How the Irish Left Explains U.S. Democrats

Democrats have often looked to European political parties for examples of what to do to win (Denmark’s Social Democrats) or what not to do to avoid losing (Britain’s Labour Party under Jeremy Corbyn). The most instructive example, however, might be a place they rarely think of as fertile ground for the left: Ireland.

That examination reveals that a broad-based majority left ultimately rests on winning large shares of the working class. And even in Ireland, doing that requires an unapologetic expression of nationalism coupled with more centrist stances on immigration and gender.

It’s true that Ireland was a conservative, Catholic country for most of the 20th century. That began to change, however, in the last thirty years. Rapid economic growth helped secularize the nation, while a deep economic collapse after the 2008 financial crisis delegitimized the traditional center-right ruling parties.

Those parties, Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael, dominated Irish politics since independence in 1922. Either they or their predecessors won every election between 1922 and 2011, usually winning 70 to 80 percent combined.

The center-left Labour Party was a perennial also-ran, never breaking 20 percent of the vote after 1922. It often served a minor role in government but never came close to winning.

This conservative century came crashing down in 2011, the first election after the 2008 crash. Fianna Fáil, the party in power during the collapse and which had never won less than 39 percent of the vote since 1932, shrunk to a mere 17 percent. It remains a shadow of its former self, winning no more than 24 percent in the three elections since.

The traditional opposition parties initially gained support. Fine Gael won 36 percent, one of its highest shares ever, while Labour’s 19 percent was its second-largest percentage ever. These parties gained a combined 18 percent over the 2007 election and gained a whopping 42 seats in the 166-seat Dáil Éireann, the all-powerful lower chamber.

One could be forgiven if one overlooked the significant gains by independents and openly left-wing parties in light of this result. The leftist grouping gained 15 seats, while independents doubled their vote share and picked up nine seats to bring their total to 14. So long as the Fine Gael-Labour government presided over a robust recovery, though, it seemed that the torch of center-right Irish politics had simply changed hands.

That did not happen. Instead, the 2016 vote demonstrated a fundamental shift away from traditional parties of any type. Fine Gael, which held the Taoiseach (Prime Minister) position, dropped 11 points and 25 seats.

That was bad, but it paled in comparison to the shellacking Labour took. It lost 30 of its 37 seats, its vote share dropping by nearly two-thirds. The winners were a collection of mostly left-wing parties that had never governed and thus had no blame for the past. These parties gained 18 seats, while independents picked up an additional five.

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One could sense this change was coming if one looked at the results of an historic referendum the year before. Catholic Ireland voted overwhelmingly to legalize same-sex marriage in 2015. Not only did the proposal pass with over 62 percent—it also lost in only one constituency. Urban and rural Ireland agreed that it was time for marriage equality.

Ireland’s secular drift was confirmed in 2018 when a constitutional amendment legalizing abortion was approved. It was again an overwhelming victory, as two-thirds of voters approved the change. Again, only one rural Dáil constituency voted no.

The Irish thus appear to be moving to the left, yet the center-right continues to hold on to power. Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael patched up the often-vitriolic century-long feud and have governed in tandem since 2016. Why has the left failed to take advantage?

They have failed to win because they remain unable to fully exploit the anti-establishment feelings among those who are angriest about the state of Irish affairs. The left-wing parties, especially the leading party, Sinn Féin, remain unwilling to adapt to the views of their prospective voters.

Most Americans think of Northern Irish terrorists when they hear the name “Sinn Féin.” It’s true that the current political party once was the political wing of the terrorist Irish Republican Army, and some observers wonder if the party has ever fully evolved from its violent past.

But for the Irish, the name means something much deeper. The original Sinn Féin was the entity that fought the British during the War of Independence and which secured the country’s freedom. Sinn Féin thus possesses an inherent claim on interpreting Irish national identity that still resonates widely.

Thus, in retrospect, it is only natural that when the parties that guided Ireland since independence lost trust, it was Sinn Féin that picked up the lion’s share of the disaffected.

The party has skyrocketed in support since 2007, gaining 12 points and 35 seats. It is now the largest non-governmental party in the Dáil and the only one that can reasonably form a government in a future vote.

The story, however, is not one of an inexorable rise. As recently as June 2022, it looked as if Sinn Féin would easily win the next election and usher in a left-wing government. It was polling around 36 percent and had been consistently over 30 percent for over a year. It seemed that the question was not if Sinn Féin would govern, but with whom.

Sinn Féin’s voter base, however, was always less doctrinaire than its leadership. A March 2022 poll by Ireland’s leading pollster, Red C, found that Sinn Féin’s voters did not share many of its leftist policies. Many preferred lower taxes rather than more spending and even backed higher defense spending. The pollster concluded, “[I]t appears Sinn Féin’s support is largely from those who feel they haven’t benefitted from the establishment, who no longer trust it, and who believe the political system as it stands is broken.”

