Fintan O'Toole: Fianna Fáil created a middle class but has little to say to a generation unable to join it
Summarized and contextualized by DistantNews.
TLDR
- Fianna Fáil, a dominant Irish party founded a century ago, attempted to create a peasantry and an industrial working class but largely failed to retain younger generations.
- The party's founding aim of land distribution for smallholders was hindered by large family sizes and religious values against contraception.
- Subsequent industrialization efforts, including opening Ireland to foreign investment in 1958, created a working class but not at a pace to absorb those leaving farms, leading to emigration.
Fianna Fáil, a party that has shaped modern Ireland for a century, faces a critical juncture. Its historical efforts to anchor Irish families to the land and later to build an industrial base have inadvertently created a generation now struggling to find its footing.
A quick way to understand modern Ireland would be to say that its dominant party, Fianna Fáil, founded a century ago, tried and failed to create two new social classes.
The party's initial vision, rooted in Jeffersonian ideals of land ownership, faltered against demographic realities and religious conservatism. The aspiration to create a nation of independent small farmers was undermined by the imperative for large families, a reality incompatible with the limited land available for subdivision.
One of the party’s founding aims was “the distribution of the land of Ireland so as to get the greatest number possible of Irish families rooted in the soil of Ireland”.
While Fianna Fáil did foster an industrial working class through protectionist policies and later by embracing foreign investment, this progress was outpaced by the exodus of young people seeking opportunities abroad. The very success of these policies, particularly the opening to international markets in 1958, created a dynamic economy but also a class of people who, despite Ireland's wealth, find themselves unable to participate in the prosperity their parents and grandparents enjoyed.
Smallholdings and very large families don’t go together.
This analysis, as presented in The Irish Times, highlights a profound disconnect. The party that once defined social mobility in Ireland now grapples with a generation that feels excluded from the very success it helped build. The challenge for Fianna Fáil is to articulate a vision that speaks to this new reality, one where the traditional paths to security and prosperity are no longer accessible.
Thus while Fianna Fáil did largely complete the job of transferring land from the old landlord class to the former tenants, the farms that resulted from this process were destined for eldest sons only.
DistantNews Editorial
Originally published by Irish Times. Summarized and contextualized by our editorial team with added local perspective. Read our editorial standards.
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