Troubled Times, The national question in

Ireland by Peter Hadden

How did Ireland's national problem arise? What was the reason for partition?
Does the British ruling class really want to pull out? Must the working class
always be divided on this issue? This landmark publication looks again at Irish
history right up to the present. It refutes much of what has become the
accepted wisdom of current academics who see no way of overcoming the
sectarian division. It offers something unique - a programme on the national
question to unite, rather than divide the working class. For those seeking ways
in which the national problem can be overcome, this challenging book is a
must. First published in 1995. Published online May 2004. socialistworld.net

introduction
The national question is probably the most debated question in Irish
politics. And for good reason! Irish history, especially recent history, is
littered with the debris of organisations which have failed to
comprehend or come to terms with it.
Today the debate has shifted ground somewhat. Old notions which, outside of
strictly unionist circles, were once generally accepted - that the roots of the
problem lay in the crimes of the British ruling class, and that it was because of
their misdeeds that the partition of Ireland came about - are now increasingly
challenged.
This shift reflects no great advance in thought or understanding. Historians
today write in the shadow of twenty five years of conflict. Like most of the
stratum of intellectual 'opinion makers' very few of them are capable of seeing
beyond the parapet of their immediate historical setting. Rather they offer up
only a mental reflection of what they see around them. They tend to take the
fact of sectarian division as their starting premise. Transferring this premise
into the past they then paint their picture of history accordingly.
The result is an exaggeration of sectarianism and a profoundly pessimistic view
of both present and past. This 'new history' tends to downplay any united
movements of Catholic and Protestant, and in particular glosses over those
struggles which have united the working class over the course of the past
hundred years. Accepting the sectarian divide as a permanent feature it tends
to explain events solely as a product of this divide.
What this leads to is a whitewash of the role and responsibility of the British
ruling class down through the centuries. After all most 'opinion makers' take at
face value the present Westminster government's 'neutral' posture of "no

selfish, strategic or economic interest". If they are benign and neutral today,
why not in the past also? So, when it comes to partition, the predominant view
now being put forward and increasingly accepted is that this was the inevitable
product of the divisions between unionism and nationalism, not something
brought about or helped along by the British government.
Coming to the present, the direction of this line of thought is towards the idea
of two nations. Little or nothing that is currently flowing off the printing
presses contradicts this trend. Indeed, if fact could be established merely
through the constant repetition of an idea there would by now be two nations
in Ireland.
This new line of thought cannot just be dismissed with a sleight of hand. It
needs to be examined, answered and an alternative explanation put forward. A
socialist response which is merely a reiteration of arguments and slogans put
forward twenty five or thirty years ago will not do. Socialist ideas must be up
to date and must take into account the effects of the last twenty five troubled
years.
This is what this book sets out to do. It is an analysis, written unashamedly
from a socialist point of view, of the national question, both how it has arisen
and how it presents itself today.
Troubled times began as a document produced for, discussed at and adopted
by the July 1995 National Conference of Militant Labour in Ireland. It was
written as part of a lengthy discussion on the national question which extended
over two years.
The book is in three sections and a brief explanation of what each is about may
help non-members of Militant Labour who did not participate in this debate.
The first is an answer to the 'new history' and its tendency to set the sectarian
divide in stone. It begins in early times at the start of recorded history, takes a
glance at developments through the centuries, but, in the main, is an
explanation of the real reasons for partition.
The second section examines the way in which the national question has
changed since partition, and in particular what have been the effects of the
twenty five years of the Troubles. It deals with the question which regularly
comes up of whether or not the differences between the two communities/two
states mean that there are now two nations in Ireland.
It goes on to attempt to tackle the difficult question of a programme which
socialists could put forward on the national question. In the past, many
socialist organisations have lost their bearings entirely when it comes to this
task. Some have preferred to ignore the issue altogether in their propaganda,

others have put forward a one-sided position and have fallen into one or other
sectarian camp as a result. Here is the outline of a socialist position which
could unite, rather than divide, the working class.

Changes
In preparing this book for publication a few changes have been made to the
original text, all with the aim of making it more accessible to the general
reader. The third and final section which deals with the national question as it
arises internationally today and with the demands which socialists and
marxists, including Lenin, have advanced on the issue, was the first section in
the original.
It has been put at the end only because some of the ideas within it maybe
unfamiliar to those who have not had the opportunity to read or discuss the
views of marxists on the national question. Better first to see these views
concretely applied as they are to Ireland in the first two sections, and then to
go on to the more general theoretical points. That it has been put at the end
does not mean that it is any less important than the other sections. On the
contrary it deals with key questions such as what constitutes a nation which
are essential in helping define what exactly are the differences between
Catholic and Protestant in Ireland.
The points it makes on programme are also important especially as some of
the demands of Lenin - e.g. self determination, autonomy - have often been
applied to the Irish situation in a manner which has nothing in common with
the way in which they were raised by Lenin. This section explains what such
demands really mean and what are the circumstances in which they may be
usefully put forward.
A few other minor textual changes have been made mainly for stylistic reasons
although in general the style of the original document has been retained. This
means that references to 'we', 'us' or 'our' are to the position Militant Labour
holds or has held in the past. Rather than change all of these to the third
person and so interrupt the flow of the text it has been felt better to leave
most of them as they were in the original.

Troubled Times by Peter Hadden

section one

the creation of two states

chapter 1

early history
In the early years of the Northern Ireland Troubles a great many of the
most widely read histories were written from a nationalist, republican
or left republican perspective. That was the view of history which
tended to predominate.
Now, with the exhaustion of the IRA campaign, and the realisation by Sinn Fein
leaders that the decisive sections of the British ruling class would prefer to
withdraw but that the problem to be confronted is that of Protestant
opposition, the theoretical foundations on which this outlook has been based,
have been systematically eroded. Republicanism faces more than a military
impasse - it finds itself in an ideological cul-de-sac also.
Inevitably there has been a backlash. In recent years an alternative school of
opinion has grown up. An established group of Northern authors have chosen
to reinterpret events from a broadly pro-union viewpoint. One example is the
Cadogan Group which has brought together economists, historians and some
politicians to present an intellectual case for unionism. It has to be said that a
good number of their counterparts on the broadly nationalist side have gone
along with many of their conclusions, especially on matters of history.
Both are agreed on the historical permanency of the division between Catholic
and Protestant and are at one in their pessimistic view of the prospects for any
united movement of Catholic and Protestant workers emerging in the future.
In answering the limitations of the old, generally pro nationalist versions of
history, this new school have leaned in the opposite direction, presenting a no
less one sided account.
These people are surrounded in a deep fog of confusion about current events,
especially when it comes to the national question. Rather than unlock the past
and use it to help illuminate the present, by their efforts they only manage to
re-seal it in their own confusion.
The key to understanding history and to unravelling the complexities of the
national question is one and the same - a class analysis and class approach. To

work out a programme today it is necessary to see things not just as they are
but as they have developed historically. In the past, Militant had to rebut the
over-simplifications and distortions of pro-nationalist historians. To this must
now be added the task of answering some of the arguments of this new
revisionist school of history.

Cicchulainn
Displayed on a large UDA mural in East Belfast is the figure of Cuchulainn, a
legendary hero of the Ulster sagas, tales of Ulster from the period of Ireland's
iron age. At first sight a figure from Ireland's Celtic past is a surprising choice
for a UDA mural.
In fact this mural can be linked to one of the most extreme and potentially one
of the most reactionary of the efforts to reconstruct history. Organisations like
the UDA which have declared for independence as the solution, have searched
for some theoretical, some historical justification for this position.
They have found it in the writings of people like Dr. Ian Adamson a local
Unionist politician and sometime historian. For some considerable time - from
the start of the Troubles at least - he has produced publications examining the
history of Ireland, especially of Ulster, all designed to prove that Ulster people
have a distinct identity which sets them apart from the rest of Ireland.
For a long period no-one took much notice of this line of argument. But when
the UDA among others begin to toy seriously with the idea of an independent
Ulster, Dr. Adamson's ideas begin to receive a broader hearing in loyalist
circles.
All along Protestants were being told by nationalists that they should come to
their senses and realise that they were just as Irish as their Catholic
neighbours. They should forget about Britishness and join in a United Ireland.
Here was someone with a novel reply. Yes Protestants and Catholics in the
North have a common stock, a common identity. A common identity - with
each other that is -but a separate identity from the people of the South. So it
is Northern Catholics who should come to their senses and see that they are
one people with Protestants but different from Southerners. They should unite
with Protestants, not for a united Ireland, but for an independent Ulster. As Dr.
Adamson concludes his book, The Ulster People:
"Ulster's historical and cultural heritage was not only extremely rich and
varied, but contained within it the proof of the common identity of the
Northerners". (1)

To prove this he begins by debunking the myth of the Irish as a 'pure' Celtic
people. Even after the Celts invaded Ireland they were, he argues, a small
minority, much as were the Normans after they invaded Anglo-Saxon England.
The earlier Neolithic or Bronze age peoples, among them those known as the
Cruthni who were numerous in Ulster, remained the majority.
Dr. Adamson goes on to list what is known of the battles between Ulster and
other parts of Ireland and the resistance put up by Ulster to conquest by those
groups of Celts who were known as the Gaels.
It is into this picture that the "Hound of Ulster" Cuchulainn fits. Because of his
physical appearance, short with dark hair, Adamson has him as a pre-Celt, a
Cruithin. According to one legend, The Tkin, when Queen Maeve of Connaught
invaded Ulster, the fighting men of Ulster fell ill with the 'pangs' and Cuchulainn
had to defend the ancient kingdom on his own.
As Ulster's King Conor recovered from his 'pangs' he summoned his warriors
with the words:
"I swear that unless the sky with all its stars should, fall upon the earth, or the
ground burst open in an earthquake, or the sea sweep over the land, we shall
never retreat one inch, but should gain victory in battle". (our emphasis) (2)
From the fabled figure of King Conor and the mists of pre-recorded history
across the centuries to Northern Ireland's first Prime Minister, Sir James Craig,
whose response to nationalist claims on northern territory was the blunt phrase
'Not an Inch'- can this be a common identity?
Northern identity?
Dr. Adamson points to a distinct sense of northern ness through history. He
also lays emphasis on the close ties between the peoples of Ulster and those of
Scotland. There is evidence that the Cruthni and the Picts of Scotland were one
people. Close connections were established during the early Christian period
between Ulster and Scottish monasteries.
After Elizabethan forces defeated the Earls of Ulster, large areas of their
territories were settled by planters of English or Scottish stock. This began in
1609 and involved much of Donegal, Tyrone, Fermanagh, Cavan, Derry and
Armagh.
Antrim and Down were settled differently. These lands were taken by swindlers
who bought them cheaply and then offered them to voluntary settlers. Those
who took up the offer were mainly refugees from Scotland, members of
Protestant sects who were persecuted for their democratic anti-monarchist
tendencies during the reformation at the end of the seventeenth century. They

brought with them their language, which in a significant number of cases was
Scots Gallic, and their custom, both of which left their mark on these areas.
From this is developed the idea of the Scots-Irish as a distinct identity. During
the eighteenth century Scots-Irish 'dissenters' were persecuted alongside
Catholics under the Penal Laws. At least a quarter of a million emigrated to
North America where their distinct character seemed to make the label
'Scots/Irish' fit. Can it be that it was in displaying their 'stern and stubborn'
Ulster character, that Davy Crockett, Ulysses S. Grant, Stonewall Jackson and
many other famous 'Scots-Irish' made their mark on United States history?.
All this is very interesting and certainly a grain of truth runs through it. But like
all truths, once they are taken too far they become untruths. Dr. Adamson
presents an extreme view. Groups like the UDA go further, the tiny fascists
groups in Northern Ireland go further still. Alongside the more extreme ideas
of these people, there is a tendency in the historical mainstream which has
swallowed many of these arguments and in whose writings the idea of a
separate and common Ulster identity is reiterated.
But to place a dot here and a dot there on the graph of history and then to
draw a line between them and across the centuries to the present is not a
sound historical method.
When it comes to debunking the nationalist myth of a pure Celtic race it is well
said, and it needs to be said, but it has been said before. Here is what the
marxist historian T.A. Jackson in his classic Ireland Her Own argues on the
question:
"The Gaels, who reached Ireland in comparatively small parties, at different
times, came from various points - Spain, Western France, and Belgium - after
a long period of wandering in the grassland belt of Europe....
..... In Ireland they found an aboriginal population which was likewise of mixed
descent. The Gaels did not exterminate the aborigines; in time they fused with
them. Any theory, romantic or fascist, which supports a 'pure' Gaelic blood as a
determinant of Irish Custom, is completely worthless". (3)
That regional differences existed in Celtic and pre Celtic Ireland is beyond
dispute. So is the fact that the Northern area under the Kings of old Ulster
based at Navan Fort fought to retain control of their territories as did later clan
leaders.
This was the nature of pre-feudal society, not just in Ireland but across Europe.
The clan system was a system of primitive communism, that is production
almost entirely for consumption by the producing community, a society without
private property or hereditary wealth. It is true that in its later stages, even

