Brian Lenihan has been ranked last for his performance over the past 12 months in an assessment of European finance ministers.
French finance minister Christine Legarde came out first of the 19 ministers ranked by the Financial Timesin terms of their political skills and the performance of their economies.
Judges described Ms Lagarde as "a star among world financial policy-makers" and said no other finance minister had came through such a testing year in such good form.
Eirk Nielsen of Goldman Sachs praised Mr Lenihan for the bold measures he had taken to address the country's economic and banking crisis. However, other judges were highly critical of what the FTreferred to as "Ireland's go-it alone approach" in the immediate aftermath of the Lehman Brothers collapse which saw the Government introduce a bank guarantee.
Jacques Delpla, a member of the Conseil d’Analyse Economique in Paris, said Mr Lenihan and his British counterpart Alistair Darling both had deficits which were so large that their countries’ long-term fiscal credibility is at stake unless they commit to reversing their fiscal policy as early as possible.
Under the heading 'Desperate in Dublin', the newspaper says Mr Lenihan's "drive to bring the economy back from the brink of catastrophe is an almighty test".
Earlier this year Mr Lenihan met with the editorial board of the Financial Timesas part of a visit to European capitals as part of an effort to restore Ireland's reputation among foreign investors. The meeting came after the newspaper had been highly critical of the Government's economic policies.
Some of the European's smallest countries were left out of the FT'srankings, leaving a total of 19 ministers to be judged.
Mr Lenihan was ranked 19th in the overall ratings and also came last in the individual economic category. However, he came in at 14th place in the political category and in 16th in the credibility poll. He came second last in the 2008 rankings.
Germany's finance minister until the recent election, Peer Steinbruck, was voted second, with Belgium's Didier Reynders in third. Anders Borg of Sweden came fourth, followed by Giulio Tremonti of Italy.
Britain's Alistair Darling came seventh.
The judging panel members were: Marco Annunziata chief economist, UniCredit; Robert Bergqvist, chief economist, SEB; Jacques Delpla, member of the Conseil d’Analyse Economique, Paris; Michael Heise, chief economist, Allianz; Gilles Moec, European economist, Deutsche Bank; Erik Nielsen, chief European economist Goldman Sachs; and Peter Vanden Houte, chief eurozone economist at ING.
