The LA Times article Judah cites in his previous post frames opposition to the Lisbon Treaty inIreland and elsewhere as largely a matter of a backlash against globalization.I obviously haven’t done any polling, but at first glance this smells to me like the spin of EU constitution proponents, and seems to seriously underestimate the role some of theconstitution’s more undemocratic provisions play in opposition to thedocument. And the process by which Europe’s political elites have tried toget around the inconvenient fact that voters often tend to reject giving away their political prerogatives to the Brussels bureaucracy only reinforcesthe often justified perception that the whole project will reduce thepolitical liberty of Europe’s citizens while enhancing the power ofunelected technocrats.
And I’m not even sure I see the logicwhereby a vote for the constitution necessarily equals a vote for theeconomic benefits of globalization. Globalization, after all, has muchto do with economic liberty, and economic liberty cannot in the end becompletely separated from political liberty. Does anyone seriouslyimagine, for example, that if Ireland votes “yes” that it’s 12 percentcorporate tax rate won’t sooner or later come under assault by Brussels?
I’m about as pro-globalization as they come, and if I were an Irish citizen I would have serious reservations about voting “yes.” Is it unreasonable to suspect there are many in Ireland like me?