before the Anglo-Norman conquest put this system to an end, this was
breaking down and the elements of a system based on class division and
private property were beginning to emerge.
However it was a society in which the concept of a centralised state or of
national identity did not and could not exist. Although there was a High King of
Ireland this was a far cry from the centralised monarchies seen in medieval
feudal Europe, or established in England by the time of the Anglo-Norman
invasions. Beneath the High King was a loose system of shifting alliances
between various clans.
Territorial differences existed not just between north and south but between
and within all the ancient Earldoms and Kingdoms. The subsequent Ulster
plantations did accentuate differences between Ulster and the rest, especially
as they introduced a substantial Protestant population. But other invasions left
their mark on other parts of the country too. The Vikings not only invaded but,
as also was the case in England, they set up permanent settlements in places
like Dublin, Cork, Wexford and Limerick.
Anglo-Norman conquest led to direct control over the area known as The Pale
around Dublin, some three centuries before the final conquest of the rest of
Ireland. This first 'plantation' in Ireland gave that area a distinct character also.
By the end of the seventeenth century the conquest of Ireland was complete.
The country was united as a colony of England and was given a subservient
parliament based on a narrow and sectarian franchise, with scant powers and
which was to meet only every second year.
Every remnant of the old clan system was eliminated, replaced by feudal social
relations in which land was very often in the hands of absentee English
landlords. Penal laws, introduced in 1642, were levelled against Catholics and
against Dissenters who made up the majority of the non-Catholic population of
Ulster.
Restrictions on trade of woollen manufactures and other goods hampered any
development of Irish industry. The surplus drawn from the land by absentee
landlords went to investment in England not Ireland. Only in Ulster was there a
partial exception. There, the custom which had once applied throughout the
whole country, whereby the tenant had security and a limited interest in his
holding, was retained.
The one industry which was allowed to develop was linen. It was given royal
subsidies to help it compete with the French and Dutch. Linen production was
concentrated in the north, and throughout the eighteenth century, was a rural
cottage industry. Flax was grown along with food, was spun and woven in the

home and then taken to the expanding linen markets, at first of Dublin and
then Belfast, for export.
By the late eighteenth century the seedlings of an Irish capitalism had
emerged, especially in the North. Power driven machinery to spin cotton,
introduced to Belfast in 1770, provided that city's first experience of the
industrial revolution.
But whatever industrial development took place was hamstrung and
handicapped by the restrictions imposed by the colonial rulers. Even the linen
industry suffered badly from the blockade imposed on the American colonies
after they declared independence in 1776.
National consciousness
Out of all this a national consciousness, based on the diversity of the Irish
people, grew and developed, spurred on by the suffocating effects of English
rule and colonial domination. Irish culture in the form of an interest in books
and theatre, began to develop. This was especially the case in Belfast where
the most forward looking citizens, mainly of Presbyterian stock, promoted a
revival of Irish music.
The artisans, craftsmen and small scale manufacturers of the north were
united with the downtrodden peasantry of the rest of the country in a common
desire to lift off the yoke of colonial oppression, to end landlordism, repeal the
penal laws and to allow Irish goods to trade as determined by an Irish not an
English parliament. The American War of Independence and even more so the
French revolution stimulated the desire of the Irish to have their own nation
state free of foreign influence and domination.
This growing sense of nationhood had its highest political expression in the
Society of United Irishmen, founded in 1791. One of its key leaders, Theobald
Wolfe Tone, expressed its aim as:
"to unite the whole people of Ireland, to abolish the memory of past divisions
and to substitute the common name of Irishman in place of the denominations
of Protestant, Catholic and Dissenter". (4)
In 1798 the United Irishmen rose in rebellion seeking to drive out the English
garrison and to emulate the great liberating events of the French revolution.
When Wexford was seized and held by the insurgents they adopted the new
calendar of revolutionary France.
The leader of the rebellion in Antrim was Belfastman Henry Joy McCracken,
arguably the greatest of the main leaders. As McCracken's forces marched
from just north of Belfast to try to seize Antrim town, they did so to the stirring
rhythms of the Marsellaise.

Failure
The rebellion failed. Wexford was retaken. The risings in Antrim and Down
were put down. A French force which landed in Mayo arrived after these
defeats and despite the brilliance of its commander, General Humbert, proved
to be too little too late.
From revolution to counter-revolution. The British response to the rebellion,
once they achieved the upper hand, was a merciless campaign of retribution to
subdue the Irish in their own blood. The rising which lasted from May to
September was followed by an Autumn of court martials, hangings, shootings,
imprisonment and transportation.
The defeat came about through a mixture of disorganisation, hesitancy, overcaution and treachery on one side and brutal repression on the other. Acting on
the information of informers, the government was the first to act. The entire
leadership was arrested before the rising had even begun. In the North they
used the weapon of divide and rule, sowing division between Protestant and
Catholic. The garrison in Ulster promoted the newly formed Orange Order as a
counter-weight to the United Irishmen.
In general, outside of Antrim and Down, the rising displayed the classic
characteristics of a movement based on the peasantry; it was sporadic,
localised and disorganised. The emerging Irish bourgeoisie, the class who
stood to gain most from it, demonstrated only timidity and a general lack of
confidence in its ability to succeed.
Hence these immortal words of Henry Joy McCracken written to his sister while
in hiding only days before his capture:
"These are the times that try men's souls. You will no doubt hear a great
number of stories respecting the situation of this country, its present
unfortunate state is entirely owing to treachery, the rich always betray the
poor". (5)
This was Ireland's attempt at a bourgeois revolution. It is impossible to say
what would have happened if it had succeeded. The eventual defeat of
Napoleon and the victory of reaction in Europe might have led to a new war of
conquest. Or independence might have been maintained. In that case the
tasks of the bourgeois revolution, the ending of feudal land relations and the
establishment of a centralised nation state might have been carried through.
Ireland then would have become a single nation state based on the
assimilation of all its peoples, as with the nation states then formed and still to
be formed in Europe. A single and independent nation - yes. But a unified

nation free of division, welded to a single culture and way of life as

romantically put forward by nationalists - no.
In every bourgeois revolution the forces which come together to attempt to
carry it through are an amalgam of various class interests. There are the
merchants and manufacturers who seek freedom to develop their enterprises
and increase their wealth. There are the peasants who want to own the land
they work. And there are the labourers and artisans, the embryo of the future
working class, who are the most consistent democrats and who want to take
the revolution furthest.
These were the people who made up the Levellers and put forward elementary
communistic ideas during the English civil war. Similar ideas were present also
in the '98 rebellion. Belfast linen weaver Jemmy Hope was a close friend of
McCracken and became a leader of the United Irishmen in the town. He
survived the rising and his memoirs show his awareness of the rival class
interests involved:
"Ulster was the seat of politics; in which there were three parties: those whose
industry produced the necessaries of life, those who circulated them, and those
whose subsistence depended on fictitious claims and capital, and lived and
acted as if men and cattle were created solely for their use and benefit, and to
whom a sycophantic clergy were ever ready to bow with the most profound
respect. The town of Belfast was the centre of this factitious system, and with
few exceptions, the most corrupt spot on the face of the earth". (6)
For a brief moment of history the bourgeois revolutions brought together all
the class interests which stood against feudalism and colonialism, at times with
sufficient force to break the old order, at others not. They did so under lofty
ideals and in the name of the whole nation, but the reality of what victory
brought was not rule by all the people, but capitalist society and capitalist rule.
As Engels said of the French revolution it was fought to establish the 'Kingdom
of Reason'. In fact it established the 'Kingdom of the Bourgeoisie'.
Victory in 1798 would have led to those forces which coalesced around the
green banner of the United Irishmen coming apart and re-forming over time
around the opposite poles of the class struggle - Capital and Labour.
Instead history took a different course. The rebellion was defeated. Reaction
triumphed. Instead of independence the 1801 Act of Union incorporated
Ireland into what became the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. The
building which housed the old toothless Irish parliament facing Trinity College
in Dublin was occupied instead by the Bank of Ireland. Reaction in Ireland was
reinforced in 1815 by the final demise of Napoleon and the triumph of the
Grand Alliance of Emperors and Kings who were restored across Europe.

In the period leading to 1798 and that which followed, one of the great laws of
revolution and counter revolution in Ireland was established. It is a law which
held good throughout the nineteenth century, through the period of partition
and which holds good right up to the present.
At times when the tempo of revolution is on the ascendant all strata of the
oppressed, exploited and downtrodden tend to unite, while those divisions of
region or religion which have at times stood between them, tend to be pushed
to the background. This law holds good also in reverse. In periods of set-back,
retreat, defeat, and especially when these features are sustained, the old
historic divisions tend to come to the fore in a modern form.
For those historians who are rewriting history from a generally pro-unionist
point of view, and who accentuate regional and religious differences as the
norm, this law is a closed book. They display no feel for the changing tempo of
events; for the ebbs and flows of the revolutionary process, the very factors
which make or un-make historical progress.

Troubled Times by Peter Hadden

chapter 2

roots of partition
A consensus reached by this new school is that the 1920-21 partition
of Ireland was a product of 'natural', historically established, divisions,
that it was inevitable from the mid-nineteenth century or earlier and
that British imperialism played only the neutral role of an arbiter in the
whole affair.
Divide and Rule (Militant booklet on partition by the author), written nearly
twenty years ago, mainly as a challenge to the simplified, romanticised picture
painted by nationalists, has already answered these arguments. But in the
struggle to develop revolutionary ideas, theoretical ground which was
conquered in the past has very often to be conquered again. Without repeating
all the main points of Divide and Rule it is necessary to re-examine and reclarify this period by dealing with the new arguments which have come up.
This is not a merely academic exercise. The answers to the questions how and
why partition came about shape both our attitude to the national question
today and the programme we put forward to deal with it.
If, for example, we accept that imperialism played an essentially benign role,
and that the division between Irish people made partition unavoidable, in effect

that there existed or were coming into existence two nations in Ireland, we
then give an historical justification to the two states which emerged.
In that case the desire felt by people in the South for eventual re-unification
could not be seen as an anti-imperialist sentiment, a desire to undo a crime
perpetrated by imperialism. It becomes a desire, at bottom an imperialist
sentiment, to have control over the territory of another people, over a separate
nation.
Even the most false theories can be bedded on a seam of truth. Militant Labour
has never held the view, which is the tenor of some nationalist accounts, that
imperialism conjured partition up out of nothing, duping one section of the
Irish people with a slight of hand and then coercing the other.
Partition did have historical roots - in the divisions which emerged in the period
of ebb of the national struggle after the defeat of the '98 rising. These divisions
were deliberately fostered and encouraged by imperialism whenever it suited
them to do so, in 1798 and after, in order to weaken and divide the opposition
to their rule.
These divisions laid the basis for partition in that they made it possible, but not
inevitable. That is one seam of the argument, one side of the truth. The other
side, which is now being challenged or ignored by the pro-unionist school, is
that partition itself, in its concrete historical setting, was carried through by
imperialism to suit its own ends. The idea of British imperialism as benign
arbiters is pure invention. As with the commander of the northern British
garrison, General Lake's order in 1798 that every government militia should
have an Orange Lodge within it, and as with all subsequent attempts by British
politicians to beat the Orange drum, partition was brought about in pursuit of a
policy of 'Divide and Rule'.
Only this complex all-sided approach explains what took place in the
nineteenth century, in the first part of this century and helps throw light on the
national question today.
The '98 rebellion was the first and the last attempt by the emerging Irish
capitalist class, or bourgeoisie, to lead a movement for independence. From
the moment of its defeat, this class, weak both economically and politically,
withdrew from the national struggle. Their only subsequent role was to
obstruct and betray every new movement.
The larger capitalists, as they developed, threw in their lot, psychologically and
in every practical sense, with their British counterparts The rising northern
capitalists and those in Dublin, bound themselves by ties of kith and kin, of

military service in helping hold those 'other colonies' in subjection, as well as

ties of money and self-interest, to the British capitalist class.
The Irish bourgeoisie were never again a unifying factor capable of drawing
other strata behind them. They could play no progressive role in unifying a
national movement or helping develop a national consciousness.
If the tasks of the bourgeois democratic revolution -the distribution of land,
extension of the franchise to break the political monopoly of the old
aristocracy, and the consolidation of a nation state --- were now to be carried
through; it would have to be by some other class.

Linen workers
Such capitalist development as took place in Ireland in the nineteenth century
was uneven. By the end of the century the main concentration of industry,
apart from agriculture related and food processing industries was in the northeast corner around Belfast.
First a cotton industry developed in Belfast and other towns such as Lisburn
and Bangor. It was spurred on by the mechanical spinning techniques of the
industrial revolution, but, after 1824, when the tariffs which protected Irish
cotton from British competition were lifted, it declined.
Mills began to be adapted to flax spinning instead of cotton. By the 1850s flax
and linen were triumphant and little remained of the old cotton mills. When the
American Civil War broke out in 1861 the cotton mills of Lancashire were
starved of their raw materials and fell idle. Belfast linen took the place of their
goods on the world market and the industry boomed.
By the end of the decade Belfast, with 9,000 power looms had become the
linen centre of the world. Vast wealth was accrued by the new capitalist lords
of linen.
An engineering industry producing industrial machinery developed alongside
linen. Shipbuilding had been carried out in Belfast from the late eighteenth
century when the first two small yards were set up. It underwent a massive
expansion in the latter part of the nineteenth century with new yards and a
huge increase in output - up from 20,000 gross tons in 1881 to 200,000 by
1912.
These industrialists looked to Britain and to markets beyond. When the issue of
Home Rule for Ireland was raised they reacted with alarm. Their interests were
not those of small-scale producers in other parts of the country who sought a
protected Irish market. For them tariffs would mean a wall blocking off both

the supply of raw materials and the access of their products to British,
European and US markets.
The linen bosses were among those who put themselves forward as stout
defenders of the interests of 'Ulster and its people' during the resistance to
Home Rule. The real interest they were defending was their own.
In the flax mills the 'linen slaves of Belfast', as James Connolly called them,
could have told a different story. The linen lords and other capitalists had never
had any regard for the interests of those of the 'Ulster people' who spun their
flax, wove their linen and created all the wealth they used to toast 'their'
achievements.
Conditions in the mills of this linenopolis were a blight on the face of the city.
Children as young as eight slaved at the looms. The ever-present clouds of
dust fibres destroyed their lungs. In the 1870s the average working life in the
flax preparing areas was 16.8 years. There were strikes - as in 1874 when 43
mills employing Protestant and Catholic struck against a ten per cent wage cut
- but the linen bosses managed to prevent union organisation right through the
nineteenth and into the twentieth century.
Self-interest caused the large capitalists of Ireland, especially of the northeast, to line up with the old aristocracy who were opposed both to land reform
and Home Rule, and launch the Unionist movement of the late nineteenth
century.
There had long been divisions between Catholic and Protestant tenants in rural
areas. These had been whipped up by the landlords with the help of
institutions such as the Orange Order. Founded in 1795, it began as a minority
movement among Protestants, based on the descendants of English settlers,
not on the Presbyterians and dissenters. In the early part of the nineteenth
century it remained a tool of the landlords and was used to mobilise opposition
not only to Catholic emancipation, but to the 1832 reform act which extended
the franchise and did away with the pocket boroughs through which the
landowners dominated parliament. It was anathema to forward-looking
Protestants like Jemmy Hope, who in his memoirs commented:
"The character of the Orange Lodges was such, that no man who had any
regard for his character would appear in them." (7)
Orangeism remained a largely rural affair although in country areas its
sectarian message was by no means unchallenged. The United Irishmen had
shown how Catholic and Protestant tenants could stand united in defence of
their common interests. In the towns relations were generally good. In 1794
when the first Catholic church, St. Mary's, opened in Belfast, the Belfast

