(photo by redjade - 'Tomso is an Irish Citizen in Hiding' - the irish state has recently deported his mother to nigeria - read his story here)

The recent referendum on citizenship may have changed the constitution but in many ways this is only the start of a debate on immigration in Ireland as legislation on the issue is still in the pipeline. Currently under Irish law any child born on the island is still an Irish citizen, the status of migrants on work visas is starting to be an issue for the trade union movement and the promise by Michael McDowell to 'deal with those currently here' has yet to be fulfilled. A number of campaigning groups have now started to look at the reality for migrants currently in Ireland.

Residents against Racism, a group which has been in existence for 5 years, launched its campaign last week to seek residency and work rights for the non-national parents of Irish children. These were the people affected by the February 2003 Supreme Court judgement which removed their residency rights. These are the people that were much discussed during the recent referendum campaign. Given that the CSO fgures showed 85,000 people immigrating to ireland last year alone, the 11,000 or so people affected by this change are a small number. Mark Grehan from Residents against Racism questions even this number making the point that deportations and outward migration have already reduced the number. Included in those deportations were at least 19 Irish citizens who were deported along with their parents.

The RAR campaign is a coalition of groups including immigrant and refugee support groups and has begun seeking support from Irish political parties and trade unions. To this end a letter will be sent to all TD's in the next week and a protest is planned for the 29th of September - the day the Dail returns from the summer recess. According to Mr Grehan the change can be made by ministerial order and will result in these people being granted residency and work rights.

Next Saturday will see another group - variously billed as the African Social Forum or Amnesty for All - holding their launch in Liberty Hall. According to Joe Carolan from the group, they want Minister McDowell to live up to his commitment given on June 14th to deal with all the people currently resident in Ireland. Mr Carolan points to the example of Portugal which granted an amnesty in 1992 to non-EU citizens who were resident for 6 months or more in the country. He also stresses the importance of the right to study mentioning the case of Celine Codorean who achieved 450 points in the Irish Leaving Certificate and who was accepted into Trinity College but who now has a deportation order against her.

What both campaigns agree on is the fallacy of the notion that immigrants will have a negative impact on existing Irish workers. In this they are backed up by international research such as that conducted across Europe by the European Commission and published in July 2001 with the title 'Labour Demand, Education and the Dynamics of Social Exclusion'. In one of its conclusions this study (which covered Ireland as well as the rest of the EU) found “.. that there were no negative labour market effects of immigration on natives and hence confirm the results obtained in other countries such as the US or Canada.”

The Social Forum movement will be in the news this Autumn: The second Irish Social Forum is planned for Dublin and Ken Livingstone and the GLC are about to invest at least ST£400,000 and a lot of time and effort supporting the European Social Forum the week after in London. Predictably neither event has avoided a generous helping of controversy on the side

On 15th - 17th October this year the European Social Forum will take place in London and between the Alexandar Palace and spaces booked in Camden and Bloomsbury up to 50,000 attendees can be catered for. There are plans underway to organise an Irish Social Forum the weekend before that, with a social evening, a thematic conference and a closing plenary switching between city centre locations and UCD. This will be the second ISF while the event in London, involving the Lord Mayor , the trade unions and the people behind the Stop the War campaign will be the third European Social Forum..

The Social Forums are difficult to pin down politically and in many ways that is their strength. Consistent with the Porto Allegre World Social Forum principles, the social forum doesn't make decisions or issue calls – this is left to the Assembly of Social Movements which have started to take place directly after the forum proper. The social movements in Florence two years ago called for the anti-war demonstrations on Feb 15th last year and in some ways could claim to be a voice for that 2nd superpower, civil society, that was spoken of at the time. By consciously challenging existing political forms and refusing to be a “locus of power” the Social Forum model has developed to provide a conference for the movement of movements.

I met the group of people who are organising the Irish Social Forum in Dublin a few weeks ago to discuss the upcoming event. The summer holidays deplete the numbers but the group has been meeting fairly consistently over the last year – forming a network that is now quite sizeable and can call on a certain infrastructural ability that you would normally associate with a much larger organisation. The range of participants was, as usual, impressive. Of course with a range like this there are going to be tensions and differences of emphasis – again, paradoxically part of the strength of the social forum.

UK Indymedia ESF Page
The Irish Social Forum Invite Individuals and Groups to get Involved
Wombles Critique of the ESF Process
Most Recent UK IMC Feature on the ESF
Open ESF Site
Official ESF Site
All the Backstage ESF Drama from the Weekly Worker