Pubs heave, parades march and for one day revellers raise a glass to Ireland and its patron saint
EVERY March, for about a week, Dublin’s corridors of power empty out. Government ministers and officials pack their bags as part of an annual soft-power push like no other. They head abroad on promotional trips linked to St Patrick’s Day, the Irish national holiday that falls on March 17th. This year, 35 countries will play host to high-ranking Irish officials, but many more will stage their own celebrations of Irishness.
Emigration has been at the heart of it. During and after the famines that afflicted Ireland in the 19th century, some 2m people left the island, the majority settling in America and Britain. By the 1850s, the Irish accounted for up to a quarter of the population of cities like Liverpool and Boston. Within these communities, an Irish identity emerged based on a strong Catholic faith and the political cause of the day: independence from Britain.
In Dublin, the national festival can bring in as much as €70m , according to one estimate. And now there is the Global Greening, in which landmarks from the Great Wall of China to the Eiffel Tower in Paris are bathed in green light. Celebrations have even been held on the International Space Station. Business deals are struck on trade missions and dignitaries take the opportunity to be snapped having the craic with pints of Guinness in their hands. .
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