Volunteers, forerunners of the United Irishmen, paraded and formed a guard of

honour for the arrival of the priest for the first mass.
It was not until the 1830s that signs of the sectarian divisions which were to be
a key factor in Belfast's history began to appear. Fundamentalist Presbyterian
preachers, Henry Cooke notable among them, began from this time to preach
a gospel of anti-Catholic sectarianism, very different from the doctrines which
had been put forward by the United Irishmen.
With rural migration to Belfast its Catholic population grew. 1843-9 saw famine
devastate rural Ireland - the destitution, starvation and de-population brought
about more by landlordism than the potato blight. Ulster was not as badly
affected as the south-west, but its rural counties, particularly Cavan,
Monaghan, Tyrone and Armagh did suffer. Many impoverished, starving and
mainly Catholic tenants from these areas moved to Belfast hoping to find relief
and work in this, the industrial centre of Ireland. By 1850 one third of the
population were Catholic and it had a distinct sectarian geography.
Appalling living conditions and increased competition for work raised sectarian
tensions. Skilled workers were mainly Protestants. In the shipyards and
engineering factories they were paid wages akin to similar trades in Britain, far
more than the unskilled who had no union organisation.
Inevitably there was craft conservatism, a desire to preserve skills, protect
trades and be able to hand on the unionised and better-paid jobs to their
families. Very often this translated into sectarianism as workers in various
trades opposed skilled jobs going to Catholics.
Sectarian riots took place in Belfast in 1857, in 1864 and at various times over
the following two decades. Catholic shipyard workers found themselves
intimidated by Protestant shipwrights - the percentage of Catholic workers in
Belfast's shipyards fell in the last decades of the century.

Home Rule opposition

When, in 1911, the aristocrats and capitalists of the Ulster Unionist Council,
financed and assisted by every shade of reactionary on the conservative wing
of the British establishment, launched their crusade against Home Rule, many
working class Protestants aligned themselves with this resistance.
All of this would seem to confirm the nationalist picture of Protestants as
concerned only with protecting their craft privileges and as easy dupes of their
masters. Those of the pro-union school would say no, these things
demonstrate the separate line of development, present through history, which
was leading the northern or Protestant (take your pick) 'nation' towards a
separate state.

Both explanations are wrong. They leave out two things. One: that a key
reason for the pro-union attitude of the Protestant masses was the narrowing
of the nationalist movement to the point where it could have no appeal to
them. Second: even in the midst of all this backwardness and confusion a new
unity of Catholic and Protestant was being prepared which, if it could reach its
fruition, had the potential to dwarf even the majestic movement of 1798.
'98 had been fought for independence and for an improvement in the material
lot of the people. The unity displayed at that time was based on a coming
together of the national and the social interests of the Irish people against
landlordism and against colonial domination.
The rise of the United Irishmen represented the victory of revolutionary ideas
over those of constitutional reformers such as Grattan whose methods had
become discredited. The following century saw the reverse - the domination of
the national movement by constitutionalists and reformers rather than by its
radical and revolutionary wing.
The radicals - among them the towering figure of Michael Davitt - took the
struggle against landlordism as their starting point. In the hands of its more
conservative wing the national movement was purified of its social content.
The very factor which united Protestant, Catholic and Dissenter in 1798 was
jettisoned.

Daniel O'Connell
This degeneration of nationalism in the hands of its most 'eminent'
parliamentary champions began in the 1840s with Daniel O'Connell's campaign
for repeal of the Act of Union. O'Connell was for limited independence, not
separation. On social questions he was conservative. His idea of land reform
was that the landlords, from whose stock he came, should treat their tenants
well. When elected to the British parliament he resolutely opposed the Chartist
uprising. He denounced early Irish trade unions as too militant and the cause
of the decline of industry in Dublin. Given his leadership of the Catholic
Association during the battle for Catholic emancipation, it was easy for
demagogic Presbyterians like Henry Cooke to caricature the Repeal movement
as being out for Catholics only.
After O'Connell the other major parliamentary campaigners for Home Rule
continued in the same vein. John Redmond, who straddled the centuries as
leader of the Irish Parliamentary Party, was a landlord, defended landlordism
and also adopted a conservative stance on social questions.
In 1910 a Liberal government led by Lord Asquith came to power. Because it
was dependent on the votes of the Redmondites, Home Rule, as the price for

this backing, seemed on the cards. Asquith's Liberals were greeted by a wave
of struggles by the working class demanding concessions. In 1911 it was
forced to give way and introduce a programme of social legislation. Redmond
strongly opposed the extension of this legislation to Ireland insisting that a
Home Rule parliament would not be able to afford it.
At best Home Rule as put forward by such people meant only the same penury,
the same exploitation but administered by different faces. To Protestant
workers it seemed worse than this. It was clear to them that gains which were
being secured by the British working class would not be applied by a
parliament of Redmondite landowners and of small business interests from the
less-developed southern areas. Tariffs put up to assist these interests would
threaten their export-orientated jobs. So long as the Home Rule formula
equalled the same but worse there was no way they would support it. Such
backing as sections of the Protestant working class gave to the lords and ladies
of Unionism, was in large part given to retain their connections with the British
working class whose struggles and achievements seemed to offer the best
hope for the future.
It was not possible on the basis of capitalism and certainly not of landlordism
to frame a new national movement which was genuinely broad in its appeal.
Stripped of its social content, Irish nationalism could not unite all of the
oppressed, irrespective of religion. Inevitably it tended to narrow, to
degenerate, and to represent itself as Catholic nationalism - never the same
thing.
This is the down-side of the history of the time. It is the only side picked upon
by the modern pro-union school. Writing at a time of sectarian conflict and a
low point in the class struggle their approach to history is to pick out every
similar low point as the norm and ignore or down play all else. Just in fact as
those of their ilk writing about the recent Troubles can see only a catalogue of
sectarian events and have written out the working class or the labour
movement as even a player.
There was another side to events pre-partition. The capitulation by the Irish
capitalists to British rule after 1798 meant that the unfinished tasks of the
bourgeois democratic revolution were left to be completed by others. At the
end of the nineteenth and in the first decades of the twentieth century a class
emerged which was capable of doing this - the working class. It had the
capacity to create a new unity of Catholic and Protestant, to complete what
was left undone by the capitalists, not as a gift to this class, but in the course
of carrying out its own historic mission, the overthrow of capitalism and
establishment of a socialist society.

chapter 3

rise of the working class

With the arrival of the working class as a force sufficiently strong to
make its independent mark on history, the potential for unity of
Catholic and Protestant in the north east and of workers throughout
Ireland was put on a new and higher level. This arrival was signalled
at the beginning of the 1890s by the first stirrings of the unskilled. A
wave of militancy was sweeping the industrial workplaces of Britain as
the unskilled and previously unorganised formed unions. Now efforts
were made to bring this new unionism to Ireland. Organisers from the
National Union of Dock Labourers (NUDL) and the National Union of
Gas Workers and General Labourers (NUGGL) came over to help Irish
unions organise. In the case of the latter it was Eleanor Marx who
came, visiting Derry in 1891 to assist with the organisation of the shirt
factories.
Sixty nine strikes were reported in 1890, up from thirty in 1889. In 1892
Belfast Trades Council organised a march of 12,000 in support of linen lappers
who were locked out for five weeks by their employers. Catholic and Protestant
bands took part, stewards wore orange and green rosettes - a forerunner of
the 'non-sectarian labour band' which James Connolly would parade in Belfast
some twenty years later.
Also in 1892 building tradesmen went on strike - successfully. There were
strikes by dockers in ports around the country, the most bitter in Belfast,
where a dispute dragged on for four months. This was a precursor to the great
1907 strike by Belfast dockers and carters. Two years later came the seven
week strike by linen workers mentioned earlier.
Out of this the Irish Trades Union Congress was founded in April 1894. Last
year (1994) the centenary of this event was celebrated - by a trade union
leadership who, are not only a hundred years removed, but are worlds
removed from the traditions of struggle which created the first trade union
centre in Ireland.
The current ICTU leadership who shrink away from politics and who embrace
the market economy with open arms, need to be reminded that the 1895 ITUC
congress voted to establish a political fund and that, in 1898, it adopted a call
for the nationalisation of the means of production, distribution and exchange.
These resolutions were not acted upon, although Belfast Trades Council
courageously and successfully took the first steps to an independent political
voice for Labour by fielding candidates in local elections.

This first wave of new unionism was unsuccessful. Most of the strikes were
defeated, militancy declined and the new unions withered to little more than
bridgeheads for the future. But as the 1905 revolution in Russia was a dress
rehearsal for October 1917, so these pioneering struggles were a preface for
mightier movements to come.
New unionism's second offensive began in Belfast in June 1907 when recently
arrived NUDL organiser James Larkin called out 500 dockers. From these
beginnings a bitter dispute developed with carters and coalmen coming out.
There was clear sympathy and support from other sections of the working class
in the city. As Catholic and Protestant workers united it was the forces of
sectarianism and of the state which began to fracture. Police, who found
themselves used to protect scabs and help break the strike, mutinied in protest
at their own workload, hours and conditions. Even Belfast's Orangemen were
divided, with the Independent Orange Order, whose membership was almost
exclusively from the working class, giving support to Larkin.
Eventually the strike was settled by the intervention of the British leadership of
the NUDL - and on less favourable terms than Larkin thought might have been
achieved. There were other struggles in Belfast - notably the 1911 mill workers
dispute in which Connolly played an important role - but after 1907 the active
focus of the discontent moved elsewhere.
A wave of strikes across much of Ireland in 1911 saw workers turn to the
recently formed Irish Transport and General Workers Union (ITGWU), Larkin's
answer to the betrayal by NUDL leaders in 1907. By the end of 1911 it had
18,089 members, 13,009 of whom had joined that year. Employers responded
with lockouts to break the union. 550 ITGWU members were locked out in
Wexford from August 1911 until February 1912. In August 1913 the Dublin
employers, led by William Martin Murphy, attempted a similar tactic.

Dublin Lockout
The Dublin Lockout was an unforgettable chapter in the history of the Irish
labour movement. Under Larkin's leadership, and that of Connolly, the Dublin
workers stood firm by the union. Against them were pitted not just the
employers but the state and the Catholic hierarchy. It polarised society in
Ireland and beyond. Even George Bernard Shaw, speaking at a rally in London,
advised the workers to arm themselves.
The strikers did, in fact, respond to physical attacks by setting up a worker's
militia. Known initially as the Transport Union Citizen Army it soon became
known simply as the Citizen's Army.

1907 had divided Protestant sectarian organisations along class lines. Now the
'nation' and the 'nationalist movement' were similarly divided. Ancient Order of
Hibernians (AOH) leader, Joe Devlin, called for Catholic unions. Arthur Griffith,
leader of Sinn Fein, denounced the lockout complaining that Irish workers were
only inflicting damage on Irish industry. It lasted until February 1914 when it
ended, more as a draw than a clear victory for either side. Although the
workers were starved back to work the union remained. The new unions for
general workers this time were there to stay.
Like the struggles of the 1890s this new surge of militancy had its political
effects. In 1912 the TUC passed a motion, moved by Connolly, calling for a
Labour Party to be set up. The decision was reaffirmed in 1914 - Congress that
year voted to change its title to the Irish TUC and Labour Party (ITUC&LP).
These events took place against the backcloth of the Home Rule crisis, the
mobilisation of unionist and nationalist militias and the seeming threat of civil
war. This was an argument fought out in the capitalist terms of which set of
bosses do you want to exploit you, which set of gangsters should rule you, and
as such could only polarize and divide Protestant worker from Catholic.
The emergence of the working class as an independent force offered the
alternative of a struggle against all exploitation, a struggle for independence,
for socialism and also for internationalism.
The challenge facing the labour movement was to place itself at the head of
the struggle for national liberation and in so doing restore to that struggle a
social content. If it could succeed in this it would have the possibility to unite
the vast majority of the Irish people against imperialism and against
capitalism, just as, at an earlier stage of historical development, the United
Irishmen had united the mass of the people against colonialism and against
landlordism.
The outbreak of war in Europe left the question whether or not this challenge
would be faced unanswered. Instead there followed a period in which all the
conflicts brewing in Ireland were put on hold. Redmondite nationalists and
Carsonite unionists put their differences to the side as both their leaders
became energetic crusaders for the war effort. The class struggle entered a
period of ebb.
It was in this situation that Connolly egged on the paltry forces of
revolutionary nationalism to take part alongside the Citizen's Army in the
Easter Rising of 1916. It was intended by Connolly to be a blow which would
inspire workers in Europe to rise against the imperialist slaughter taking place
in the trenches. The idea that it would detonate a broader movement in Ireland
or in Europe was a forlorn hope, as Connolly himself almost certainly knew.

