Guaranteeing failure: neoliberal discourse in the Irish economic crisis

We examine how the discourse in three radio interviews, between 2008 and 2010, with the then Irish Minister for Finance, constructed state support, including a banking guarantee, to private sector banks in Ireland. These interviews provide insights into the kind of neoliberal discourse that was prevalent in Ireland during what is referred to as the Celtic Tiger period. Neoliberal discourse is a free market ideology, yet it is precisely the workings of the market mechanism that the state prevented from operating by intervening on the banks' behalf. Analysis of the interviews thus provides a stark example of neoliberal discourse under strain, but persistent, within the context of a financial crisis that threatened the Irish economy. The analysis specifically focuses on the work done by the Minister, in these interviews, in maintaining a separation between the concerns of the market and the state.