Comment Archives for Peter Geoghegan
Peter lives in Edinburgh but works across Ireland and Scotland. He is the editor of Political Insight, a magazine published by the Political Studies Association, and a a regular contributor to various publications including The Irish Times, The Irish Independent, The Sunday Business Post, The Scotsman, and The Glasgow Herald. He is also on Twitter @PeterKGeoghegan.
Advertise
-
Books
-
John Laird for Christmas?
John Laird (Lord Laird of Artigarvan) is unionism’s jester. His memoir A Struggle To Be Heard ” by a True Ulster Liberal” (from Slugger’s shop on Amazon here) might serve more as a heavy stocking filler than anybody’s idea of a main present. In it he wears the masks of comedy and tragedy to turn the [...] read our review »
-
The Irish political journalist’s problem with partial disclosure…
The nod and wink politics of Ireland’s last two or three decades as practised par excellence by Bertie, Albert and Charlie is ultimately what has the Republic in the stew it’s in. Don’t get me wrong, the effective monitoring of those exercising of power does not demand full disclosure of everything all the time. But [...] read our review »
-
Have we Learned our own Lessons? Book Review of John Brewer’s Peace Processes
Northern Ireland’s peace process has been promoted as an international success story. The Republic’s Department of Foreign Affairs has its Conflict Resolution Unit, which aims to disseminate the ‘lessons’ of the Northern Ireland peace process. And some of the prominent players in our peace process have travelled abroad to other troubled spots to share their [...] read our review »
-
Comment on RBS bonus: Obscene or a nice piece of business?
on 31 January 2012 at 10:56 am
Writing in the LRB Hester/RBS-gate, Zizek has some interesting comments on why there’s a boom in bankers pay (and in boardrooms more generally, note real wages have decreased in the US since 1970s and in UK for about last 25 years).
http://www.lrb.co.uk/v34/n02/slavoj-zizek/the-revolt-of-the-salaried-bourgeoisie
‘If the old capitalism ideally involved an entrepreneur who invested (his own or borrowed) money into production that he organised and ran, and then reaped the profit from it, a new ideal type is emerging today: no longer the entrepreneur who owns his company, but the expert manager (or a managerial board presided over by a CEO) who runs a company owned by banks (also run by managers who don’t own the bank) or dispersed investors. In this new ideal type of capitalism, the old bourgeoisie, rendered non-functional, is refunctionalised as salaried management: the members of the new bourgeoisie get wages, and even if they own part of their company, earn stocks as part of their remuneration (‘bonuses’ for their ‘success’).
This new bourgeoisie still appropriates surplus value, but in the (mystified) form of what has been called ‘surplus wage’: they are paid rather more than the proletarian ‘minimum wage’ (an often mythic point of reference whose only real example in today’s global economy is the wage of a sweatshop worker in China or Indonesia), and it is this distinction from common proletarians which determines their status. The bourgeoisie in the classic sense thus tends to disappear: capitalists reappear as a subset of salaried workers, as managers who are qualified to earn more by virtue of their competence (which is why pseudo-scientific ‘evaluation’ is crucial: it legitimises disparities). Far from being limited to managers, the category of workers earning a surplus wage extends to all sorts of experts, administrators, public servants, doctors, lawyers, journalists, intellectuals and artists. The surplus takes two forms: more money (for managers etc), but also less work and more free time (for – some – intellectuals, but also for state administrators etc).’
Go to comment
Comment on Letters from Iceland
on 1 April 2011 at 9:38 pm
Fair point on the Eurozone Pete, probably should have mentioned that.
But there is a distinctly different attitude to debt (public and private) here, too, that is worth remarking on.
Having their own currency has been a mixed blessing for Iceland though. At present it’s a closed currency but when they open it up (a process supposedly due to begin soon and end in 2015), all hell could break lose with massive capital flight from Iceland.
Go to comment
Comment on Northern Ireland to lose two MPs…
on 4 March 2011 at 10:46 am
Yep, it will Nevin – nobody sought to de-link Assembly representation from Westminster, which the Bill does for Wales! So the Welsh Assembly numbers will stay the same but Stormont’s won’t.
Go to comment
Comment on Northern Ireland to lose two MPs…
on 4 March 2011 at 10:23 am
This is the result of the Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill 2010, which was tagged onto the bill for the AV vote.
The total MPs is being reduced from 600 to 650, early estimates had NI losing 3 but looks like it will be 2. Constituency boundaries will be redrawn, along strict population lines (all electorates bar Western Isles, Orkneys, Isle of Wight) must have between 95 and 105 per cent of the new quota (which is 76,600 voters) – which means that the traditional electoral wards as we know them will change dramatically (how much in the North isn’t clear but it could be quite a lot).
The focus when the AV bill was going through the Lords and the Commons was all on Labour obstruction – Labour have by far the most to lose from the changes – but these are major overhauls of the electoral map that have just been passed without a lot of voters knowing much about them.
I wonder which MPs in NI find themselves without a seat to defend at the next election?
Go to comment
Comment on Voting Rights for Irish Emigrants
on 20 December 2010 at 6:26 pm
@Mark You don’t need dual nationality to vote in many EU countries.
@Mark Dowling The no taxation no representation chestnut spun about emigrant voting is both old and more than a little disingenuous – we don’t take away the votes of non-tax payers living in ROI do we?
If you look at the UK once you emigrate you are entitled to register for an overseas vote. It’s a relatively hassle free exercise that can be done on-line and doesn’t lapse for 15 years (although that is currently being challenged in the EU and could be made indefinite). Ireland, on the other hand, gives its citizens 18 months and then there are excluded from the democratic process.
But it’s also worth remembering that the proportion of Irish abroad who would actually vote if they could is liable to be very, very small. Eg in the UK only a few thousand ex-pats bother to register and vote even though it’s a pretty straightforward process.
Go to comment