The fault of the rising was that it was premature. A deep anti-war sentiment
had not yet developed - indeed many in Dublin who spat on the defeated
insurgents did so because they saw them as having stabbed the soldiers in the
trenches in the back. It was only the vengeful programme of executions which
changed the popular mood in Ireland to one of sympathy. But by then Connolly
had been executed and the Irish working class deprived of its greatest leader this on the eve of events in which he could have made his greatest
contribution.
The Easter Rising did leave an imprint on the consciousness of the working
class of the southern part of Ireland at least. But at the time it was isolated
and did not precipitate further movements.

chapter 4

revolutionary events
The final two years of the war saw the beginnings of a revival of the
class struggle in Ireland. The ITGWU began to reorganise itself, in
1917 breaking new ground with the recruitment of agricultural
workers. Then, in 1918, a tremendous new offensive movement of the
working class, surpassing anything which had gone before, was begun.
It is difficult to place precise dates, like parentheses, around such a
movement. Inevitably it had its prehistory and its aftershocks, but
generally we can say that from April 1918 to the middle part of 1920
this movement was in the ascendant. This period saw the highest
expression of the class struggle which the Irish working class have yet
attained.
Yet the outcome was not socialist revolution, but partition. The modern
historical school of sceptics, point to this as a confirmation of their analysis.
Unable to ignore this movement, they instead choose to enlarge its every
negative feature. They triumphantly point out that in the end working class
unity did not resolve the national question, but rather was breached by it.
There is a false method at work here. It is the same false method being
displayed now by the vast majority of historians of the current Troubles.
Because they are unable to see beyond the sectarian divisions they start out
from the premise that the Troubles, in the sectarian form they have taken,
were inevitable. The negative conclusions they then arrive at come as no
surprise.
Proponents of the idea of 'separate development', North and South, take as
their premise the inevitability of partition. From this they work back to find the

'proof' in preceding events. They minimize the potential of the revolutionary

movement of 1918-20. To answer them we have to look at what actually
happened.
On April 20th 1918 a special labour movement conference of 1,500 delegates
lit the torch of this new workers' movement. It decided on a one day general
strike against conscription. April 23rd, the day of the strike, brought the
greatest shut down there had ever been in Ireland. All over the country
factories, transport, even pubs remained firmly closed.
Only in the northern area was there an exception - something which has been
made much of by those who look for sectarian division in everything. This,
they say, was a sign that even the working class movement, north and south,
was following different paths.
In fact the evidence indicates that there was broad sympathy in the north,
among Protestant and Catholic workers, for this strike. Anti-war sentiment by
now was a European, not a southern Irish, factor and it was strong in the
northern counties also. There was no strike only because the union leaders
hesitated and did not call workers out in Belfast and other northern areas. Still,
the 10,000 who demonstrated the day before at Belfast City Hall showed the
anti-conscription mood that was present there as well.
The strike showed the power of the working class and gave it confidence in
itself. There followed an unprecedented strike wave. Building workers, hotel
and restaurant staff, carters, transport workers - the list of those who took
action is endless. Even undertakers and domestic servants were out at some
stage.
Moreover the movement spread across the country: Limerick bakers, flour
millers in Kilrush, gas workers in Dungarvan... the full extent of the strike wave
begun in 1918 and carried on through 1919 is so great as to be impossible to
record fully. Suffice to point out that during these two years there were three
national and 18 local general strikes.
The real feeling in the north was shown by the unofficial action taken by
Belfast engineering workers alongside those of Glasgow for shorter hours. This
was probably the only major dispute of the period which did not directly
involve the ITGWU, by now synonymous with trade unionism in much of
Ireland.
The strike lasted from late January to late February. Although the strikers were
mostly Protestant, there were Catholics employed in the industry and they
came out. The strike committee likewise was mainly Protestant, but a number
of Catholics were prominent within it.

Like the dockers and carters strike of 1907, this dispute polarised the city. The
strike committee published its own newspaper and organised a workers' police
force. Their newspaper took up one of the old anti-Home Rule rallying cries of
the Carsonites and presented it in a new form: "Labour in Belfast has
discovered that, when it must fight it must fight alone. No helping hand is
stretched out to help it on the way. Labour will fight, and Labour will be right.
Labour can stand alone." (8)

Differences exaggerated
Far-reaching class conclusions were being drawn. Yet the proponents of
'separate development' play down their significance. Always searching on the
underside of events for their cues they make much of the fact that offers of
sympathetic action made by workers in the South were turned down.
Here is an example of how a single decision, torn from its context can be used
to exaggerate sectarian differences. In fact there was a possibility of much
wider action on the question of hours. A special conference of the ITUC&LP was
held in Dublin on 8 February to consider the possibility of a national wages and
hours movement. There were calls for the 44 hour demand of the Belfast
workers to be taken up throughout the country.
Despite this the strike committee decided not to approach the ITUC&LP. No
doubt one element of this decision was their hesitancy about the pro-Sinn Fein
leanings they could detect within the leadership of this body.
But there were other probably more decisive factors. The Belfast workers
received offers of support and of solidarity action from other workers in the
city. Early in the dispute, linen workers in the Belfast mills made an approach
offering to come out for shorter hours, but the strike committee turned them
down also. There was an element of craft prejudice and also of male
chauvinism in this decision. There were doubts among the strike leaders about
whether the female linen workers would stick out a struggle. The Strike
Bulletin argued that:
"custom has decreed that the amelioration of onerous conditions is generally
secured by the craftsmen first though we do not think there is any inherent
reason this should be so". (9)
By the time of the ITUC&LP special conference, the dispute in Glasgow had
entered a critical phase. The city had been occupied by troops, sent to break
the strike, since the start of February. Rather than back down, the Glasgow
workers issued a call to workers in the rest of Britain to come to their aid. A
mass meeting of Electrical Trades Union members in London threatened to
switch off the power in the capital from 6 February.

On the eve of this action the government issued a ban, using powers under the
Defence of the Realm Act. The ETU leaders hesitated and postponed, in reality
called off, their action. Also at this time the national leaders of the
Amalgamated Society of Engineers (ASE), to praises from the government,
dealt the strikers a blow by suspending the Glasgow, London and Belfast
district committees of the union. This was a turning point and a few days later
the Glasgow workers voted to go back. In Belfast they carried on until the end
of the month but with little prospect of any further concessions now that they
were standing alone.
At this stage, to broaden the dispute meant an all-out confrontation with the
state and a battle with their own union leadership. With the strike in Glasgow
beginning to crumble, the Belfast workers opted not to spread the action. From
the point of view of winning an outright victory this decision, and the refusal of
the linen workers' offer, were clearly mistakes. They were a victory of
hesitancy over militancy - but it is not difficult to understand why they were
taken.
Nothing is gained by prettifying or denying the negative features which may be
present in any workers' movement - nor is anything gained by exaggerating
them. Within every battle against the employers there is another battle socialist ideas versus more backward ideas from the past.
It is when it enters the arena of struggle that the working class finds itself as a
class and learns to put old ideas, old prejudices to the side. The fact that
hesitancy, possibly even a degree of prejudice influenced some decisions of the
1919 strike committee in no way obscures the huge impact this dispute made
or the effect that it had in enormously raising the consciousness of the Belfast
working class as a whole. This was to be seen in subsequent developments in
the city which will be mentioned later.

National struggle
The revival of the working class movement in 1918 was paralleled with an
intensification of the national struggle. The old idea of the Redmondites of
limited independence in a British context held no place in the more radical
climate of the time. In the 1918 general election they were swept aside by
Sinn Fein, with its call for outright independence to be achieved through
struggle, not just by negotiation.
The newly elected Sinn Fein members refused to take their seats at
Westminster. Instead, in 1919, they set up their own Irish parliament, or Dail,
and issued a declaration of independence. This was backed with a military
campaign launched by the newly formed IRA. The British government replied
with a counter-campaign of reprisals and atrocities.

It wasn't that the industrial movement was a backcloth to the national struggle
- or visa versa. In truth the two were intricately but firmly woven together.
With the exception of the north-east that is. Here the class movement was
developing in tandem with the industrial and socialist offensive on-going
elsewhere in Ireland. But when it came to the national question, building and
maintaining class unity was a more difficult thing.
Sinn Fein's programme, all the radical rhetoric borrowed from the labour
movement put aside, was at bottom for an independent capitalist Ireland. Its
message to labour was that your separate demands must wait. Independence
first, other social change only for discussion later. What this meant was shown
in practice when the underground courts set up by Sinn Fein and backed
physically by the IRA were used to end land seizures.
Just as capitalist Home Rule held no attraction for Protestant workers, neither
did capitalist independence. Protestant workers could only have been won to a
national struggle if this was part of a struggle for socialism and was fought, not
under the banner of nationalism but that of internationalism.
Instead of striving to take the leadership of the national struggle, which they
were well poised to do, the ITUC&LP leaders capitulated to Sinn Fein. In mid1918 the ITUC&LP decided to contest the forthcoming general election and a
programme was subsequently worked out in which Labour candidates would
stand. However the ITUC&LP leadership made no concrete preparations to
stand, held no special selection meetings, mounted no campaigns in local
areas. Their lack of preparation and the compromises they had already made
to Sinn Fein meant that the question was bound to provoke opposition. Sinn
Fein were at this time adopting a policy of abstention from Westminster, a
policy which the ITUC&LP endorsed for its own candidates arguing that
attendance in the British parliament would be pointless due to the war.
The issue of abstention provoked dissension in trade union ranks. Earlier
courtship of Sinn Fein by senior union figures made it difficult to argue that this
was anything other than Labour pursuing Sinn Fein's agenda. With the end of
the war in sight it was clear that prominent ITUC leaders were in favour of
dropping this policy. But in that case many of the most militant ranks of the
movement would be likely to vote for Sinn Fein with its seemingly more bold
policy of a complete abandonment of Westminster.
The threat of a division over the issue was used by the right wing of the
movement, William O'Brien of the ITGWU included, to justify reversing the
decision to stand. Al-though left wingers such as Cathal O'Shannon, also of the
ITGWU, opposed, the right carried the day at a special conference in
November.

The result was to give Sinn Fein a free run and to elevate them to the position
of undisputed political leaders of the national struggle. More than this, the
ITUC&LP leaders gave Sinn Fein candidates every material assistance, helped
with propaganda and did what they could to bolster them in the eyes of the
working class.
'Labour must wait' became the joint philosophy of Sinn Fein leader De Valera
and of the dominant leaders of the ITUC&LP. This helped sustain those
elements of difference which existed between the broad mass of Protestant
workers in the north and the rest of the working class. In the hands of these
leaders the national question was certain to be divisive.

Unity from below

At this point those who argue that partition was the inevitable result of these
divisions, nothing to do with British imperialism or its henchmen in Ireland, lay
down their pens. But there is far more to the question than this. People like De
Valera and Labour leader William O'Brien pointed the movement one way.
Within the movement itself there was an opposite tendency strengthened in
every struggle, which pulled in a different direction. In the south the ranks of
the labour movement and of Sinn Fein were beginning to go far beyond the
programme of their leaders. They were embracing the idea, not just of a
republic but of a workers' republic or, as it was often put, of a 'soviet republic'.
The Protestant working class in the north were also unmistakably moving in
the direction of socialism and of internationalism.
The role of leaders like O'Brien pointed to division, to the isolation of the
advanced workers from the broad mass of the working class especially in the
north. But with the broadening and deepening of the class struggle their ideas
were being challenged. From below a socialist consciousness was being
developed, socialist goals were being advanced. North and south, Protestant
and Catholic, the working class were advancing, at an accelerating pace in the
direction of unity around socialist ideas.
Across the country the movement was overtly socialist in its character. Not for
nothing sections of the Belfast press dubbed the 1919 Belfast strike the
'Belfast Soviet'. At this time the outstanding socialist and revolutionary, Peadar
O'Donnell, was leading struggles in other parts of Ulster in his role as the
organiser of the ITGWU. He brought together Protestant and Catholic mill
workers in Caledon.
When, led by O'Donnell, Monaghan asylum workers occupied their workplace,
the red flag was flown over the building. Elsewhere in the country a rural
movement involving agricultural labourers and workers in agricultural
processing plants began in earnest. Red flags and socialist slogans appeared

everywhere - adorning platforms, carried on parades and held at rallies. The

word 'soviet' seemed on everyone's lips.
In Limerick in April 1919 'soviet' became more than a word, it became a fact.
When the British military authorities declared the city a special military area
where everyone would have to carry special permits, the local trades council
replied with a general strike.
From the first day of the strike the city came to a standstill. For two weeks
Limerick had a workers' government which regulated prices, distributed food,
even printed its own money. It was the first 'soviet' to be established in Britain
or Ireland.
The radicalised mood rubbed off on some leaders who were forced to give it
partial expression in their speeches. One prominent figure, Cathal O'Shannon,
speaking in Dublin's Mansion House stated:
"The soviet idea was the only one that would confer freedom on Ireland." (10)
He sent a message to the British Daily Herald urging the English working class
to set up an "English Soviet Republic". (11)
O'Shannon was a delegate from the ITUC&LP to the conference of the Second
International in Berne where a decision was taken to support a call for a
general strike on May Day 1919. The ITUC&LP leadership issued this call in
Ireland and were met with a massive display of solidarity. Across the country
the shut down was complete, in towns large and small there were
demonstrations with red flags and the call for a socialist republic to the fore.
It is true that again much of Ulster including the Belfast area did not take part.
In some areas the reason was simply that local union leaders did not call
workers out. In Belfast the ITUC & LP's courtship with Sinn Fein did mean that
its authority was not automatically accepted in that city. Elsewhere the ITGWU
provided the leadership of the strike. It was not a significant force in Belfast.
All this is but a detail. Two days later, on May 3rd, 100,000 workers marched
from Donegal Place in the centre of Belfast across to the Ravenhill Road in the
east of the city and then to the Ormeau Park for a massive public rally. All
unions, including the ITGWU, took part, Catholic and Protestant marched side
by side.
And like so many other marches in other parts of the country it was bedecked
with socialist flags, banners and slogans. The rally in Ormeau Park was so large
that three platforms had been erected so that speakers could address the
crowd simultaneously.

