Politcal Reform Mechanism

PhotogTom

For the sake of argument, lets suppose for a moment that the current Irish political system is "broken" and we need a complete, new system - not just reform (fewer TD's, ablolish Senate, etc).
What mechanism exists to make needed changes? And, in particular one that is not driven by the incumbent politicians?
I seem to recall an article I read about two recent examples of citizen's groups being elected to debate and propose just such a reform measure. This group would simply debate and propose. The resulting proposal would be put to the people as a referendum?
Personally, I've come to the conclusion that the wholesale reform approach has some real merits.

Denerick

Its rather straightforward if you want to create a new constitution. First of all a constituent assembly needs to be called, whose sole purpose is to create a constitution. Then that constitution gets voted on by the public. Then it becomes law.

The real question to ask is whether the fault in Irish politics lies with the system or with the citizens, who have consistently failed to exhibit any kind of political virtue and who are embarassingly ignorant of political issues in their own domain. This is why we invariably elect gombeen men to represent us, as we cannot comprehend a national picture. Better to have some cute hoor in the Dáil to bring government offices to Tralee or bypasses to Mayo.