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Interested in maladministration. Estd. 2005

offsite link RTEs Sarah McInerney ? Fianna Fail?supporter? Anthony

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offsite link School Chaplain the Church of England Is Trying to Cancel Again? Six Years After He Said Pupils Need... Sun Jul 27, 2025 15:00 | Richard Eldred
Six years after his sermon defending freedom of belief, Reverend Dr Bernard Randall remains blacklisted by the Church of England ? punished, he says, not for wrongdoing but for refusing to renounce his faith.
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offsite link Voltaire, International Newsletter N?127 Sat Apr 05, 2025 06:38 | en

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Cohesion

category louth | rights, freedoms and repression | opinion/analysis author Saturday February 25, 2006 16:17author by Sean Crudden - imperoauthor email sean.crudden at iol dot ieauthor address Jenkinstown, Dundalk, Co Louth.author phone 087 9739945 Report this post to the editors

Democracy or Dictatorship?

Are there only the two opposites which, in abstract terms, define all possible approaches to political development? Are we sleepwalking from democratic ideals into a colourless and unsvoury dictatorship?

Consideration is being given in the boardrooms of the Partnerships and Louth LEADER to local development and social inclusion programs. The keyword is “cohesion” and the impetus seems to be towards amalgamations and “integration.”

This is no surprise because in the political sphere in Ireland today the ruling idea seems to be centralisation of power. An example of this is The Health Services Executive. Some of us have experienced the aggregated way of doing things - for instance under Vocational Education Committees. In other places - in the same spirit - I have previously pointed toward what may not be dictatorial tendencies in psychiatry and education. But they are certainly, at the very least, prescriptive.

It seems to me that for true development to take place the opposite attitude is required. Decentralisation and real democracy and a sense of place are the more obvious routes to social and political development in the regions. The cornerstone of a living community is the individual and individual freedom and responsibility. The growing push towards integration and command politics and economics (which was the modus operandi of the old Soviet Union) seems to me to militate against and crush fragile but important developmental freedoms.

Related Link: http://www.iol.ie/~impero
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