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Florida International University, School of International and Public Affairs Department of Politics and International Relations CPO 2002, Introduction to Comparative Politics Fall 2012 Tuesday & Thursday| 2:00PM to 3:15PM| PC 211 Tatiana Kostadinova, Professor

Ireland and Haiti: A Comparative View

By Stephane Achille Panther ID: 3790260

11/27/2012

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Ireland and Haiti: A comparative view In this paper, I will compare and contrast the Republic of Ireland with the Republic of Haiti. I decided to write about the Republic of Ireland (not to be confused with Northern Ireland that is part of the United Kingdom) because earlier this year, I had the distinct honor of travelling to Dublin, Ireland to celebrate the 1st annual Haiti week. Haiti week was a week-long celebration of all things Haiti sponsored by a charitable cause named Haven. Haven is a non-governmental organization that works strictly in Haiti and is based in Dublin, Ireland. About two years ago, Haiti sustained a devastating earthquake and since then, the world community has joined in the rebuilding efforts especially Ireland and its many charitable causes. There is a small community of Irish people in Haiti and it takes about 15-19 hours to travel between Haiti and Dublin by connecting non-stop flights from New York or Miami. Let us examine the two countries by first reviewing their geography, history, government structures and finally their political cultures. More depth will be given to the Republic of Ireland, which is the focus of this paper, but some comparison will be made with Haiti when there is commonality or when there is sharp contrast. Geography and history Both Haiti and Ireland are islands surrounded by water and both share one main island with another country. The island of Ireland is located in Western Europe and contains two jurisdictions: Northern Ireland, which is part of the United Kingdom (UK) and the Republic of Ireland, which is a sovereign state. The entire island of Ireland was a former British Colony, which consisted of 32 counties but after a civil war, the island split and only 26 counties remained part of the Irish Republic (OMalley, 2011 P3). The name Ireland is highly contested because some regards the entire island as belonging the Irish state. Many inhabitants of Northern Ireland consider themselves British and a growing majority consider themselves Irish and would like to be governed by Dublin or Belfast, which is the Capital of Northern Ireland instead of being governed from London (OMalley, 2011 P4). About 5,000 years ago, Ireland was invaded by the Celts and later the British.
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Haiti on the other hand is located in the Caribbean between North and South America and shares the island of Hispaniola with the Dominican Republic, which borders it to the west. Comparatively, Ireland is the size of West Virginia in the United States and has a population of 4.7 million according to a July 2012 census (CIA.gov). In Ireland the official language is Irish (Gaelic) but the general or spoken language is English (CIA.gov). Many roads and government structures retain their Irish names, which only 30% of the population speaks (OMalley, 2011 P9). In Haiti both French and Creole are the official languages (CIA.gov). Haiti by contrast is slightly smaller than the state of Maryland but is more densely populated with 9.8 million inhabitants. The north part of Ireland is bordered with Northern Ireland. To the south of Ireland is the Celtic Sea, to the west is the North Atlantic Ocean and to the east is the Irish Sea. The capital of Ireland is the coastal city of Dublin with about 1 million inhabitants and is located on the east side of the island. The overwhelming majority of Irish people are Christians. 87.4% of the population consider themselves to be Roman Catholics, 2.9% belong to the protestant Church of Ireland and 1.9% unspecified Christians (OMalley, 2011 P3). Ireland was among the initial group of the 12 European Union nations to adopt the Euro as their official currency (CIA.gov). Ethnically the island of Ireland is fairly uniformed racially with about 88% of the population being white Irish and 7.5% consider themselves white of other ethnicities. Only 1.1% of the population of Ireland is black and 1.3% is Asian as compared to Haiti where almost the entire population or 95% is considered black and 5% white or mulatto (CIA.gov). Some commonality exist with the fact that like Ireland, the majority of Haitians are Christians and 80% of the population of Haiti consider themselves Roman Catholics but the difference is that in Haiti 50% of the population also claim to practice Voodoo, an ancient African mystical and ritualistic religion (CIA.gov). The Republic of Ireland, which I will refer to as Ireland in this paper, became politically independent from the UK in 1922 as the Irish Free State (Collins, Cradden 2001 P1). After gaining its independence, Ireland remained part of the UK commonwealth and in 1949, Ireland withdrew completely from British Commonwealth and became a Republic (OMalley 2011 P3). Haiti became independent from France in
