’re prepared to live with the consequences. Many emigrants have totally clueless ideas about Ireland, particularly in relation to Northern Ireland. Giving emigrants the vote is the worst idea ever.
Pual you appear to be confusing emigrants, people who have left Ireland, with the Irish diaspora, people who identify with Ireland because that’s where their ancestors came from.
If Immigrants vote they don’t have to live with the consequences of the vote.
That’s enough reason to not allow it or only allow it for a short while.
Easy for an immigrant to vote for a party promising large income tax increases when they won’t have to pay it.
have your say