New Lamps for Old

national | consumer issues | opinion/analysis Saturday July 14, 2007 15:04 by Sean Crudden - impero sean.crudden at iol dot ie Jenkinstown, Dundalk, Co Louth. 087 9739945

Where Have They Come From? Where Are They Now? Where Are They Going To?

The dilemma for The Progressive Democrats now is whether to try to ride out the storm with the old crew or to change course under a new leadership?

Sean Crudden

The stereotype of the messianic leader is out of fashion. Michael McDowell bit the dust at the last election and, basically, Gerry Adams got nowhere. Perhaps Sinn Féin and The Progressive Democrats shared the same "directorial" approach combined with a lack of organic, spontaneous democracy within their own parties. Self-confident leaderships were too ready, perhaps, to be didactic and prescriptive towards the public which would prefer, as anyone would, to have a little wriggle room and be allowed to think for itself, to some extent at least.

Keeping a political party in swing is like playing the hula-hoop. If there is not enough energy being generated and enough resonance the hoop will soon fall down around your ankles. Politics is like the hula-hoop in another sense too - some can do it and some can’t.

Bertie Ahern seems to have farmed the political scene in Ireland more successfully than any other leader and he seems to have brought the organisation of a political party to the heights of greater fulfillment. He has maintained a listening ear and excelled in the "now you see it, now you don’t" school of magic in promulgating national policy as he plays ducks and drakes with a disapproving media who seem always to be in peevish mood - perhaps because they feel themselves left out of the loop and perhaps have not the acumen or intelligence to read the auguries for themselves.

Michael McDowell definitely seemed to be a source of energy rather than a sink. However it is in the area of resonance that the problem arises. My experience within The Progressive Democrats was that there seemed to be a rank of anointed people whose voices were listened to while others (who didn’t smell right?) were ignored. In fact it seemed to me as if that was the modus operandi of the old guard in the party.

So I think, as an avuncular outsider, the only way out for the party now is new, young leadership, a smaller scale of operation, and take a leaf out of Bertie Ahern’s book.