Ireland Inc.: The corporatization of affective life in post-Celtic Tiger Ireland

Abstract

Employing a framework of commercial nationalism, this article analyses how a post-Celtic Tiger Irish government aligned with elite interests has doubled down on its commitment to corporate citizenship. Despite the depredations of this era being directly attributable to the irrational exuberance of the Celtic Tiger period and lapses in financial regulation, Ireland post-2008 is marked by a radical forgetfulness and defined by ‘Shock Doctrine’ regulatory policies that have installed corporatism at the heart of everyday life. Key features of this landscape include ongoing governmental facilitation of tax avoidance by multinational corporations, the hollowing out of public services, the normalization of under-employment and a burgeoning housing crisis. We show here how the popular images and narratives of the period index a shift toward corporate impregnability and a public culture in which individuals absorb greater risk and take up positions of heightened precarity.

Home Truths: Property TV, Financialization, and the Housing Crisis in Contemporary Ireland

“…Cultural commentator Fintan O’Toole (2019) considers the impact of this shift toward financialization for the main Irish centrist parties, “who firstly turned housing into a commodity,” and their main political base, the middle classes “pulled downwards by the gravitational pull of housing costs.” O’Toole concludes that “this destruction of the middle-class lifestyle is being accomplished by the very political system that depends on it.” One unexpected consequence of the boom and crash is that “several decades in which government and market forces coalesced around the promotion of homeownership appear to have undermined access to homeownership and triggered a resurgence of renting” (Byrne 2020, 743). The subsequent market recalibration saw significant interventions from “vulture” funds, which often bought up housing en masse that would traditionally have accommodated first-time buyers (Negra and McIntyre 2020, 64).…”

“…Social progressiveness, evidenced by the success of the gay marriage referendum in 2015 and the legalization of abortion in 2018, is often capitalized upon by mainstream politicians such as former Taoiseach (Irish Prime Minister—currently Tánaiste (Deputy Prime Minister)) Leo Varadkar to burnish their own image. It has made Ireland increasingly attractive to globally mobile workers in the burgeoning tech and financial services industries in the capital and other urban centers (see Negra and McIntyre 2020, 70–3, 65–6). Ironically this compounds the rental crisis and further exacerbates the exodus of young people and those employed in the CCI sector.…”

“…High levels of personal debt accrual over these years (aided by the banks who were supplying 100% mortgages all through the “good times,” coupled with a retrenchment of social housing instigated in the 1980s) persists for many over a decade later. The post-crash entry of vulture funds and bottlenecking of rental properties in major cities in the intervening years (Negra and McIntyre 2020, 64) has led to a contemporary housing crisis whose spatial dynamics have seen the expulsion of many local inhabitants from the central areas of major Irish cities to make way for the internationally mobile, skilled workforce attracted by the resurgent tech and financial industries (Mullally 2019).…”

“…The increased visibility of homelessness, particularly in major cities such as Dublin that are often celebrated as booming “tech hubs” due to the unprecedented relocation of major multinational corporations such as Google and Facebook, underlines the increasing divide between rich and poor. This divide draws comparisons with US cities such as San Francisco (Negra and McIntyre 2020), and widespread public soul-searching within Ireland in the wake of the great recession (Mullally 2019).…”

Introduction to the Special Issue: Contemporary Irish Television

“…A €67.5 billion “bailout” of Irish banks (Mercille and Murphy 2015, 50) was followed by severe austerity measures. Negra and McIntyre (2020, 2) encapsulate the current socio-political landscape as “governmental facilitation of tax avoidance by multinational corporations, the hollowing out of public services, the return of youth economic emigration, intensified elite/underclass divisions and a burgeoning housing crisis.” Successive governments’ reluctance to address RTÉ’s financial difficulties typifies this “hollowing out.”…”