Opinion

Chris Donnelly: Grounds for optimism in what is proving to be a pivotal year

Chris Donnelly

Chris Donnelly

Chris is a political commentator with a keen eye for sport. He is principal of a Belfast primary school.

Brazil's President Jair Bolsonaro puts his hand over his heart during his inauguration, in the plenary of the Brazilian National Congress, in Brasilia, Brazil, Tuesday, Jan. 1, 2019. (AP Photo/Raimundo Pacco).
Brazil's President Jair Bolsonaro puts his hand over his heart during his inauguration, in the plenary of the Brazilian National Congress, in Brasilia, Brazil, Tuesday, Jan. 1, 2019. (AP Photo/Raimundo Pacco). Brazil's President Jair Bolsonaro puts his hand over his heart during his inauguration, in the plenary of the Brazilian National Congress, in Brasilia, Brazil, Tuesday, Jan. 1, 2019. (AP Photo/Raimundo Pacco).

2020 is not six months old and yet it already has the feel of one of those pivotal years which must await the passage of time to be fully appreciated.

At a global, national and down to our own regional level, events of immense significance have occurred which will have repercussions in many different ways for a long time to come, with unintended consequences we are yet to fully realise.

The Covid-19 crisis has been the most significant global event for a generation. Societies which elevated populist figures to the highest political offices have paid dearly for indulging the ignorant and reckless. Whilst Trump plunders and Boris blunders their respective ways through the global virus crisis, Brazil’s Bolsonaro has led the South American country past Britain in virus-related deaths.

The Brazilian president is a Trumpian figure, having dismissed social distancing and other precautions as the virus continued to spread across the continent’s largest nation. Bolsonaro even sacked his health minister after the latter criticised him for visiting a hospital before heading outside to walk and shake hands in a crowd, all the while refusing to wear a mask. Time will tell if the lost lives precipitate an electoral reaction against the right in countries previously consumed by identity politics.

Who will be first to connect with a post-pandemic vision for something better? Greta Thunberg became a worldwide phenomenon because she tapped into a desire to change how we do things to help save the world from humanity. Some of the consequences to date of the pandemic have been a global appreciation for the role played by health workers and a sharpening focus on what value we place on helping our elderly populations live out their lives with dignity. It remains to be seen if the organisation of our health care systems and improved measures to protect the old and vulnerable become pre-eminent social themes as a legacy of coronavirus.

The appalling killing of George Floyd has powered a Black Lives Matter movement which has resonated across the western world, channelling a desire to confront discrimination and the narrow-mindedness fuelling it at an institutional level. The short term focus on removing statues and challenging past narratives should give way to comprehensive critiques of racial disparities in health and incomes, requiring determined political programmes to bring dignity and parity to peoples of all races to counteract prejudice and the injustices that sustain it.

Pre-pandemic, Brexit would have been depicted as this generation’s defining political moment for the inhabitants of these islands. Tory planning for Brexit remains a contradiction in terms. The destination Boris Johnson and his cabinet have in mind for Britain is not one of our choosing yet our status as reluctant backseat passengers only further underlines the need for pro-active and determined planning on an island-wide basis to confidently forge a different path.

Who would have thought it would be members of the Green Party in the north of Ireland, as opposed to Sinn Féin, playing a critical role in deciding if an all-Ireland political organisation would potentially become the first to serve as part of a coalition government in Dublin. The Sinn Féin TD David Cullinane had this in mind when he noted last week how the rise in the party’s vote over the past five years had introduced confidence and supply, a rotating taoiseach role and the first ever Fianna Fail-Fine Gael coalition to southern politics, all desperate measures aimed at keeping republicans from the gates of power in Leinster House. If the new post-civil war coalition of the right does get up and running, Sinn Féin will be in pole position as the undisputed voice of Opposition to lead the next government in Dublin.

2019 ended with unionism being reduced to a minority at Westminster, and these developments illustrate further how the tectonic plates of Irish politics continue to shift.

Finally, to the micro level. The birth of 2020 brought the return of devolution with the evidence to date suggesting that both the DUP and Sinn Féin recognise, in their separate ways, that making our institutions work, and being seen to do so, is now central to the attainment of their ultimate constitutional objectives. The lesson from 2019’s rise of The Other is being learned. Grounds for optimism in a time when it is a scarce commodity.