The message from the platforms was of support for socialist ideas, acclaim for
the Russian Revolution and for internationalism. Its main theme was the need
for "undiluted, uncamouflaged representatives" (12) of labour to stand in
elections to challenge the other parties.
Strikes continued through 1919 and into 1920. Dockers in Dublin and Limerick
came out as did Dublin gas workers and transport workers in a number of
areas. Forty four new branches of the ITGWU were formed during the second
half of 1919. During the year as a whole there were no less than twelve local
general strikes.
The rising influence of socialist ideas was vividly shown in April 1920 when the
ITUC&LP called a general strike demanding the release of 100 prisoners held
without charge in Dublin's Mountjoy Jail. The strike began on April 13th and
lasted until the 15th, when the authorities caved in and the prisoners were
released.
This was an immense demonstration of the power of the working class when
called to action. It is true that the workers of the north east did not take part
but, by this time, their lack of response was understandable.
It should be remembered that the proposal for partition was already well
advanced. The Government of Ireland Act which put forward this proposal had
been through its first and second readings in Westminster. On the national
question the movement north and south had already been pulled in different
directions.

Workers' power
Every all-out general strike although it maybe called on a single issue very
quickly goes beyond that issue to wider questions. As a general strike
develops, the outlines of an alternative state controlled by the working class
become visible. The question of power, of which class runs society, is posed. So
it was with the 1920 strike. Apart from the north-east, the strike was solid
everywhere. From the first day, workers' organisations, trades councils, ITGWU
branches, took over the distribution of supplies, organised policing and other
services in towns and cities alike.
Limerick, Cork, Galway became centres of workers' power. So too did smaller
towns, even villages. In Tralee the trades council took control, setting up its
own 'police'. 'Red Guards' patrolled Naas. A report from Muine Bheag to the
ITGWU gives a flavour of the overall mood:
"On the second day of the strike we held a public meeting in the Market
Square and publicly proclaimed the establishment of a provisional soviet
government..." (1s)

Just as the engineering strike in the north saw unionist ideas put to the side to
be replaced by socialist and internationalist ideas, so the 1920 strike showed
the potential for the working class acting from below to go beyond the tailending by its leaders of Sinn Fein, and take the leadership of the national
struggle. Although starting out from different points the working class
throughout the country could have been united politically as well as
industrially, under a socialist rather than any other flag.
Britain's military commander, Neville MacCready, arriving in Dublin during this
strike, clearly had in his mind this danger when he commented:
"Red murder stalked through the length and breadth of the land". (14)
The tendency for the movement in all parts of the country to dovetail politically
was apparent right into 1920. Although the national leadership of the ITUC&LP
had embraced Sinn Fein from 1918, socialists in the north refused to endorse
this course.
The Belfast Labour Party did put up candidates in the 1918 general election,
standing in four seats. Although Sinn Fein candidates stood against them in
every seat they managed to prevent this from driving Protestant workers
behind the unionists. Their manifesto opposed the politics of 'Celt against
Saxon, Catholic against Protestant'. (15)
It demanded the 'socialisation' of wealth under democratic control. The results
showed the potential. They won 22 per cent of the votes where they stood,
polling 12,164, against 41,176 for the unionists and only 3,319 for Sinn Fein.
In January 1920, Labour fielded its forces in local elections. This time there
was no repeat of 1918. A special conference of trades councils was called and
it was agreed to put up candidates nationally.
341 out of the 650 Labour candidates who stood were successful. The scale of
this success is well measured by a comparison with the 422 seats won by Sinn
Fein.
35 Labour or union-backed candidates stood in Belfast, 22 of them in the name
of Belfast Labour Party. Depending on their definition of Labour different
historians quote different figures for the numbers elected but most now settle
for 12.
When the labour movement was seen in alliance with Sinn Fein the national
character of the movement was diminished. When it stood alone, as in these
elections, the result was a single movement north and south behind the
socialist policies which, in words at least, it put forward.

The 1920 elections saw the ranks of the working class movement still pressing
forward in the direction of socialist ideas. The possibility still existed that
socialist militancy would overwhelm the 'Labour must wait' philosophy of the
heads of the labour movement.

chapter 5

strategy of the ruling class

Old divisions plus the tragically false course pursued since 1918 by the
trade union and Labour leaders helped clear the way for this defeat,
but were not themselves the instrument which brought it about. That
instrument was partition. Its architect was the capitalist class in
Britain. The image of this class and its representatives sitting back and
eyeing these events with a neutral eye is quite absurd. They acted,
with more than a small degree of desperation, to preserve their
interests in Ireland and elsewhere, to protect their system from
overthrow.
The conclusion which Militant has reiterated many times, that the British ruling
class partitioned Ireland to suit its own ends, is straight forward and entirely
accurate. However, like any scientific formula, it represents the essence of the
question and conceals behind it a complicated web of events, relationships and
interests. Similarly when we argue that the British ruling class have pursued a
strategy through the Troubles, and are now doing so with the 'peace process',
we understand that different capitalist spokespersons have different views, and
that there are various, sometimes conflicting, capitalist interests involved.
Nonetheless, it is possible to detect a general trend.
The ruling class is a complex social organism. When we say it acts in a certain
way we do not intend to conjure up an image of some kind of executive body
meeting in a room to decide strategy. Within the present ruling class there are
various layers and conflicting interests - financiers, industrial capitalists, top
state functionaries, military chiefs, law lords and so on.
Rarely does this class take a single view. Even when there is an
overwhelmingly predominant view there will be voices who will speak out
against. In periods of revolutionary upheaval divisions which at other times are
curtained off from public view tend to come into the open and become more
pronounced.
The capitalist class does not rule directly but through governments - whether
these are broadly democratic, military police dictatorships, or fascist regimes over which it has to find ways of exerting its influence and ultimately its

control. Consequently capitalist governments, responding to other pressures

within society especially the pressure of the working class, can take measures
which are temporarily at odds with the interests of the capitalists. Even when
governments act faithfully at the behest of their capitalist masters the details
of policy, the nuances of negotiation, have to be left to the politicians.
Just as politics is dynamic and ever changing, so the ruling class have no once
and for all policy which they pursue. As world relations and class relations
change so must their tactics and their strategy.
So when we state that British imperialism partitioned Ireland all of this
complexity is understood as implicit in this statement. We do not mean that
British capitalism at some point fixed on the idea that partition would be
necessary and over years and decades worked towards this objective. We
mean that in the concrete conditions which existed in 1919-1920, they seized
on this drastic remedy as the only way they could see of protecting their
interests.
To see how the policy of the ruling class developed it is necessary to go back to
the beginnings of the Home Rule crisis. The first Home Rule bills were brought
before parliament by the Liberal government of Gladstone in 1886 and again in
1893. At this time the landlord system was intact in Ireland. Behind the
pressure of the Irish masses for self-government was their desire to have the
power to scrap this system.
The policy of the Liberals, representing more the industrial wing of capital in
Britain, was to introduce land reform to defuse the social agitation on this
question and to offer limited Home Rule, really a form of devolution, to curtail
the call for separation. The Tories, who opposed both bills and who led their
defeat in the House of Lords, were influenced by the landowners and by the
more aristocratic and backward-looking wing of the ruling class.
Yet the increasingly dominant power of manufacturing capital soon told, even
on the Conservatives. It was a Conservative government which, apart from the
on-going issue of annuities which continued to be paid to the old landowners,
in 1903 finally resolved the land issue by passing legislation to buy out the
landlords and allow the tenants to buy the land.
At this point, the threat of social agitation on the land issue having receded,
the ruling class would have been prepared to allow limited measures of selfgovernment - precisely to forestall any demand for independence. Yet only a
few years later when the Third Home Rule bill came before parliament a
fundamental schism opened up between the two major parties reflecting a
division within the ruling class.

Two elections in 1910 produced minority Liberal governments which had to

lean on other parties, including the Irish Parliamentary Party of Redmond, for a
majority. Redmond made Home Rule the price of his support. On 11 April 1912
Liberal Prime Minister Asquith introduced the Third Home Rule Bill.
The reaction from the Tories was swift and ferocious. Tory leader Bonar Law
linked with Dublin Unionist Edward Carson, who had served in the previous
Tory government and now sat on the opposition front bench, to organise to
resist this bill.
Ulster provided the centre for this resistance. As the Ulster Unionist Council,
with Carson as their figurehead, began to mobilise mass opposition, Bonar Law
publicly voiced his approval. On 20 July he spoke to a large crowd at Blenheim
Palace:
"I can imagine no length of resistance to which Ulster will go, which I should
not be ready to support and in which they will not be supported by an
overwhelming majority of the British people." (16)
In September Carson unveiled an Ulster Covenant with a pledge not to accept
a Home Rule parliament. 237,368 Ulstermen signed this declaration. Women
were made to sign a different but similar covenant and 234,046 did.
At the start of 1913 the Ulster Unionist Council launched an Ulster Volunteer
Force to be made up of 100,000 of those who had signed the covenant.
Each of these steps and the others which were to follow have been well
documented and are not in dispute. The real issue is why this unionist reaction
was promoted and assisted by the British Tories and by considerable sections
of the British ruling class.

Changed conditions
The answer lies in the changed conditions which existed both in Ireland and in
Britain since the period of consensus after 1903. A new threat had developed
in Ireland in the form of Larkinism. The British ruling class was at one with
William Martin Murphy and other Irish employers in trying to destroy this, to
them, particularly virulent form of new unionism. Those who rallied to the
Tory-Unionist resistance feared that concessions given in the context of this
social movement might only whet the appetite for further concessions, with,
for them, unthinkable consequences in Ireland, and unwelcome effects outside
Ireland.
At this time the British Empire covered one quarter of the continents and
encompassed 425 million people, over 300 million of them living in India. The
knock-on effects of events in Ireland on this restless mass of humanity was

always a prime consideration. It was no accident that among the most

prominent backers of Carson were those sections of the political and military
establishment most closely associated with maintaining British rule of India,
South Africa and other colonies and dominions. Historian Nicholas Mansergh in
his book The Irish Question concludes:
"The appeal for readiness and, if need be, resistance, was directed to Ulster
but it was not for Ulster. It was for the integrity of the Empire that Ulster was
to fight". (17)
Not just for the empire but for the most conservative and reactionary section
of the Establishment in Britain. Between 1909-1914 Britain was embroiled in a
social and constitutional crisis which split the ruling class, with one wing
prepared to use extra-parliamentary means to try to preserve the status quo.
To these people Ulster provided a stage on which they could act to bring the
Liberal government into line.

Labour unrest
During this period there was a major strike wave in Britain which involved
whole sections of the working class, an upsurge in struggle which has been
accurately labelled by historians as the 'Great Labour unrest'. Militancy was on
the rise and pressure was being applied on the Liberal government to make
substantial concessions. As events unfolded there was a growing fear among
the ruling class that the Liberals were going too far and might be pushed much
further.
In 1909 Liberal Chancellor Lloyd George introduced his so-called 'people's
budget', which was to finance the old age pension scheme, the government
had enacted the previous year. It included provisions for a tax on wealth,
including death duties and land taxes. These very rudimentary provisions for a
welfare state, the changes which Redmond opposed being applied to Ireland,
were dumped by the House of Lords using its constitutional veto. The Liberals
replied with a proposal to abolish this veto.
The two elections of 1910 were fought in the throes of this constitutional crisis.
Liberal victories cleared the way for a Parliament Bill introduced in April of that
year, which proposed to limit the Lords veto. In future it would be able to hold
up but not overrule legislation passed by the Commons. Further measures such
as an elected second chamber were considered but not brought forward. All of
this excited a furore of opposition from the more conservative wing of the
ruling class. Nonetheless the government's bill became law the following year,
the Lord's permanent veto was gone, and one consequence was that for the
first time Home Rule became a practical possibility.

Asquith's Home Rule Bill was being brought to parliament in April 1912, Bonar
Law, along with no less than 70 Conservative MPs, came to Belfast to a huge
opposition rally at Balmoral. Their concern was not just with Home Rule. It was
to use the Unionists as a cudgel against the Liberals. Bonar Law reminded his
Ulster audience that the opposition to Home Rule was linked to other
questions: "Once again you hold the pass, the pass for the empire... the
government have created by their Parliament Act a boom against you to split
you off from the help of the British people. You will burst that boom. That help
will come, and when the crisis is over men will say to you in words not unlike
those used by Pitt - you have saved yourselves by your exertions, and you will
save the empire by your example." (1a)
The workers movement was soon a target of this Unionist and Conservative
reaction. The summer of 1912 saw some 3,000 Catholics and several hundred
Protestant socialists and labour activists evicted from the shipyards, the
Sirocco factory and other Belfast workplaces.
The following year, with the Home Rule Bill still being debated, Bonar Law
issued a stern warning to the government that even if this legislation should
get through parliament, there were "things stronger than parliamentary
majorities." (19)
A taste of what these words might mean was given early in 1914, when the
Home Rule Bill was offered for its final reading. Churchill, then a prominent
Liberal, ordered troops to the north and was met with a mutiny by army
officers based at the Curragh in County Kildare. The government backed off
and rescinded its order.
The Curragh mutiny had a shock effect. It brought it home to both wings of the
establishment that the division between them risked the possibility of armed
conflict. There was pressure from elements on both sides for a compromise.
The idea of partition had been considered for some time. It was implicit in the
Unionist threat to set up an Ulster Provisional Government in the event of
Home Rule even though this was not put forward because they favoured a
separate state, but because they believed this threat would make the whole
scheme inoperable.
Churchill had privately argued for a separate deal for Ulster. Even before the
Curragh mutiny Liberal leaders had persuaded Redmond to accept the
temporary exclusion of some of the Ulster counties. In March 1912 Asquith
made this idea public when he spoke in parliament, offering exclusion for six
years. At the time Carson and the Tories rejected the idea - a "sentence of
death with a stay of execution of six years" (20) - was Carson's retort.

