Populismo bucolico-cattolico

Questo discorso esclusionista, strumentale alla costruzione di un’identità particolare, omogenea ed isolata, è fondamentalmente legato alla giustificazione della strategia politica del Fianna Fáil De Valeriano, che si allarga fino ad accettare l’assunto dell’arretratezza rispetto alle società industriali. Così recita Eamon De Valera in uno dei suoi più famosi discorsi alla nazione degli anni 40:

The Ireland which we have dreamed would be the home of a people who valued material wealth only as a basis for right living, of a people who were satisfied with frugal comfort and devoted their leisure to things of the spirit; a land whose countryside would be bright with cosy homesteads, would be joyous with the sounds of industry and with the romping of sturdy children, the contests of athletic youth, the laughter of comely maidens; whose firesides would be forums for the wisdom of serene old age. It would in a word be the home of a people living the life that God desires men should live.

Da: E. De Valera, 1943, cit. in R.B. Finnegan, Doors opening and Closing: Economy, Education and the Irish Language, in R.B. Finnegan, E.T. McCarron, Ireland: Historical Echoes, Contemporary Politics, Oxford, Westview, 2000, 91.