Why the Irish vote really matters

This article about the Lisbon Treaty was written for a South African audience and appears on the Mail & Guardian’s Thought Leader website.

Why the Irish vote really matters

On October 2nd the Irish electorate will be pressed into voting again on a treaty that they rejected as long ago as last year. There have been no changes to the Lisbon Treaty itself as, indeed, there was little to distinguish it from the Treaty Establishing A Constitution For Europe that Dutch and French voters rejected in 2005.

It should also be noted that there have been, save for the Supreme Court’s 1987 requirement of the Irish Republic, no other referenda in Europe to obtain the consent of 375 million otherwise eligible voters. If one similarly factors in the dismal percentage turning out to elect the current European parliament then before one begins to debate the details of the new social contract – and there are some few hundred pages of such - one has to acknowledge both the democratic deficit and the moral hazard.
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