Then came the Curragh mutiny and the fear of civil war. Attitudes began to
change and all sides began to search in earnest for a compromise. Even Bonar
Law spoke about the need for a settlement by consent. A Times editorial on 30
April summed up the change in attitude of some who had been on the antiHome Rule side:
"We have constantly opposed the principle of Home Rule for Ireland and
continue to do so. We should regard any form of settlement on the lines
proposed, not with jubilation, but with sorrow. For us too it would spell defeat
and not victory. Yet there are some defeats more honourable than victory and
we place the preservation of the internal peace of these realms, and the
salvation of the Empire from disaster, above the cause of a single parliament
for the United Kingdom.- (21)
There was general pressure for talks to provide a solution. The Home Rule Bill
went through the Commons in May but there was an understanding that there
would be some amendment dealing with the position of Ulster. In July a
conference was held involving government and opposition, unionists and
nationalists, to discuss this issue. Both British parties wanted a compromise
but they could not get Carson and Redmond to agree on the size of the
excluded area, particularly the fate of Fermanagh and Tyrone.
It is probable that an agreement could eventually have been reached through
further negotiation. Both Irish parties would have come under pressure from
their erstwhile British allies to strike a deal.
Home Rule would have been applied to part of Ireland, with either four
counties or six counties excluded. On the length of the exclusion some
compromise could have been arrived at, perhaps neither permanent exclusion
nor the six years 'commuted death sentence' but a mechanism for the situation
to be reviewed within a certain time.
For the working class it would have been a disastrous outcome. Sectarian
divisions would have been reinforced and the task of creating a party of labour
which had just been accepted by the ITUC would have been made immense.
The Redmondites had set out with limited objectives and would have settled for
limited results. The real interest of the Unionists had been in scuppering the
whole question of Home Rule, not in partitioning the country. It would have
been very much a second best option.
For the British ruling class who had closed ranks in securing a deal it would
have been a result born of pragmatism. The division among them had led one
section of them to go to the brink of civil war in Ireland. The compromise of
partition seemed the best way to avoid a conflict which they had been

instrumental in unleashing. When the issue arose again in 1919 and 1920 it
was for very different reasons that the British ruling class once again came up
with the answer of partition.

Unanswered questions
Would agreement have been reached? Could this have been sold to the UVF or
the Irish Volunteers who were still busy mobilising? We cannot answer these
questions with certainty. Outside events interfered to jolt the frame of history
in another direction.
Days after the all-party conference broke down, Britain issued an ultimatum to
Germany to pull its troops out of Belgium and war became inevitable. All
parties to the Irish conflict agreed to suspend their differences and support the
war effort. The Home Rule Bill became law but with it there was a commitment
to further discussion on the outstanding areas of difference before it could be
implemented.
Nothing ever came of this. True in the latter part of the war, from July 1917
until May 1918, an Irish Convention was summoned by Prime Minister Lloyd
George but this was just a talking shop set up to keep the Irish occupied
during the war and to encourage the United States to come into the fighting on
the British side.
The deliberations of this Convention - on the shape of a new Home Rule
government - were by then an irrelevance. Home Rule was no longer an
acceptable basis for a settlement. Redmond died in March 1918, before the
Convention reported, but his cause of limited self-government was already
dead before him. His party was being displaced by Sinn Fein (who were not
involved in the Convention) and Labour - which of these would be predominant
was not yet decided. The call for Home Rule was replaced by the demand for
outright independence.

British withdrawal?
Among the pro-unionist school of historians who paint a picture of the British
ruling class as a neutral arbitrator between warring Irish factions, there are
those who go further and say that the real interests of British capitalism, at
this time and since, lay in complete withdrawal. This is a completely hollow
idea which sits particularly uncomfortably alongside the stormy events of 1918
and after.
The 1918 general election resulted in the formation of a coalition government
between a wing of the Liberals led by Lloyd George and the Conservatives led
by Bonar Law. This was a government of crisis faced by social ferment and

upheaval on every front. Its uppermost concern was to withstand and defeat
the rising tide of revolution and to defend, untouched as far as possible, the
status quo.
To the call for independence for Ireland this government answered with an
emphatic and unequivocal 'no'. There may have been divisions among the
ruling class on Irish policy before the war, but now, in their determination to
resist the clamour for a separate republic, there was unanimity.
There were two main reasons for this stance. Firstly there were the direct
interests, strategic and economic, which British imperialism had in retaining
overall control of this its oldest and strategically most vital colony. The
country's industrial base, heavily concentrated in the north east, functioned as
a component of British capitalism. The powerful magnates who owned the
shipyards, the factories and the mills were regarded and regarded themselves
as part of the British capitalist class. Imperialism wished to hold onto this
industrial prize.
Ireland's strategic importance lay in its proximity to the 'mother country'.
Events in other colonies were somewhat blurred by distance. Canada was
3,000 miles away, South Africa 6,000, Australia 10,000, while Ireland lay on
Britain's doorstep.
During the war Britain had been able to draw on its resources and had relied
heavily on the use of its ports. There was a consensus among the government,
the military establishment and the capitalists themselves that in military terms
Ireland ranked above the other colonies and dominions as essential for the
defence strategy of Britain.
The second key factor determining the attitude of the British ruling class was
their fear of the knock-on effects of independence. Before the war the
Conservatives had baulked at Home Rule partly because they believed it would
loosen the ties of the Empire. Independence, especially in the context of postwar unrest, made this a far more real concern, one now shared by both major
parties and by the ruling class as a whole.
After the war the Empire was enlarged through the formation of British
protectorates in Iraq and the Middle East. It is true that they withdrew from
Afghanistan and from Persia but this was only under pressure from US and
French imperialism and was part of the re-division of the post Ottoman world.
British policy in their new protectorate of Iraq showed clearly their attitude to
the rights of subject peoples to independence. Despite an international
agreement that the Kurds should have the right to a separate Kurdish state,
the new British rulers refused this to Iraqi Kurds. In this case direct control of

the oil-fields of Iraqi Kurdistan was a more important concern than the rights
of the Kurds.
During the war India had been deceptively quiet. But as with Ireland this
quickly changed when the war ended. In 1917 India had been offered a
measure of self-government, something close to the dominion status of
Canada, New Zealand, Australia and South Africa, but to be implemented by
what the British called 'gradualness', in other words at a snail's pace

Oppression in India
The masses of the Indian sub-continent sought independence and were not
satisfied with this step. The attitude of the British ruling class to this demand
was the same as to the similar demand for independence for Ireland - outright
rejection and brutal coercion.
They introduced the Rowlatt Act in 1919. This instituted virtual martial law in
much of India and provoked massive opposition. A one-day general strike and
day of action, what the Indian people call a Hartal, was called for 6 April 1919.
It led to a shut down, to protests and demonstrations and to some violence.
In one incident five Englishmen were killed in Amritsar and a missionary lady
was attacked. The commander of the local British garrison General Dyer
declared martial law. A week later 10,000 people protested against the martial
law decree which among other things banned public meetings. They were
surrounded by troops who opened fire with machine guns and massacred 379
people. The same General Dyer who ordered his troops to fire and who refused
to allow doctors into the area to treat the wounded also ordered every Indian
neighbour of the missionary who had been attacked, to crawl along on their
bellies any time they moved up or down their street.
The fact that a large body of the English establishment went out of their way to
support the actions of the troops in Amritsar, indicated clearly what the
prevalent attitude was to the idea of withdrawal from, and independence for,
colonies such as India, Egypt or Ireland. The House of Lords went so far as to
pass a motion condoning General Dyer's actions.
It was not just the effects in the colonies which the government and the ruling
class feared. Their overriding concern through this whole period was with the
prospect of socialist revolution - in Europe, in Ireland and at home.
Much of central Europe in particular emerged from the war in a state of
revolutionary ferment. For the capitalists there was no doubt where the source
of the contagion lay - in the fact of Bolshevik rule in Russia. The British
capitalists favoured joining other powers in military action to aid White reaction
in Russia. Within the British cabinet there were differences.

Lloyd George was hesitant about intervention but it was the views of prointerventionists like Churchill, who spoke contemptuously of the "foul
baboonery" (22) of Bol shevism, which prevailed. Saving Europe from
Bolshevism was the number one concern of the time. Speaking at the postwar
Paris Peace Conference, Lloyd George warned his fellow statesmen:
"Europe is in a revolutionary mood. The whole of the existing social, political
and economic order is being called into question by the mass of people from
one end of Europe to the other." (23)
A secret report to the British cabinet in November 1918 described a;
"very widespread feeling among the working class that Thrones have become
anachronisms, and that the Soviet may still prove to be the best form of
Government for a democracy. "(24)
Throughout 1919 the Foreign Office based itself in Paris. Lloyd George spent
much of his time there. All this leaves little doubt as to what were the main
concerns of the government during this, the period when its scheme for the
partition of Ireland was being hatched.
A profound radicalisation was also taking place in Britain. It was reflected in
the 1918 general election in which the Labour vote went up from the eight per
cent won in 1910 to 22.2 per cent. Labour, with 59 seats, were now the main
opposition.
Through 1919 and 1920 the government was besieged with strikes. There were
protests and strikes among soldiers who as they de-commissioned found that
'the land fit for heroes' was nothing more than the same slums, the same dole
queues and the same exploitation as before the "great sacrifice".
There was a major confrontation with railway workers. Miners, disappointed
that a special report, the Shankey Report, had not recommended
nationalisation of the pits, demanded that the TUC call a general strike. Troops
were deployed in Glasgow to help crush the 1919 engineering strike. Shortly
after this strike ended a new menace emerged in the form of the Triple
Alliance, an agreement by railworkers, miners and dockers to stand together in
struggles.
A letter from Lord Milner, a prominent figure in the establishment, to the Field
Marshal of the General Staff, Sir Henry Wilson, showed the concern felt in such
quarters about these strikes and about the government's inability to halt them:
"We are in chaos in England as regards strikes, which under Lloyd George's
regime are being dealt with by every sort of men and every sort of
department, each acting on a different principle from the others." (25)

Threat of revolution
The social and national revolt in Ireland threatened to overspill in the direction
of socialist revolution. Should that happen it would trigger revolution in Britain
also. There were many twists and turns in the application of British policy
between 1918 and the signing of the Treaty which gave recognition to the new
26 county state. But there was a single strategy. This was to derail and defeat
the revolutionary movement of the working class, to disrupt the growing unity
being displayed by workers, Catholic and Protestant and in the process to halt
the independence movement.
The 1918 strike against conscription woke the British government to the
dangerous situation beginning to unfold in Ireland. Their first response was to
try to keep the labour movement in safe hands and at a safe distance from
Sinn Fein.
100,000 Irish soldiers were demobilised after 1918. Advisers to the
government recommended unemployment benefit and reconstruction grants be
paid in order "to keep the soldiers out of Sinn Fein and Bolshevism". (26) Years
later little had been done, discontent remained among the war veterans, and
many became important participants in the working class struggles.
While trying to wean the union leaders away from Sinn Fein the government
was, at first, opposed to any concessions on the national issue. Given the
general radicalisation they feared that even the mildest gesture on their part
would merely whet the appetite for more. Lloyd George was at first convinced
that even the limited degree of self government proposed in the 1914 Home
Rule Bill might dangerously encourage those demanding independence and a
republic. He wrote to Bonar Law in 1918 and expressed his view that:
"such an attempt could not succeed and it must be postponed until the
condition of Ireland makes it possible". (27)
The government's remedy for the condition of Ireland was to 'improve it',
General Dyer style, by coercion. The Dail set up by Sinn Fein was banned. To
the military campaign launched by the newly formed IRA it replied with
curfews, with internment and with a policy of military reprisals.
A Restoration of Order Act passed in August 1920 allowed court martial for
treason and replaced coroner's inquests with closed military courts of inquiry.
It was martial law by another name. "If it is war they (the IRA) want, they
cannot complain if we apply the rules of war" (28) was the justification put
forward by Lloyd George.
While there was no serious let up in this policy at any time during the
independence struggle, there was a growing recognition that on its own it

would not do. In fact, it could be counter-productive. In Ireland it was bringing

the working class more and more into the national struggle - as the 1920
strike over prisoners showed. It was also arousing opposition in Britain. There,
the Labour Party eventually organised a mass campaign of some 500 well
attended rallies all over the country, demanding peace in Ireland.
The army chiefs were not confident that they could hold the line by military
means. The fact that they had to draft in irregulars, the notorious Black and
Tans, was a sign that the army was becoming over-stretched. At the time of
their deployment, Sir Henry Wilson expressed his worries about military overcommitment. "In no single theatre are we strong enough, not in Ireland, nor in
England, nor on the Rhine". His uncomforting conclusion was that, if there was
industrial trouble in Britain, "we shall be boiled". (29)
The significance of the 1919 Belfast engineering strike may be lost on some
modern historians. It was understood by the British administration in Ireland at
the time. The Viceroy of Ireland, Lord French, recommended that the
government undertake a change of policy as a result of this strike. In a
memorandum to the cabinet he commented:
"I did not however, consider that the time was ripe for a move in the direction
of an immediate release of the prisoners until the strikes in the north occurred
and a very dangerous crisis was at hand which might plunge the whole country
in (sic) disaster. Bolshevik propaganda was undoubtedly at the root of those
strikes, and it came to my knowledge that a close alliance exists between the
Bolshevik element and the advanced Sinn Fein sections ... Moreover, I found
out that this junction with the Bolsheviks was condemned in the strongest
manner by the real Sinn Fein leaders such as John McNeill, De Valera and
Griffiths (sic)". (30)
French had come to recognize that the greatest threat in Ireland came from a
united working class movement which could draw towards it the most radical
sections of Sinn Fein. The significance of the Belfast strike was not just that it
united the working class of Ireland, but that it was part of the industrial
movement in Britain also. The mainly Protestant workers of Belfast threatened
not to be an instrument of division, but to provide a bridge directly linking the
movement in Ireland with that of Britain.

