ABSTRACT
Smallness of scale occupies pride of place in many discussions of populism. One of the three principal types namely: smallness of scale, the dispersion of economic activity, and the desirability of 'participative' development, of populism discussed by Canovan centres on petit capitalism and the political orientation of small proprietors who favour private property but are suspicious of big business and government. Ideological commitment to populism was one thing, the implementation of populist policies proved to be quite another. The ability of relatively larger-scale economic activity and more advantaged areas to benefit disproportionately from populist policies in Ireland has always caused the gap between the theory and the reality of populism to be wide. Ethnographic investigation suggests that many west of Ireland rural areas were in a state of chronic demoralisation by the 1960s. In the 1980s, the severity of the unemployment crisis forced the state in Ireland to take every job creation proposal seriously.
