Predictability is not always a comfort. We know at least some of what will happen in 2023, and much of it is grim. Yet that knowledge should also be a form of power. Humanity is not helpless. We have the ability to respond to events, to prepare for the worst and to do more than merely hope for the best.
Most of what is known about the coming year is daunting. The war in Ukraine will almost certainly continue beyond the first anniversary of Vladimir Putin’s savage invasion last February. Its consequences will still reverberate around the world, feeding high inflation and a cost of living crisis that makes life harder for those who are most vulnerable. The climate emergency will deepen – 2023 will almost certainly be (yet again) among the hottest years on record, with all the concomitant consequences of fires, floods and droughts.
Domestically, there is little prospect of immediate relief from a long-term shortage of affordable housing that is creating deep social and political divisions. The economy will do well to avoid recession. The dreary afterlife of the failed Brexit project will drag on, not least in the persistent conflict over the Northern Ireland Protocol.
The winter months will be immensely difficult for the people of Ukraine, subjected as they are to Russia’s criminal assaults on their energy infrastructure. They will also test the resolve of the democratic nations.
Putin will be hoping that Russia’s old ally, General Winter, will break their will and force them to put pressure on Ukraine to negotiate a bad peace that rewards aggression. Those hopes must be dashed <NO1>-<NO>– standing with Ukraine remains a matter not only of justice but of self-interest for all democracies.
Hope and determination
Yet the war cannot be allowed to drag on forever. It cannot become a mere fact of life, an open-ended stalemate in which death, misery and destruction are the background noise of life in Europe. There will be extremely difficult choices to be faced in 2023. Is the war to go on until Russia withdraws to its lawful borders, pays reparations and hands its war criminals over to international courts?
If so, its end may be a long way away. If not, how can an acceptable truce be negotiated and guaranteed? These are excruciating questions, but they cannot be avoided.
Nor can the climate emergency be allowed to become the new normal. The replacement in Brazil of Jair Bolsonaro, who encouraged the destruction of the Amazon rainforest, by Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, who has promised to protect it, will be one of the first global events of 2023. It should be a signal of hope and determination. Every year is now a crucial one. The time that remains for decisive transformation is far too short for further denial, delay or distraction.
The immensity of these challenges should put the problems of the Protocol, and of restoring devolved government in Northern Ireland, into perspective. In the grand scheme of things, these are petty matters. Dealing with them is a question of will. The British government has to stop its futile and irresponsible use of Northern Ireland as a rallying point for the lost cause of Brexit. The European Union has to be generous and flexible in making the operation of the Protocol as painless and unobtrusive as it possibly can be. Europe and the UK do not need to be fighting a phony war while a real one is raging.
A greater sense of urgency
On the domestic front, the Government has to acquire a greater sense of urgency and a sharper edge of radical thinking. Even as the economy experiences much slower growth, this remains a period of historic opportunity for Ireland. We have a rising population, a more stable political system than much of the rest of the democratic world, and unprecedented public resources. But we do not have a State geared to cope with a rapidly expanding society, a severe deficit in physical and social infrastructure, and the transition to a zero carbon economy. Business as usual is not adequate – government must galvanize itself to deliver large-scale change.
Everywhere we look in 2023, the tasks are formidable, but the possible rewards are immense. A just end to the war in Ukraine would be a decisive vindication for the idea of a law-bound international order. A serious global effort to limit climate change would give humanity the greatest sense of common purpose and mutual dependence it has ever had.
An early and amicable settlement of the Protocol problem would begin to undo some of the damage that Brexit has done to what the Belfast Agreement calls the “totality of relationships” on these islands. Clear evidence that the Government can solve the housing crisis and get a grip on the many deficits in public services would allow Ireland to face into its second century of independence with justified confidence.
These things can be accomplished. And since they can be done, they should be done now. This should be a year of urgency, of achievement and of hope.