chapter 6

partition carried through

The 1914 Home Rule Bill was technically on the statute book and the
government was required to come up with a decision on whether to

scrap it or put it into operation. In October 1919 a special cabinet

committee was set up to look into this, but in reality to come up with
an answer to the threat not just of independence, but of socialist
revolution. Lord French was one of those who was appointed to serve
on it. On November 4th it reported:
"In view of the situation in Ireland itself, of public opinion in Great Britain and
still more of public opinion in the Dominions and the United States of America,
they cannot recommend the policy either of repealing or of postponing the
Home Rule Act of 1914." (31)
In advocating a new Home Rule Bill they recommended significant changes on
the old. The 1914 Bill had proposed a single parliament for Ireland but with the
north or part of the north to be excluded. The new proposal was for two
parliaments, each with similar powers to those envisaged in 1914, and with a
Council of Ireland to control matters of common concern. The powers of this
council could be enlarged with the agreement of both parliaments. After
consideration it proposed that the northern area should be made up of six of
the nine Ulster counties.
The purpose of this was to partition the country so as to divide the working
class, while at the same time allowing the government to pursue its tactic of
splitting Sinn Fein. It was not unionist pressure which persuaded the
government to set up a parliament in the north, a measure of 'Home Rule'
which unionists had never asked for or desired. This, and the associated
proposal for a Council of Ireland was to allow imperialism to divide the country
while giving an impression that their policy was really to see Ireland as one
self-governing entity. This was the bait which they hoped Griffith, perhaps De
Valera, and other moderate Sinn Fein leaders would swallow. With the working
class divided and weakened, and with Sinn Fein split, the government would
then be able to use coercion to tame those who stood against.
This is the real meaning of the deliberations of the special cabinet committee,
and of the Government of Ireland Act which implemented their main proposals
and brought about partition. At this particular moment the 'historical
separateness of Ulster' currently being exaggerated by historians was being
melted down in the furnace of the class struggle. Partition was imposed to reestablish it.
As the Government of Ireland Act made its way through the Westminster
parliament in 1920, unionists in Ulster prepared for its implementation by a
ferocious assault on the labour movement and a determined effort to break the
unity of the working class. Belfast Labour would still have been exultant at its
success in the 1920 local elections when Carson made it the target of his

venom at that year's Twelfth of July Orange platform. "The most insidious
method is tacking on the Sinn Fein question and the Irish Republican question
to the labour question".
At this point of his speech a voice from the crowd reminded him that; "Ireland
is the most Labour centre in the United Kingdom". Carson did not contradict
this: "I know that. What I say is this - these men who come forward posing as
the friends of labour care no more about labour than does the man in the
moon.... Beware of their insidious methods. We in Ulster will tolerate no Sinn
Fein, no Sinn Fein organisation, no Sinn Fein methods." (32)
Carson's words and those of other unionist leaders were intended to invite
attacks on the organisations of the working class. By lumping Labour and Sinn
Fein together in the same breath he gave the excuse. Small organisations
made up of Protestant bigots, such as the Belfast Protestant Association, or the
Ulster Ex-servicemen's Association, took these leaders at their word.
Late in July systematic expulsions began from the two Belfast shipyards, from
engineering firms and from some linen mills and smaller factories in Belfast.
These were more extensive attacks than in 1912, more than 7,000 workers
were expelled as opposed to some 3,000 then. Of those expelled an estimated
1,800 were Protestant. These, and many of the Catholic victims, were trade
union, labour and socialist activists. A delegate from the printers trade union
told the 1920 British TUC conference:
"Every man who took part in the trade union movement and in the labour
movement has been absolutely driven from the (Queens) Island." (33)
These expulsions, which Carson publicly commended, were a turning point for
the labour movement. The class offensive begun in 1918 was halted, in the
north at least. The tendency to united action by workers, Catholic and
Protestant, north and south was thrown into reverse.
Sinn Fein's response, which was to organise a boycott of Belfast goods through
the rest of Ireland, only helped to confirm and widen the growing separation of
Protestants in the north from the rest of the working class. This was especially
so when, despite the initial opposition of Cathal O'Shannon and some on the
left of the union, the ITGWU gave its active support to the boycott.

Cuts in pay
The workers left behind in the Belfast factories were rewarded by the
employers with a round of pay cuts. Left leaderless by the expulsions they
could not resist or even take part in resistance. When, for example, the British
shipbuilding employers withdrew a pay rise they had given to joiners in May,
joiners in Britain went on strike but those in Belfast voted not to take part. In

the 1919 engineering dispute and other past struggles the Belfast workers had
been in the vanguard. Now the marvellous unity demonstrated during this
'Belfast Soviet' was broken.
Although the industrial movement in the rest of the country continued, with
land seizures, occupations, strikes, even local `soviets' - it did not decisively
end until the defeat of a series of important strikes by dockers, farm labourers
in County Waterford and other well organised sections of the working class in
1923 - the ruling class were successful in removing the biggest potential threat
to their rule, the possibility of a united movement of the working class of
Ireland as a whole.
The Government of Ireland Act did not succeed in its other objective of
splitting Sinn Fein - not even the most moderate of Sinn Fein leaders could be
persuaded to switch from the carriage of independence to that of 'Home Rule,
plus partition', even if it did have the words 'Council of Ireland' embroidered on
its side.
The only immediate option now left to the government was to try for a military
solution. Coercion, reprisals, repression became ever more the watchwords of
its policy. On December 23rd the Government of Ireland Act became law amid
a sustained effort to subdue the southern counties by force. Two weeks earlier,
on December 10, counties Cork, Kerry, Limerick and Tipperary had been placed
under martial law. Two days later part of Cork city was burnt by the Black and
Tans in reprisal for an IRA ambush. The new year opened in a similar vein. On
4th January martial law was decreed in counties Clare, Kilkenny, Waterford and
Wexford.
Although it had not achieved all that the ruling class had hoped, the
Government of Ireland Act did put them in a more advantageous position. With
the fact of a divided territory and a divided working class it was easier to lean
on one part of the country while dealing blows against the social and national
revolt in the other. It was in their best interests to bolster the new northern
state. During and after its painful delivery British imperialism spared no
resource, material or other, to help it through its infancy.
Not so, say the school of 'Ulster separateness', 'inevitable partition' and 'British
neutrality'. To these people partition was forced by Protestant resistance.
British imperialism merely shuffled the cards which the various participants in
Ireland handed to them. They had no particular interest either in the formation
of the northern state or in maintaining it. Not only where they prepared to
undo partition, this was their preferred course of action.
So runs the argument. Because there is a reaction against the republican
oversimplification that imperialism divided the country without reference to

Ireland or the Irish, it is an argument which has recently gained some support.
But it simply does not fit in with what happened.
During the pre-war crisis the unionists had concentrated on developing
resistance in Ulster because they thought this the best way to destroy the
whole idea of Home Rule. The British put forward the idea of partition towards
the end of this crisis at a time when the Tories and Liberals were seeking a
compromise. They felt the proposal would leave the unionists with no choice
but to accept, because the very nature of their campaign in Ulster would make
it difficult for them to explain to public opinion in Britain why they should
refuse this 'offer'.
When Lloyd George again raised the issue in 1916 the unionists found
themselves in a similar quandary. Carson felt they could not reasonably object
and still keep the British public behind them. He persuaded a reluctant Ulster
Unionist Council, for the first time, to back this idea. Even then many unionists
looked to partition only in the hope that it would bring down the whole Home
Rule idea.
What they had come to was a policy of exclusion of Ulster or some part of
Ulster. The modified idea contained in the Government of Ireland Act that there
should be two states and two parliaments was thought up and put forward by
the British cabinet for the reasons already explained. The unionists had never
sought, demanded or campaigned for a separate state.
As for the idea that it was unionist pressure which forced the hand of the
government, the real truth is that no such organised pressure existed. There
were none of the mass rallies, seditious speeches or armed volunteers of the
1911-14 crisis. The unionist leadership did not feel that this earlier resistance
had worked, they felt their English 'allies' had manoeuvred against them, and
they were not wont to repeat it.
After 1918 the remnants of the UVF handed many of its arms over to military
custody. In 1919 Carson issued threats to revive the UVF but nothing was
done.
Those extreme loyalist organisations which did exist were a far cry from the
pre-war UVF. They had more of the character of lumpen gangs made up mainly
of unemployed Protestants who were taught to blame Catholics and labourites
for their plight. They did not mobilise around grand appeals to resist Home
Rule. Rather their sordid business was to act as shock troops against the
labour movement. Take the Ulster Ex-servicemen's Association as an example.
Until 1919 there had been two organisations for war veterans in Belfast - the
'Comrades of the Great War' and 'The Discharged Soldiers and Sailors
Federation', commonly known as 'The Federation'. Dawson Bates who was

Secretary of the Ulster Unionist Council wrote to Carson complaining that the
'Comrades' was "very socialist in its management" (34) and that 'The
Federation' was going the same way.
The Ulster Ex-servicemen's Association was a rightwing loyalist split from 'The
Comrades'. It grew in 1920 as did other seedling fascist organisations and was
among the instigators of the August 1920 workplace expulsions.

Unionist leaders
The attitude of the unionist leaders was to encourage these organisations in
their attacks on Catholics and on the labour movement, but always from a
distance. They let the UESA, the Ulster Protestant Association and others do
their dirty work for them while they kept their hands clean.
At the same time as they applauded, sometimes secretly, the actions of these
lumpen gangs, the well-to-do and respectable unionist leaders were concerned
that they might get out of hand, going too far with pogroms against Catholics.
There were plenty of signs that the UESA, BPA and others were keen to
develop their influence further. This was especially so after the August
expulsions when they moved to set up vigilante groups in some areas, but
there was evidence of it earlier.
While leaning on these lumpen bands the unionist hierarchy preferred that they
would have a force more directly under their control. In July 1920, in the same
breath as they invited attacks on socialists and Catholics in the workplaces,
leading unionists began to take concrete steps to reform the UVF.
This decision had nothing whatever to do with pressurising the government to
partition the country or give them a state. The Government of Ireland Act was
by now all but law. The decision was taken amid rising concern that troops
would have to be withdrawn from the north to quell strikes in Britain. Knowing
that they were to be given a state, the unionists wanted to have a ready-made
instrument of coercion which they could use to keep its citizens, Protestant and
Catholic, some of their more zealous supporters included, in line. While
beginning to re-establish the UVF, with mixed success, unionist leader James
Craig approached the British government with a proposal for a special Ulster
constabulary. On 1 September he sent a memorandum to the cabinet which, of
course, spoke about the need to have a force to counter Sinn Fein but added
that it would also be;
"partly to restrain their own followers from acts which are regrettable and in
large measure ineffective.... a special constabulary would ensure that as large
a proportion of the population as possible were brought under discipline." (35)

There was concern at this proposal in lower circles of government. Officials in

Dublin Castle pointed out that it would inevitably be a Protestant force which
would engage in its own 'disciplined' pogrom.
But within the top circles of government Craig was pushing at an open door.
The earlier steps to re-form the UVF had only been taken after consultations
with the government through Sir Hamar Greenwood, Chief Secretary for
Ireland. He had told the Unionists that Lloyd George was privately in support of
the idea.
Ministers had no illusions about what would be the nature of such a force.
Indeed its sectarian make-up was part of its appeal. It would provide an
extension of the divide and rule tactic underlying the Government of Ireland
Act.
Churchill argued that 'Protestants' should be given weapons and "charged with
maintaining law and order and policing the six counties" .(36) On September
2nd Bonar Law wrote to Lloyd George:
"We cannot afford to have everyone in Ireland against us and I think now the
time has come when we ought to make special arrangements to let the
loyalists in Ulster be in a position to preserve order there". (37)
This sentiment re-echoes that of General Lake, one hundred and twenty years
earlier, when he boasted of helping divide Orangemen and United Irishmen and
argued that Orangemen should keep their weapons:
"Were the Orangemen disarmed or put down, or were they coalesced with any
other party, the whole of Ulster would be as bad as Antrim and Down". (38)
It is in line with that age-old policy of divide and rule and in total contradiction
to the idea of a 'neutral' British administration.
By September 8th the decision to set up a force of special constabulary had
been taken. This decision was implemented by the British who appointed a
senior civil servant, Sir Ernest Clark, to carry it through. Clark acted in close
liaison with the leaders of the UVF and with no pretence that the new force
would be anything other than the UVF in different uniforms. The arms and
finance for it came from the Westminster parliament who retained direct
control over it until November 1921, months after the Northern Ireland
government had taken office.

