The term populism is now deployed so frequently that there is a risk it will lose its meaning. It is invoked with alarming frequency to explain everything from the rise of Donald Trump to Brexit.
There is no doubt that there are factors at play in many western countries that are both unprecedented and destabilising, but there is a danger that populism is used as a scapegoat for underlying problems that need to be addressed.
In the case of Ireland, there has been a breakdown in trust between the state and the electorate. This is perhaps an inevitable outcome of the savage level of austerity that was introduced after the financial crisis. Government policy is widely blamed as being one of the most important contributing factors to the economic crash.
The burn the bondholders movement was very effective at popularising the narrative that ordinary taxpayers had unfairly shouldered the vast bulk of bank losses. The truth is far more complex but too unwieldy to combat this simple and emotive message. There is a yawning chasm between the level of trust in the state among voters and the level of trust needed to ensure the effective running of government.
Take, for example, the front page story of The Times yesterday — half of eligible girls refused the cervical cancer vaccine in the 2016 and 2017 academic year. The HSE has warned that it will take years to repair the damage caused by misinformation campaigns against the HPV vaccine. The Irish Cancer Society has used a formula to show that the low number of girls being vaccinated between 2016 and 2017 will result in 40 avoidable cervical cancer deaths.
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There is absolutely no scientific evidence to back up claims that the HPV vaccine is harmful, yet the HSE, which is an arm of the state, is unable to convince half the eligible population to take it.
The water charges debacle is a symptom of the same malaise. Over the past couple of weeks, the parlous state of the country’s water infrastructure has become very evident. Irish Water estimates that it will cost €600-€700 million each year for the next 20 years to ensure the pipe system is fit for purpose. In a spectacular case of economic self-sabotage, the public backlash against water charges eventually forced their removal. Now there is a national water utility that does not have the ability to raise funding. That means that the money needed to fix the water system will come out of the budgets for health, education and other services.
Campaigners against water charges were very effective in drumming home one message: Irish Water was a stalking horse for the full privatisation of the water system, even though the government went to every conceivable length to persuade the electorate that this was not the case.
As with other pledges, voters simply did not believe the most senior elected representatives of the state. The people behind the water charges protest are now turning their attention to bin charges. In this febrile environment they have every chance of being equally successful.
In the aftermath of the economic crisis in 2008, Irish people showed an incredible amount of fortitude to withstand the swingeing level of tax increases and spending cuts needed to restore fiscal rectitude. It was inevitable that this forbearance would eventually give way to inchoate rage.
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The country is now at a crossroads. The economy is performing well but that will not continue indefinitely if legislative impotence besetting the minority government carries on for much longer. Unless trust is restored between the voters and the government then the legislative process will remain hostage to whim. It is up to all politicians, not just those on the government benches, to ensure the fickle public mood is not manipulated for short term and self-serving reasons. If not, the business of government will become an impossible task.