Fraser, Alistair, Murphy, Enda and Kelly, Sinead (2013) Deepening neoliberalism via austerity and ‘reform’: The case of Ireland. Human Geography, 6. pp. 38-53.
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Abstract
The current economic crisis – the ‘great recession’ – raises numerous questions about neoliberal
ideas and practice, not the least of which is whether (and if so, how) neoliberalism can survive it.
Our paper takes on these issues using the case of Ireland. This is the first proper neoliberal crisis
in Ireland. From the early 1990s to 2008, Ireland was held up by many neoliberal champions as a
place that gained from deregulation, openness to inward investment, and low corporation tax
rates. But the build-up of contradictions in Ireland exploded rapidly in 2008, when its property
bubble burst and private banks and government finances collapsed. Rather than examining what
caused Ireland’s crisis, we look at what has happened between 2008 and 2013. We focus on
structural adjustments regarding the property, finance, and labour markets and then on the
government’s austerity programme as a whole. In addition to demonstrating how these
adjustments have been an attack on workers and ordinary citizens, we identify some particularly
striking elements, which we use to argue that a new phase of disturbance and restructuring is
deepening and extending neoliberalism’s influence in Ireland.
Item Type: | Article |
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Keywords: | neoliberalism; Ireland; structural adjustment; austerity; Europe; |
Academic Unit: | Faculty of Social Sciences > Geography |
Item ID: | 4398 |
Depositing User: | Sinead Kelly |
Date Deposited: | 13 Jun 2013 08:59 |
Journal or Publication Title: | Human Geography |
Publisher: | Institute for Human Geography Inc. |
Refereed: | Yes |
Related URLs: | |
URI: | https://mu.eprints-hosting.org/id/eprint/4398 |
Use Licence: | This item is available under a Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial Share Alike Licence (CC BY-NC-SA). Details of this licence are available here |
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