David Begg is unlikely casting for the role of the man who shouted stop. Mr Begg was central to the creation of the political and economic consensus that defined the boom years. As ICTU general secretary, he was a cheerleader for so-called social partnership. As a board member of the Central Bank, he was among the watchdogs who failed to bark. Last week, however, he made a clear and unequivocal stand. “We have to remember,” he fearlessly declared in a newspaper opinion piece, “that Borgen is fictional.”
Pointing out the make-believe nature of the TV drama about Danish coalition politics is not as frivolous as it might appear. Mentions of Borgen have been repeated mantra-like, throughout discussion of the post-election arithmetic and the likely composition of the next government. In itself, there’s nothing wrong with political analysis that employs cultural touchstones. Novels, movies and TV shows often tell us more about the truth of current affairs than conventional, current-affairs journalism.
But, when politicos and pundits repeatedly make the same pop-culture references, and do so with the same ho-ho-ho intonation, you are not in the company of alert commentators with well-tended hinterlands — you’re living in an echo chamber. And that’s what our political discourse increasingly resembles. Even amid the aftershocks of what we are continuously told was an “electoral earthquake”, the loudest sound has been the heavy-rotation of buzzwords and rinky-dink platitudes.
It was Bryan Dobson who set the Borgen ball rolling. Early in last Saturday’s results coverage, as he contemplated the unprecedented proliferation of new parties and groupings, the RTE news anchor made an offhand remark about the 32nd Dail being a “Borgen parliament”. Clearly stuck for anything else to say, several contributors to subsequent political gabfests seized upon the reference like drowning men grabbing a life raft.
Denmark hasn’t experienced single-party government in 35 years. Coalitions are the norm and some of the multi-party arrangements have had up to a dozen constituent parts. The hero of Borgen is Brigitte Nyborg, a politician of rare integrity and bounding ambition with a special talent for forging alliances among seemingly disparate groups. By name-checking Nyborg, the talking heads seemed to believe they were asserting their unique grasp of European coalition mechanics.
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The notion that some political players forget that Borgen is fiction is not entirely fanciful. After all, most of our major parties seem to be staffed by handlers who think they’re living in The West Wing, Aaron Sorkin’s snappily written serial about whipsmart operatives in a fictionally noble White House. Fine Gael is especially over-endowed with backroom functionaries who evidently see Josh Lyman when they look in the mirror. As the party’s calamitous election campaign demonstrated, however, a more accurate reflection would be Baldrick from Blackadder.
Sooner or later, it was inevitable that Mr Begg would climb aboard the Borgen-chat bandwagon. These are heady days for the establishment grandee. Last week, he published a book with the catchy-title of Ireland, Small Open Economies and European Integration: Lost in Translation. He also announced his candidacy in the forthcoming Seanad elections. To promote both of these exciting developments, he wrote an article for The Irish Times in which he reflected on the state of the nation. Tellingly, however, the nation about which he seemed most exercised was Denmark.
He opened his piece with the aforementioned wake-up call to those who would use Borgen as a manual for coalition-building. As you would expect from someone of his impeccable taste, Mr Begg is a Borgen aficionado. He writes about the show with the enthusiasm of a fan and the background knowledge of an obsessive. He also delivered a mini-dissertation on Danish history. All very interesting, no doubt — but, in the week that’s in it, spectacularly beside the point.
Mr Begg’s links with the Labour party are well known, yet his Irish Times piece had nothing to say about his fallen comrades. Labour has just endured the drubbing of a lifetime. Its Dail representation fell from the 37 seats won in 2011 to seven: an 81 per cent collapse. But Mr Begg, a would-be student of history, makes no reference to any of this. Insofar as the events of recent days were mentioned, they were introduced only to be dismissed. “The general election of last week has not settled anything,” he harrumphed.
The absence of comment about Labour’s election rout was especially conspicuous because Mr Begg was an election issue — to Labour’s detriment. In January, he was appointed chairman of the Pensions Authority by Joan Burton, the Labour leader and tanaiste, under controversial circumstances. Ms Burton hired him using a provision that allowed her to sidestep the public service advertising and appointments process, arguing that he was the best man for the job.
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In the ensuing furore, Ms Burton was accused of a “return to Celtic Tiger cronyism” and the Independent Alliance tabled a no-confidence motion against her. The government easily won the vote, but the no-confidence debate provided the opposition with a lavish opportunity to attack Labour as the election loomed. Ms Burton was unrepentant. She defended her appointment of Mr Begg, describing him as “a totally trustworthy man” and “eminently qualified”.
The issue didn’t go away. It was raised during the final leaders’ debate on TV and subsequently became a campaign talking point. Despite Mr Begg’s undoubted expertise and ability, the accusation of cronyism had traction, and did not help Labour’s election prospects.
All of which brings us to the most eye-popping feature of his Irish Times article: his attempt to present himself as a standard-bearer for what he calls “new politics”. Ireland, he insisted, has “rejected auction politics” and is now ready to “demand from politicians a credible narrative of Ireland’s future”. He obviously knows just the man to provide such a narrative.
This, it seems, is the reality of the much-vaunted electoral earthquake. The political order has been turned upside down but the inversion is entirely cosmetic. Old-stagers who have been strutting around the public square for decades barely pause for breath while they rebrand themselves as reforming mavericks.
Mr Begg is by no means the only blast from the past who sees himself as tomorrow’s man. Michael McDowell, the former Progressive Democrats leader, is also seeking election to the upper house. It seems that in politics, as on TV, there’s always room for more reruns.