Social Justice Matters

59. SJI Interview Series Ep30: Declan Markey on access to Higher Education

Declan Markey is Regional Community Connector with College Connect, a Higher Education Authority funded three year PATH 3 ( Programme for Access to Higher Education ) project which aims to admit 400 students from specific target groups who are under-represented in college. 

In today's episode, Susanne Rogers, Research and Policy Analyst speaks with Declan about the programme.

58. SJI Interview Series Ep29: Dr. Joe Whelan on Welfare Stigma, COVID response and the need for a paradigm shift

In this episode, Colette Bennett is joined by Dr. Joe Whelan of UCC to discuss his latest publication on the subject of welfare stigmatisation, self-identity and the need for a paradigm shift to eliminate reliance on charity to for basic services.

 

57. SJI Seminars Ep17: A New Social Dialogue - Panel Speakers

Social dialogue and social partnership, in various forms, are common across Europe’s most successful economies and can play an important role in creating a fair and sustainable economic recovery here in Ireland.

At a national level a new structure for Social Dialogue is required where issues may be discussed in a deliberative manner. Any proposal for Social Dialogue should involve Government, trade unions and employers, the community and voluntary sector, as well as farmers and environmental groups. Any structure for Social Dialogue that excludes any of these groups would be a recipe for ensuring that
most of Ireland’s resources would be captured by those participating in the discussion. Such an approach would simply lead to deepening divisions and growing inequality in Ireland.

In this episode, we look back to our Annual Social Policy Conference 2020 and hear from our panel on the need for a new Social Dialogue. Speakers include Danny McCoy of IBEC, Patricia King of ICTU, Damian McDonald of the IFA, Karen Ciesielski of the IEN and Seán Healy of Social Justice Ireland.

56. SJI Seminars Ep16: Colette Bennett on a New Social Contract for Ireland

Covid-19 has highlighted things that are profoundly amiss with our Social Contract.  Once the pandemic has been addressed successfully it is crucial that we face up to the radical reforms that are required if we are to deliver a new social contract based on the principles of justice and fairness, with sustainability at its core. 

In this episode, we take a look back to our Annual Social Policy Conference 2020 where Colette Bennett of Social Justice Ireland proposes a series of policy recommendations to build such a new Social Contract.

55. SJI Interview Series Ep28: Visions for Community Wellbeing - Public Participation Networks

There has been a recent political shift towards wellbeing, with talk of a Wellbeing Budget for 2021 and the publication of a discussion document on Wellbeing Indicators with that Budget. This is a good thing, but how those Wellbeing Indicators are developed, and who is consulted, will be key to their success.

In 2018, the Public Participation Networks (PPNs) embarked on a large consultative project to develop Visions for Community Wellbeing across all Local Authority areas. This process saw community groups come together to develop a vision for their community for this and future generations.

In this episode of Social Justice Matters, Colette Bennett speaks to Siobhán Cronogue of Longford PPN, Helen Howes of County Wicklow PPN and Dr. Harriet Emerson, independent consultant, about the process of developing these Visions; their policy impact, and the potential for this process to inform the national Wellbeing Indicators.

54. SJI Seminars Ep15: Joe Larragy - Social dialogue and social contract in a world at fever pitch: what are the chances?

Dr Joe Larragy, author of Asymmetric Engagement: the Community and Voluntary Pillar in Irish Social Partnership, 2014, is Lecturer in Social Policy since 2001. He studied Economics and Sociology in TCD, and graduated with a BA (mod) there before gaining an MA in Social Theory from UCC. He previously was Social Policy Analyst at the National Economic and Social Council and prior to that Research Officer at the National Council on Ageing and Older People. While working at Maynooth, he was awarded a PhD in Social Policy from UCD. His research interests include Ageing, state-civil society relationships. He has worked with several organisations in the statutory and NGO sector. In 2012  was founding chair of Maynooth Green Campus, which engages in education and action to promote climate justice and sustainable practices. He is a member of the Pensions Policy Research Group, COST Action on Reducing Old-Age Social Exclusion: Collaborations in Research and Policy (ROSENet). He represents Maynooth University as a member of the NUI senate. 

