Thread by @mariafarrell

To UK ppl talking about Irish vote to #repealthe8th and #brexitshambles, why UK referendums either sink without trace or create massive, unintended geopolitical self-harm: Ireland preps for years, UK turns up at the marathon starting line in novelty costume with no training 1/n

Irish ppl voted on specific change to written constitution, based on a fair idea of what the enacting legislation would be.

Brexit: open-ended question, little discussion of how it would work, no enacting legislation, no clear way to interpret result vis a vis Parliament.

Irish political system worked rigorously through the EVIDENCE and testimony; experts, affected women, etc. in disciplined + public way with a well-reported parliamentary committee to deliberate, resulting in some politicians changing their minds.

British system: did not.

Before parliamentary committee, Ireland used deliberative democracy idea from British Columbia, a #CitizensAssembly on abortion. Again, evidence, testimony, moderated discussion, leading to changed minds, 69% support which perfectly matched the Ref. outcome.

UK: the Daily Mail.

Now, Ireland still had influx of hard-right American $$ and campaigners. We still had a conservative-biased media that under-estimated support for progress and insisted on shambolic "he said/she said" debates.

Families fell out. Women abused in public.

So anyone who thinks 'oh but it was easier for the Irish referendum' is deluding themselves.

But the difference is, compared to #BrexitShambles, Ireland a) did its homework, b) has constitutional constraints and wide understanding of how referendums work and what they tell parliament to do, and c) shows when done right, MORE democracy beats hard-right populism.

Doubling down on democracy - in a hard-work, rules-based, honest way - is how we will go on defeating hard-right populism and making our societies workable and fair:

medium.com/s/how-to-cope-…