Madam, – Geraldine Moane of UCD (Opinion, October 15th) recently criticised an article by me in which I tried to outline a method of rebuilding the economy (Opinion, October 4th).
She claims that my characterisations of the Irish psyche are both "costly and dangerous". It is surprising that an academic would regard the free expression of views as dangerous. She then discusses "longstanding colonial stereotypes about the Irish that include lazy, impulsive, irrational and fantasy-prone". She also mentions the Taoiseach's drinking behaviour. I referred to none of these things in my article or in my recent book, Ireland's Malaise: The Troubled Personality of the Irish Economy, (The Liffey Press, October 2010), and have no idea why she gratuitously drags them in.
Nor have I the faintest idea why she considers my ideas to be “particularly worrisome” coming, as they do, from a “former chief economist at the Central Bank and former member of the board of the IMF”.
Ms Moane then argues in favour of mass mobilisation and mass resistance on the part of Irish people, as if this injunction would not have any effect on market sentiment! I am certainly not questioning her right to voice this view but, combined with her list of colonial stereotypes about the Irish and the Taoiseach’s drinking, it does seem rather more “dangerous” than my inoffensive remarks about bureaucratic inertia, our obsession with bricks and mortar, and the “diffidence and deference” shown by the financial regulator.
In my view, Irish people on the whole are brilliant in the arts, especially literature and music, and in many other areas, but rather less enthused by the more humdrum business of business.
Her main criticism is that my article blames the victim and not the elite group that brought down the economy and the financial sector.
Nothing could be further from the truth. In my article I clearly criticise the Government for misleading the people, for eroding trust and confidence, and for the “pernicious system of political appointments” which leads to cronyism and inefficiency. I am hyper-critical of our entrepreneurs, especially those in the property and banking sectors “who all had feet of clay”. In the past I have argued for greater empowerment of consumers and taxpayers, workers and NGOs. I fail to understand how Ms Moane can possibly interpret any of this as “blaming the victim”. – Yours, etc,