Rank the parties w/ national legislative representation: Ireland

[Wake Me Up When The Hard Border Ends]

1. Fianna Fáil
2. Fine Gael
3. Labour
4. Sinn Féin
5. Socialist
6. People Before Profit Alliance
7. Workers and Unemployed Action Group

Those last three could be in any order though, not fond of any of those parties.

[Wake Me Up When The Hard Border Ends]

Can someone explain what kind of parties these are? (Summarize their ideology in 3-5 words?)

Fine Gael: Pro-EU Christian democratic party.
Labour: Social democratic centre-left party.
NOTE: FG and Labour tend to form governments, such as the current Irish government, when they have enough seats between them.
Fianna Fáil: Conservative populist party, formed from a split in Sinn Féin back in the 1920s.
Sinn Féin: Left-wing nationalist party, who would like to see the whole of Ireland united under the Republic.
People Before Profit Alliance, Socialist, Workers and Unemployed Action Group: Hard-left.

This is from what I know about Irish politics.

[Wake Me Up When The Hard Border Ends]

Can someone explain what kind of parties these are? (Summarize their ideology in 3-5 words?)

The above explanation is not bad, but for a real understanding you will need some context.

As is tradition when Fianna Fáil is ejected from office in disgrace, the government consists of -

THE NOT FIANNA FÁIL PARTY

NB: These are technically two different parties with dramatically different support bases but in practice they've historically ended up being something of a package deal. It actually makes a little sense to think of the two as tendencies of the great Not FF Party.

Fine Gael: A truly weird party, Fine Gael occasionally seems to be developing something like a coherent ideology only to have some random array of backbenchers confuse the issue by coming out in favour of mandatory euthanasia or banning condoms. Arguably described in the broadest possible terms as "center-right", Fine Gael have historically prided themselves on masturbating about how they are the "party of law and order", based on their ancestor party's role in ending the Civil War during the first government of the Free State.

While one would think this would place FG firmly on the right, it was Fine Gael Taoisigh (Prime Ministers) who crusaded for such shocking ideas as divorce - both under Garrett Fitzgerald in the 80s and successfully under John Burton in the 90s. Party leader (and Taoiseach) Enda Kenny recently stated that he'd campaign for gay marriage, which is faintly remarkable given he's a politician in his mid 60s from rural Mayo, which is roughly comparable to a career party hack from backwoods Kentucky hopping aboard the liberal cause célèbre.

It's ultimately fairly difficult to pin down FG's "ideology" beyond "center-right"-ish since they're always in coalition with the other half of the Not FF Party -

Labour: The third wheel of Irish politics, Labour was told by De Valera to "wait", and did so, and has been a half party ever since, although the second biggest in the Dáil after a record performance in the general election, something largely credited to popular party leader Eamon Gilmore's strong attacks on the dying FF government. Three years later, in classic Irish fashion, Gilmore has resigned, as one of the least popular figures in the country, as Labour's been perceived to roll over for FG and implement fairly severe austerity policies. There's some speculation that new leader Joan Burton can ease the brunt of austerity somewhat - coupled with a gently improving economy - but it's unlikely the party can recover the ground lost to SF.

Because of the all-too-obvious Lib Dems in the UK comparison, Labour are nominally easy to categorise, but in practice most would disagree. They're "social democrats" like every other bland center-left party in Europe, but in practice they're not much more than the liberal wing of Fine Gael. I still vote for them, mind, because the alternatives are...


DE NATURAL PARTY OF GUVERNMENT

Fianna Fáil: They believe in nothing but that is not an issue - they are For The Common People of Ireland. A nominal "republican" party, Fianna Fáil were the largest party in the Dáil for virtually the entire history of the state until they were almost wiped out in 2011. Largely discredited thanks to their established policy of bankrupting the country on a regular basis and everyone slowly realising that corruption on a grand scale was not necessarily something to be dismissed with a shrug, they are currently a rump opposition party with an ineffectual moron as a leader. Their "dramatic recovery" in the past year has consisted of basically performing the same as they did in the 2009 local elections, which at the time was considered a disaster of historic proportions.

Fianna Fáil can be best understood not in terms of "ideology' but as one of the traditional pillars of Irish society that has crumbled in recent years - the other being the Church. Flann O'Brien once suggested replacing the art on postal stamps with traditional scences from Irish life, such as a Fianna Fáil bigwig fixing a job for a relative.

CRIMINALS, TROTS AND OTHER WEIRDOS

Sinn Féin: Half-baked "socialism" and a committed "No to everything" platform has allowed Sinn Féin to go from strength to strength since 2011, with unpopular austerity policies taking their toll on the government and Fianna Fáil mired in being Fianna Fáil, but they are still weighed down a little by their previous policy of shooting their opponents and burying their bodies in unmarked graves. Most polling shows Sinn Féin as one of - or the - most popular party in the country, but it's virtually impossible that they end up leading a government, unless you're Gully and prone to Doom Paul-ing about such things. It is an unfortunate reality that we could end up with a FF/SF "nightmare  coalition", though.

Sinn Féin's ideology involves "republicanism", which means in practice little more than a tedious overuse of the Irish language for no reason and lots of lip service to concepts that generational FF voters in the middle of nowhere will find appealing. It also involves "socialism", which in this instance mostly revolves around saying things like "VOTE FOR REFORM - VOTE NO".

People Before Profit Alliance, Socialist, Workers and Unemployed Action Group: Trots and other hacks of various shades, almost all of whom are long overdue a metaphorical meeting with an ice axe. Part of a hilarious parliamentary technical group.

Thanks for the thorough explanations of the Irish parties Oakvale, interesting read and insight. Noticed that unlike a lot of European nations, there's no fascist party (think the likes of the BNP, Jobbik or the FN), or even an anti-EU right-wing party (think the likes of UKIP and the AfD).

How come neither of those styles of party have developed/flourished in Ireland? Although if you ask me, in the case of the former grouping (the fascists), it's good to see that movement hasn't really taken off in Ireland, especially given the rise of such parties in other European countries.