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1804 after a bloody revolution that defeated Napoleons powerful army (Hillman, Dagostino, 2009 P162). Both countries share the common pride of having claimed their independence from a repressive rule and overcoming colonization; Ireland by the British and Haiti by the French. Irelands history was marked by a great famine which took place in the 1800s and caused the death of 1 million from starvation. The Irish diet consisted almost exclusively of potatoes 200 years ago and successive years of no cropping of potatoes resulted into the famine and also caused 1.5 million to emigrate to the United States and Great Britain (Collins, Cradden 2001 P2). Ireland was also struck by a deadly Cholera outbreak which brought with it great devastation during the 1800s (McHugh, 1998, P25). The Irish blame the British for allowing them to starve and remember this great tragedy and the benevolent society that they are carry the burden of this history till today and vow to help others in a similar plight. Haiti is the poorest country in the western hemisphere and on January 12, 2012, most of Haitis already fragile infrastructure was destroyed in a giant magnitude earthquake, a phenomenon not seen in the region for over 200 years (CIA.gov). Ireland ranked among one of the worlds most charitable countries in the world (Irish Times). After the 2010 earthquake several Irish charitable organizations or non-governmental organizations (NGOs) joined in Haitis rebuilding efforts. Government Structures Ireland has a parliamentary system of government with a President and a Prime Minister (Adshead, Tongue 2005 P9). The Irish President is not the head of state as in the United States or France and even Haiti. The Head of government in Ireland is the Taoiseach or the Prime Minister who presides over the day-to-day decision-making process of the Parliament (OMalley, 2011 P16). The current PM of Ireland is Enda Kenny who has been in office since March 2011 and the President Michael Higgins was elected by popular vote and has been in office since October 2011 (CIA.gov). The Irish Presidents role is largely ceremonial with the main role of guarding the constitution and the citizens rights (Collins, Cradden 2001 P 74). The constitution of the free Irish state was replaced in 1937 (Collins, Cradden, 2001 P5) and this is the constitution
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that remains in force today. The current constitution is called the Bunreacht na hEireann and article 5 declared Ireland a sovereign, independent and democratic state (Collins, Cradden, 2001 P82) Irelands legislature is a bicameral parliament named Oireactas that consists of the Senate or Upper house and the Lower house of Parliament (CIA.gov). The Upper house or the Seanad Eireann has 60 indirectly elected members and has a subordinate position in the Oireachtas (OMalley 2011 P3). The Lower house of the Oireachtas or Dail Eireann varies in size from 128 seats to 166 at present and is directly elected via popular vote (Collins, Cradden, 2001 P77). The President appoints the Taoiseach (Prime Minister) on the nomination of the Dail Eirann and members of government on the advice of the Taoiseach (Ashead, Tongue 2005 P15). The President reserves to the right to dissolve the Dail due to a no-confidence vote taken against the government (Ashead, Tongue 2005 P15). All bills passed by the Oireachtas are promulgated by the President, who may refer any bill (excluding money bills) to the Supreme Court to test their constitutionality (Ashead, Tongue 2005 P16). A brief overview of Haitis government structure reveals that the country has a Semi-Presidential system of government with a President and a Prime Minister. The current PM of Haiti is Laurent Lamothe (CIA.gov). The PM oversees the day-to-day activities of the Parliament which is bicameral and consist of a Lower and Upper house. The current President of Haiti is Michel Martelly who was directly elected in 2010 for a 5-year term by a majority run-off election. The PM is appointed by the President and their system of government is similar to that of France. Political Culture Ireland is a relatively stable democracy with a stable government system that the Irish accept as legitimate. In Ireland, it is said that ones Irishness can be measure depending on your degree of antipathy to the English (OMalley, 2011 P4). The capital Dublin is a sprawling cosmopolitan country. The Irish social structure is traditional and strongly dominated by the Catholic Church which still flexes its political muscles even today (OMalley, 2011 P5). Divorce was banned in Ireland
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between 1925 until 1996 and then legalized after a bitter campaign. Ireland is considered the most religious country in Europe. Abortion is still illegal in Ireland and very few politicians have the appetite to take on the topic (OMalley, 2011 P11). Even though the Irish try to differentiate themselves from the British, Great Britains influence it still the most dominant culture in Ireland. Women in the workforce has increased from 7% in the 1970s to over 50% in recent times (OMalley, 2011, P11). If countries could have trademarks, then the Irish would be the Celtics. The Irish are ascribed the word Celtic to assert their degree of Irishness. The Celts were one of the first inhabitants of Ireland (OMalley, 2011 P16). The Irish have a strong sense of nationalism supported by their successful revolution to become a Republic. In Ireland there is no left wing secular political party and no true welfare state. There is still a system of patronage dominating the political culture where the family and the Church are deferred most social protection (OMalley, 2011 P73). The countrys economy is considered one of the strongest in Western Europe minus a recent economic set back in 2010. Ireland is going through a period unprecedented economic and cultural growth and renewal. Irelands economy is globalized, and culturally laws on divorce and sexuality have been liberalized (Kuhling, Keohane 2007, P3) Haiti is still recovering from a recent devastating earthquake and years of totalitarian regimes yielded a democratically elected government in 1991. Its Presidential government has been marred by a legacy of military coups leading to UN intervention of the MINUSTAH peacekeeping forces on the ground since 2004 (Annis, Ives 2011). The peacekeeping force MINUSTAH inadvertently contaminated the fresh water supply of Haiti with the deadly water borne pathogen: Cholera 201o sparking world wide outrage (Annis, Ives 2011). There is widespread mistrust in government and accusations of election fraud due to fact that, members of the popular party, was excluded from the second round of the majority run off Presidential election (Annis, Ives 2011). In addition, government elites from the totalitarian regimes of the past and other oppressive rules continue to play key political roles in recent administrations (Fatton, 2002, P6). Conclusion