 

In this paper, presented at the Social Justice Ireland Annual Social Policy Conference, Joe considers the role for a New Social Contract in today's society.

53. SJI Seminar Series Ep14: Philippe Pochet - Four ways out for the post-COVID-19 period

Philippe Pochet is General Director of the European Trade Union Institute (ETUI), Professor at the Université Catholique de Louvain (UCL) and associated researcher at the Interuniversity Research Centre on Globalization and Work (CRIMT, Montreal). Prior to becoming Director of the ETUI in 2008, he was Director of the Observatoire social européen (OSE) for 16 years.

He is interested at and has published extensively books and articles on European social and economic policies, European social dialogue and new forms of governance. 

He is now working on the issues of impact of climate change and digitalisation on jobs and seeking how to combine the analysis of the big trends. Previously he had other temporary positions, such as invited Professor at the College of Bruges and invited scholar at the Faculté Universitaire Saint-Louis (FUSL), adjunct professor and visiting scholar at Griffith University (Brisbane). He was also visiting scholar at Berkeley University, at Montréal University, at the Max-Planck-Institut für Gesellschaftsforschung (Cologne), and at the Centre for European Studies, Harvard University, Cambridge (USA). In 2005, he was awarded an EU Fulbright-in-Residence grant at the University of Wisconsin-Madison (USA).

 

In his paper, presented at the Social Justice Ireland Annual Policy Conference on the 18th November 2020, Philippe discussed the fact that, at the European level, what the pandemic has cast doubt on is the very fundamentals of European integration. The main features of the European Union, what could be described as its “pillars”, are these: the single market and freedom of movement, the euro and the Stability and Growth Pact, and competition and state-aid law. We can already look ahead and see that the post-crisis EU could be standing on very different foundations if the questioning of the three basic pillars continues over time or, conversely, it could just as easily go back to its old ways.  What will the world environment in which this happens be, though? Here, Philippe provides four possible scenarios emerging.

52. SJI Seminar Ep13: Ann Pettifor, Ireland and Europe: the urgent need for a social, economic and ecologically just transformation.

Ann Pettifor is best known for her prediction of the Great Financial Crisis in The Coming First World Debt Crisis (Palgrave 2006).  In 2008 she co-authored The Green New Deal published by New Economics Foundation. In 2017 Verso published The Production of Money on the nature of money, debt and the finance sector. She is the author of The Case for The Green New Deal (Verso, 2019).

In her paper for the Social Justice Ireland Annual Social Policy Conference, Ann speaks of the urgent need for ambitious, cohesive and transformative economic policies and for Europe’s need to face challenges collectively, and in solidarity. But Europe must do more. The upcoming challenges are daunting: not just the ecological and economic failure brought on by the coronavirus pandemic and the risk of a debt-deflationary downward economic spiral,  but also the economic divergences that have led to the rise of anti-Europe sentiment, nationalism and populism; and the grave, even terrifying ecological risks that transcend borders.  

51. SJI Interviews Series Ep27: Jerome Marston, Global Coalition to Protect Education from Attack

International Children's Day is November 20th. To mark this occasion, Colette Bennett chats with Jerome Marston, Researcher with the Global Coalition to Protect Education from Attack about their 2020 report - Education Under Attack 2020 and why this issue is so important, particularly to children growing up in areas of armed conflict.

50.SJI Ten Minute Lessons Ep11: Deliberative Democracy and the Development of the Public Participation Networks

Deliberative democracy goes beyond mere representation to give a voice to all citizens in the decision-making process. The development of the Public Participation Networks (PPNs) in 2014 provided a mechanism for community groups to have their say in local government decision-making. With over 15,000 member organisations, PPNs are going from strength to strength. In this Ten Minute Lesson, we take a quick look at the pathway to the development of the PPNs.

In other news, we are delighted that Social Justice Matters has been recognised by FeedSpot as one of the 20 social justice podcasts you should follow in 2020. Check out the list here: https://blog.feedspot.com/social_justice_podcasts/