In other words, Sinn Féin was channeling the same trends that had birthed Donald Trump and other right-wing populist movements into a left-wing populist party.

This is also clear from a demographic analysis of its voters. The March 2022 Red C poll found that Sinn Féin did worst among managers and professionals and best with semi-/unskilled workers, casual workers, and the unemployed. A June 2022 Red C poll taken at Sinn Féin’s height found the party with 29 percent support among the upper half of the socio-economic strata (known as ABC1 in Irish statistical parlance) but 44 percent among the C2DE lower half.

That heavy working-class tilt is very similar to the modern Republican Party’s.

Sinn Féin started to lose support as immigration became a hot-button issue. Riots and protests about the large number of refugees and immigrants started in late 2022 and have never really gone away. Like many left-infused parties, Sinn Féin failed to unequivocally take the protestors’ side, allowing other political forces to peel away their support.

The polls again show this clearly. Sinn Féin steadily drops in Red C polls throughout 2023, while independents and two conservative minor parties, Aontu and Independent Ireland, rise. By January 2024, Sinn Féin was down to 16 percent support with ABC1s and 36 percent with C2DEs.

2024 was even worse for the party as conservative cultural attitudes resurfaced. The impetus for this was two constitutional amendments proposed by the government. One would expand the definition of family to include stable non-marital arrangements, while the other would replace references to mothers’ responsibilities for family life and care with gender-neutral language.

Most Irish observers thought the amendments would easily pass, building on the experiences with same-sex marriage and abortion. Indeed, the final Red C poll suggested both measures would pass, although not as resoundingly as the previous ones.

They were instead decisively rejected. Sixty-eight percent voted against the marriage amendment, and a massive 74 percent opposed removing references to mothers from the constitution. Only one urban Dáil constituency—Dun Laoghaire, one of the most highly educated constituencies in the country—backed the marriage amendment. None backed removing mothers from the Constitution.

This shocking rejection reverberated throughout Irish politics. The Taoiseach who had proposed them, Leo Varadkar, resigned, although the government coalition survived. But Sinn Féin’s support took the biggest hit.

That’s likely because it had only reluctantly supported the measures because they did not go far enough for the party’s tastes. A party that depended on working-class votes instead took an extreme position, likely backed by the very highly educated voters who were least likely to back them.

What happened next should have surprised no one. The February 2024 Red C poll found Sinn Féin with 28 percent overall, 24 percent with ABC1s, and 36 percent with C2DEs. By June it was down to 20 percent overall, 16 percent with ABC1s, and a mere 26 percent with C2DEs.

That’s bad enough news for Féin and the Irish left. Even worse is where these former Sinn Féin voters migrated to.

The final pre-election Red C poll had Sinn Féin exactly where it was in June, both overall and among both demographics. Other left-leaning parties received 21 percent among ABC1s in the February and final polls; lost Sinn Féin support among the well-off went to the government parties, which rose from 39 to 45 percent. Lost C2DE voters, however, went to both the government parties, which rose from 29 to 36 percent between February and late November, and to independents and right-leaning populists, which rose from 19 to 23 percent.

The shift towards right populists has only exacerbated since the election. The most recent Red C poll, from late last year, showed Sinn Féin receiving 17 percent with ABC1s and 29 percent with C2DEs. Populists now get 31 percent of the C2DE vote, surpassing Sinn Féin for the first time in years.

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Democrats looking at these data should easily see parallels to their dilemma. If they don’t take strong stances on immigration, they are simply not credible in a national election among a large segment of working-class voters when matched against a right-populist party that does.

They cannot make up those lost votes among the elites. Those voters favor the status quo, which compromises the left’s ability to engage in redistributive economics. They also prefer a light touch to social and cultural issues—progressive but not too much so. The type of cultural message that resonates with those voters—like being pro-trans but anti-trans women in girls’ sports—would strike left progressives as too timid, just as the progressive gender language in Ireland made Sinn Féin’s leftist leadership queasy.

Sinn Féin ironically followed a similar course to the group they likely despise most, the English. The British Conservative Party effectively did that after winning in 2019, winning with former Labour working-class votes but governing like classic upper-class Tories. They now face electoral oblivion because those voters found someone who they can trust, the Reform Party’s Nigel Farage. Ireland’s proportional representation system keeps Sinn Féin from following suit, but they remain as far away from genuine power as their hated enemies.

A party or a movement that seeks to gain power cannot afford to disregard their prospective voters’ opinions. Sinn Féin tried to do that and lost the winnable election. Whether Democrats follow suit in 2028 is the key question in American politics today.