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In conclusion, Ireland and Haiti are very different in many respects but a common past related to a deadly Cholera outbreak followed by a great famine experienced by Ireland in the 1800s have engrained in them a spirit of solidarity with others on the globe facing extreme poverty and disease. In this paper, I examined the geographical regions and gave a brief history of both countries with the hopes of finding similarities and commonalities and discovered that although at opposite ends of the globe both countries share a common humanity which links us all to one another thus reducing the planet to a neighborhood.

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Bibliography
Adshead, Maura, and Jonathan Tonge. Politics in Ireland: Convergence and Divergence on a Two-Polity Island. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009. Print. Annis, Roger and Ives, Kim. Haitis Election Debacle: A Coup Legacy : NACLA Report On The Americas, 2010. Print Collins, Neil, and Terry Cradden. Irish Politics Today. Manchester [England: Manchester University Press, 2001. Print. Fatton, Robert. Haiti's Predatory Republic: The Unending Transition Democracy. Boulder, Co: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 2002. Print. Hillman, Richard S, and Thomas J. D'Agostino. Understanding the Contemporary Caribbean. Boulder: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 2009. Print. Kuhling, Carmen, and Kieran Keohane. Cosmopolitan Ireland: Globalisation and Quality of Life. London: Pluto Press, 2007. Print. McHugh, Ned. Drogheda Before the Famine: Urban Poverty in the Shadow of Privilege, 1826-45. Dublin: Irish Academic Press, 1998. Print. O'Malley, Eoin. Contemporary Ireland. Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011. Print.

Additional References: CIA.gov: Ireland/Haiti Irish Times, Ireland Second Most Charitable Nation (Dec 21, 2011). Print

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