'Global Dub' much admired internationally

WORLD VIEW:'A GLOBAL Dub." UCD president Hugh Brady so summarised Bertie Ahern's personal style and international achievements when introducing him to a packed audience at UCD to speak on the legacy of the Belfast Agreement.

Combining the local and the global, the personal and the political, Ahern always retained the common touch, he said. Those skills have been widely acknowledged in his domestic politics, but they apply equally to his dealings with the "wider world" - a phrase he has used repeatedly in the European Union, the United States and Asia. They are the three main areas he has been involved in as Taoiseach, alongside his central role in Ireland's relations with Britain, over the last 11 years.

Brady recalled seeing him perform as a global leader at another packed auditorium, in Shanghai university, during a trade mission to China. The Chinese, like other Asian states, saw the importance of Ireland's disproportionate achievements in recent years - including how the Irish diaspora has been harnessed for its economic development, as they have done with Taiwan and Chinese communities in southeast Asia and North America.

Ahern gave a charismatic performance on that occasion too. He took the initiative of launching the government's Asia strategy in 1999, having spotted the emerging importance of the region in a globalising world during a visit to Taiwan in 1995. Concentrating mainly on trade, the Asia strategy co-ordinates inter-departmental activity and has boosted Ireland's official representation, preparedness for and awareness of this huge shift in world affairs.

Ahern's central role in the Northern Ireland peace process has been recalled here this week by Bill Clinton and Tony Blair. His relationship with Clinton was warmer than with George Bush; but Ahern's distinctive pragmatism showed in his management of Ireland's relations with the US during the Bush years. Pushing the Shannon/Iraq/US troops issue too far would have jeopardised Ireland's larger economic and political relationship with the US, including privileged access to the White House on St Patrick's Day, which astonishes east Asians.

Ahern used his involvement in the EU to temper and mediate the transatlantic relationship, especially during Ireland's EU presidency in June 2004 at the EU-US summit in Dromoland. That six-month EU presidency, together with the peace process, is the centrepiece of his international reputation. It was described at the time by Jacques Chirac as "remarkable" and by Romano Prodi as "beyond compare". Ahern was given a standing ovation at the European Council in June 2004 when he announced agreement had been reached on the constitutional treaty. Academic commentary is similarly complimentary.

Ahern was shocked by the June 2001 Nice referendum defeat. In a speech welcoming Prodi (then commission president) to Dublin after it, he said: "After nearly 30 years of membership, it should be clear to everyone that the EU is not them; it is us. Its institutions are our future. Each of us has a say in every decision. We do not always get our way; there are things which we might want differently - but that is the reality of any democratic relationship." This expresses his "global Dub" ethos very well.

He went on to strengthen the central co-ordination of EU affairs, to give the Oireachtas a greater role in scrutinising them, to set up the National Forum on Europe so that political parties and the public would be more engaged, and then to organise a political campaign capable of winning the second referendum in October 2002. That was achieved thanks in large part to a much greater civic involvement, which mobilised half-a-million more Yes voters who had not turned out the previous year. This whole political effort was also channelled towards advance planning for the 2004 presidency.

Ahern's skill as a negotiator - built up as a trade union official, constituency and party organiser, Cabinet minister, practitioner of social partnership and Taoiseach in charge of the peace process - fits in very well with the EU's own methods of consensual bargaining. On another occasion he put it like this: "If I had to depend on Ireland's weighted vote to promote our interests in the council, I wouldn't bother to turn out." Influence in this system is bolstered by such skills.

Four formal priorities were set out for the presidency, including completing the enlargement from 15 to 25 member states. But confronted with the need to complete negotiations on the constitutional treaty, Ahern had to make that his main objective.

His approach was characteristically cautious and strategic, planned with Brian Cowen as foreign minister and a few key officials. Playing down the likelihood of success at his press conference at the end of the December 2003 European Council, he resolved over the Christmas break to give it a real try. Ireland had projected itself successfully as a relatively neutral mediator, despite having its own interests in the outcome.

He started with an informal listening phase, doing a round of visits to build trust, not relying on what the Italians had done. Bilateral meetings were preferred, allowing him to report to a March summit that a consensus existed to complete the treaty by June. Timely closure of issues, leaving critical ones to the last and fine-tuning them to the consensus, made the difference.

It is ironic that the timing of Ahern's departure should be dictated partly by fears that the payments controversy would affect the Lisbon Treaty referendum. Seen from the wider world, that does not matter as much as his achievements, which could still yield him another senior EU role.

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