Leo lifted as people rally round the flag

International crises are often good news for governments struggling in the polls, writes Kevin Cunningham

FINE Gael has benefited from an enormous coronabounce that has the potential to reshape Irish politics. The party is 15pc higher than it was at the time of the General Election and 20pc ahead of Fianna Fail. It is a dynamic that influences who has the power to walk away from Government. To understand how this has happened and how long this might last, we should understand what John Mueller in 1970 called the “rally-round-the-flag” effect.

This phenomenon is when a government benefits from an extraordinary poll increase in response to a major international crisis. One of the biggest on record was Margaret Thatcher’s surge following the invasion of the Falklands in 1982 — features of which are strikingly similar to Irish politics today.

Some studies suggest that when threatened, citizens look towards their political leaders and authorities to protect them. Leo Varadkar’s “We will prevail” speech on March 12 served such a purpose. It is said that the rally occurs “regardless of the wisdom of policies pursued” and that “simply by being the leader through what is perceived to be a great crisis increases support”. Indeed, in early March approval ratings for Donald Trump reached his own all-time high. At the same time approval ratings of the leaders of France, Sweden, Italy, Germany, Australia, Canada, and the UK all improved dramatically, despite wildly different approaches to what was unfolding.

Approval ratings, of course, mean little if they don’t translate to whom voters would prefer to run their country. One can empathise with a leader while also remaining loyal to a party. Since March, 18, governments have seen an extraordinary increase in support. The biggest have been in countries with deaths of between 1,000-10,000 (Germany, Ireland, Canada, Netherlands and Sweden) where the threat is significant enough to warrant the attention and support of the populace but perhaps not damaging enough for the government to be openly criticised.

What is most interesting is that Fine Gael has seen the highest increase in support of any governing party in this crisis. One explanation lies behind studies that observe the motivations of individual voters. They suggest those that are more ambivalent and less partisan are more available to rally. For example, Jimmy Carter’s gains during the Iran hostage crisis were made up almost entirely of independents. It stands to reason, therefore, that contexts in which there are more of these voters will produce a greater rally.

Returning to 1982, this was a unique time in British politics, as it was a time of extreme polarisation and the only time since the war that a political party other than Labour or the Conservatives led the polls.

On the eve of the invasion, the Liberal-SDP Alliance was the most popular party in Britain, a reflection of the relative absence of partisan loyalties at that moment in British history. Six weeks later the Tories were up 18pc, the Liberals down 10pc, to a distant third. Labour, on the far left, held on. The Liberal-SDP alliance eventually folded and never really threatened the big two again.

Irish politics is certainly going through a similar period of instability as a result of the rise of Sinn Fein. Evidence from the UCD/Ireland Thinks exit poll points to increasing polarisation between Sinn Fein voters and Fine Gael voters. The former hoovering up those on lower incomes and generally aggrieved with the state of their personal finances, the latter those on higher incomes and generally more satisfied with the state of their finances, and Fianna Fail, operating in the middle without any distinctive base. Like the Liberal-SDP Alliance Party, FF started off the year in the lead but have found themselves squeezed by polarisation that itself has been accelerated by this rally-round-the-flag event. The party similarly finds itself a distant third.

The rally-round-the-flag effect can, however, be ephemeral. The UK Conservatives’ coronabounce is already over. Jimmy Carter and George Bush Senior both benefited from significant rallies following the Iran hostage crisis and Operation Desert Storm respectively and both failed to be re-elected the year after the rally. However, studies have shown the Falklands rally and, indeed, the rally of George W Bush following 9/11 to be instrumentally significant in their re-election prospects. These rallies lasted much longer because they redefined the political environment. It is also very possible given the scale of the rally that Irish politics will, too, return to a new normal, polarised by two parties.

While Fine Gael may be an unloved party, so too were Thatcher’s Conservatives. While one should never write off Fianna Fail, the party arguably faces its most difficult challenge yet.

Kevin Cunningham is a lecturer in Politics at TU Dublin.