chapter 7

treaty negotiations
Proponents of this general idea have one last argument. During the
Treaty negotiations with Sinn Fein leaders in the autumn of 1921 Lloyd
George was prepared to transfer those powers over Northern Ireland
held at Westminster to a Dublin parliament. Proof that the British had
not wanted partition and that they wished to relieve themselves of the
burden of Ireland as a whole?
In fact what did happen demonstrates none of this. By the middle of 1921 it
was clear that a policy of coercion alone was at best going to involve a long
war of attrition against the national movement. The dangerous consequences
of this lay in the increasing outcry in Britain, particularly from the labour
movement, at the reprisals and atrocities which were becoming commonplace.
Ireland was becoming an issue in every by-election and was providing a focus
for opposition to the government.
While coercion could be maintained, and was also in part effective in curbing
the IRA, the government, concerned at the effects of a protracted war, began
to consider other options. Once again they looked for proposals which might
split the Sinn Fein leadership and bring its more malleable sections over to the
side of compromise.
The idea of dominion status for Ireland, or for part of Ireland, an idea
previously rejected, was put forward as a possibility. Canada, Australia, South
Africa and New Zealand were already dominions, that is they enjoyed selfgovernment but remained within the Empire and had a special relationship with
Britain. The idea had been put forward in relation to India during the war.
By June Lloyd George had come round to the view that De Valera and other
Sinn Fein leaders would accept a settlement short of a republic. He wrote to De
Valera and to Northern Ireland's first Prime Minister, Craig, inviting them to
discussions in London. In July the government offered the IRA a truce during
which negotiations would take place.
For their part the IRA were militarily at a low ebb and felt in no position to
refuse this offer. Their campaign based mainly on isolated acts of terror and
largely divorced from the movement of the working class, was not the best or
most effective method of carrying out a struggle. Its military commander,
Michael Collins, wrote later to Sir Hamar Greenwood admitting:

"You had us dead beat. We could not have lasted another three weeks. When
we were told of the offer of a truce we were astounded. We thought you must
have gone mad." (39)
In July the British made De Valera a formal offer of dominion status. It was
posed as the same status as other dominions but in reality what the British
were offering was considerably less in certain aspects. Dominion status in
Ireland was to be subject to conditions - guarantees for British defence
including access to the Irish ports, the Irish to be responsible for a proportion
of Britain's national debt, free trade to be preserved, and the Northern Ireland
parliament to retain its powers except by their own consent. Of these
conditions the Times accurately commented: "Broadly they represent the
extreme limit of concession to which the British people is likely to allow this
government, or indeed any other British government, to go." (40)
Negotiations proper between Irish and British delegations began in London in
October. At one point during the discussions - and this is what modern
historians seize on - Lloyd George did appear to pressure Craig to accept that
Northern Ireland's subordination to Westminster become a subordination to a
new all-Ireland parliament.
The reason why this came about and what actually resulted are both
instructive. Both sets of negotiators were keen to be seen as occupying the
high ground so as to win what both saw as the vital battle of courting public
opinion in Britain. The Irish felt that they would be on weak ground if the
discussion concentrated on dominion status and they were seen to be
intransigent on the British offer. They tried to concentrate the discussion on
partition which they felt to be the British government's weakest ground.
For their part the British were anxious that if there were to be a breakdown, it
should not be over the issue of partition. Earlier Lloyd George had advised the
king that if the discussions were to be concentrated and perhaps bogged down
on the status of Ulster, if would have dangerous consequences, not on the Irish
settlement only, but on India and elsewhere". (41)
Breakdown over partition would mean the British would have to return to a
policy of coercion over what would be presented by the nationalist side as the
obstinate refusal of Ulster Unionists to budge. If there was to be a return to
'war' far better and clearer, from their point of view, that it should be on the
issue of Ireland remaining within the Empire. It could then be presented to the
British public as a war made necessary by the obstinate refusal of Irish
nationalists to accept the 'reasonable' offer of dominion status.
In order to shift the ground of the discussions Lloyd George offered that if the
Irish would accept his proposals for dominion status, he would go to the

unionists and try to persuade them to go under an all-Ireland parliament. A

remark made by him on 25 October shows his reasoning: "If they accept all
subject to unity we are in a position to go to Craig; if they don't the break is
not on Ulster. My proposal is put Ulster on one side and ask Sinn Fein for their
views in writing." (42)
His whole purpose was to take partition out of the discussions until such time
as the Irish delegation said yea or nay to dominion status and to remaining
within the Empire. A wily negotiator he approached members of the opposing
delegations separately. It was when he had extracted the assurance that he
wanted from Arthur Griffith and knew that at the very least the Irish delegation
would split, that he wrote to Craig and made the proposal that is now being
cited as proof of British neutrality in the whole matter of Ireland's internal
politics.
Lloyd George met with Craig on 5th and 7th November. By the end of the first
meeting Craig was in broad agreement with the latest government proposals
but with certain important provisions. One was that responsibility for security
would immediately be transferred from Westminster to the Northern Ireland
parliament. This was done with effect from 22nd November. Further
discussions between Craig and security chiefs ended with the Ulster Special
Constabulary being given an extra 20,000 rifles and 5,000,000 rounds of
ammunition.
Craig was also assured that, relieved of the imperial contribution, the North's
tax burden would be lighter under an all Ireland parliament. The way to get a
Presbyterian, Lloyd George assured his secretary, is through his pocketbook.
Craig seemed to be on the verge of accepting the whole proposal, yet two days
later at the second meeting, he flatly refused Lloyd George's offer.

Bonar Law
This abrupt about face came about it seems through the intervention of Bonar
Law. A few months earlier in March, Bonar Law had resigned from the
government as 'ill health grounds'. His place as Tory leader was taken by
Neville Chamberlain.
By the time of Lloyd George's meetings with Craig he had returned from a
period on 'recuperation' in the South of France, his political ambitions
sufficiently refreshed to consider a challenge for the Tory leadership. Once
again Ireland seemed to offer him a convenient vehicle. He spoke out against
any weakening of Ulster's position and threatened to lead a revolt from within
the Tory party. Bolstered by such a powerful ally, Craig felt confident enough to
reject Lloyd George's proposal.

That was as far as the proposal got. An alternative suggestion was put to the
Irish to entice them to settle. Dominion status would mean the setting up of a
Free State. The northern area would be included but the northern parliament
would have the right to vote itself out within one month. If they did so a
Boundary Commission would be set up to 'revise' the border between the two
states "in accordance with the wishes of the inhabitants". (43)
This was sold to Griffith as a ploy to deceive the unionists. The Northern state,
suggested the British, would lose so much territory that it would not be able to
survive. In fact the Boundary Commission when it was established was
deliberately biased towards the unionists and transferred no territory to the
South.
Once again the pro-Unionist challenge of Bonar Law became a factor in the
negotiations. On 12 November Lloyd George suggested to Griffith that Bonar
Law was about to lead a challenge at a Conservative conference in Liverpool
which might unseat Chamberlain and so upset the whole process of
negotiations. He claimed that the existing Tory leadership were planning to
ward off this challenge by announcing their support for the idea of a boundary
commission - but that to be able to do so successfully, they would need to be
able to say that it would not be opposed by the Irish delegation.
The conference was to be held on 17 November giving Griffith only a few days
to ruminate on the issue. In the end he gave way and declared his acceptance
of this proposal. The threat from Bonar Law, which Lloyd George conveniently
exaggerated, came to little at the Tory conference -but by this stage Griffith
had given his assent and the issue of partition was effectively taken out of the
negotiations.
Lloyd George's device to switch discussion to the fundamental issue of
dominion status, worked and worked well. Although the idea of an all-Ireland
parliament was gone, Griffith's acceptance that Ireland would stay within the
Empire was there on record. The Irish delegation was split and the way was
opened to agreement. On December 6th a treaty was signed.
This is the real explanation of Lloyd George's offer of an all-Ireland parliament.
That it was made in no way negates the idea that British imperialism
partitioned Ireland for the reasons we have so far mentioned many times. By
the time Lloyd George met Craig with this proposal partition had already
served its purpose. It had helped forestall the prospect of socialist revolution.
It had also helped disorientate the independence struggle.

British interests protected

When Griffith capitulated to what were to be the terms of the Treaty regarding
dominion status, the idea of independence had been abandoned. British
imperialism had not started out with the intention of granting dominion status.
But dominion status plus the key limiting conditions meant that their strategic
economic and military interests were protected.
On this basis Lloyd George's suggestion of an all-Ireland parliament would
have been accepted by a section of the ruling class. The guarantee of free
trade meant that the northern industries would not be cut off from the rest of
the British capitalist economy. The military safeguards spelt out in the eventual
Treaty allowed the British imperial forces access to "such harbours and other
facilities" (53) as the governments would agree in times of peace and the
British would 'require' in times of war.
The job of partition in bringing the national and social revolution in Ireland to
heel was accomplished when these terms were accepted. The only worry was
that dominion status would be merely the first step; that an Irish government
would use its self-governing powers to move towards independence at a later
stage. From this point of view there was some advantage in the idea of adding
into the state a powerful minority which could be relied on to firmly oppose any
and every such move. Lloyd George's proposal may have been nothing more
than a ruse on his part but it was still a quite forward-looking notion, too
forward looking to be acceptable to Bonar Law, to many Tories or probably to
the bulk of the British establishment at that time.
It has been necessary to deal with the new arguments about partition at length
and in detail. At first glance this might seem like an indulgence but it is not.
Without clarity on this question it would be quite impossible to go on to work
out a programme on the central aspect of the national issue which confronts us
today, that is the continued existence of the border.

section two

forever divided?
chapter 8

two sectarian states

Following partition the new state in the North consolidated itself using
coercion and repression and with the assistance of generous amounts
of finance and weaponry from Britain.

The first elections to the new Northern Ireland parliament were held in 1921.
Labour candidates, standing in Belfast, found their meetings and campaign
activities attacked and disrupted by right wing loyalists from organisations like
the UESA. In the general sectarian atmosphere which prevailed, the 1920 local
election successes were but a memory and they polled badly.
The Unionists won an outright majority and set about ensuring that this would
always be the way it would be. They strengthened their grip through a policy of
blatant discrimination and by the gerrymandering of electoral boundaries.
Some of the new generation of dissident or 'fringe' Unionists decry this as a
'mistake' and a lost opportunity. David Irvine of the Progressive Unionists, for
example, has argued that Carson warned Unionists that they would be judged
on how well they treated the minority.
In truth the early Unionist policy cannot be explained away as just a mistake.
Gerrymandering was necessary to take councils such as Derry, out of
nationalist hands. Discrimination was necessary to make Protestant workers
feel that they would receive preferential treatment and so encourage them to
throw their lot in with their unionist employers rather than with Catholic
workers. The whole rotten system was necessary in order to keep workers
divided, and to ensure that politics always equalled religion. This was no
'normal' state. Should the Unionist lose their majority, the state itself would be
threatened. Their 'ill treatment' of the minority was not an error but was their
only way of guaranteeing themselves a permanent majority in the new
parliament.
That there was no mass uprising by Catholics against their inclusion in the new
state, not even in border counties like Fermanagh and Tyrone, indicates the
scale of the defeat inflicted by partition on both the social and the national
struggles. The majority of Catholics felt they had no option but to accept things
as they were for the time being, and to hope that the outcome of the ongoing
war in the South would see a change. Then, left abandoned by the signing of
the Treaty, their only hope rested with the Boundary Commission. After this
body delivered a unionist verdict, they were left to face the reality that
partition was firmly in place and that they were going to remain on the 'British'
side of the border.
The history of northern nationalism, whether of its military or its constitutional
arms, has been, ever since, a history of failure to come up with any strategy or
any means to undo this situation.
In the southern area it took civil war between the conservative wing of the
republican movement, who supported the Treaty, and the more militant antiTreaty wing, before the new state could firmly establish itself.

Following the defeat of the anti-Treatyites, the subsiding after 1923 of the
revolutionary wave of workers' struggles begun in 1918 allowed the most
reactionary elements of the national movement, together with the big ranchers
and businessmen to consolidate their grip. Like their Northern counterparts
they used the tools of coercion and repression to construct a sectarian state.
Southern Unionists were nearly all from the old Protestant ascendancy. In
order to protect their property and their social status, they quickly
accommodated themselves to the new state. This fact does nothing to disguise
its sectarian character. The 1937 constitution gave formal expression to the
Catholic sectarianism which had been there from the outset. It recognised
various churches but gave special recognition to the Catholic church. It
embraced Catholic teachings, both on social questions and on the upholding of
private property.

A subservient class
Partition gave a comprehensive expression to the failure of the weak and
subservient Irish capitalist class to carve out a unified national territory for
itself and build an Irish nation state. In as much as an Irish capitalist class
developed, it was now as the ruling class of the Southern state. As a class it
remained weak and subservient to the dominating power of British capitalism.
When De Valera's Fianna Fail party came to power in 1932 it did so with the
support of small farmers, of the petty bourgeoisie and of a section of the
working class. Reflecting the pressure of these layers it tried to defy British
economic power by raising tariffs. The hope was that Irish capitalism might
develop behind this protective shield. This 'economic war', begun in 1932, had
to be abandoned in failure in 1938 when the additional tariffs imposed in 1932
were scrapped.
By the late 1950s Irish capitalism was forced to a policy of the scrapping of all
tariffs as the only way it could enjoy some of the benefits of the post war
boom. Economic development henceforth was to be on the basis of free trade with grants and incentives to foreign multinationals to entice them to Ireland.
In December 1965 an Anglo/Irish Free Trade Agreement was signed. All British
tariffs on Irish goods were to be scrapped and Irish tariffs on British goods
were to be phased out over a ten year period. British dominance was thereby
reinforced.
If, more recently, there has been a change in this situation it has been due to
the decline of British capitalism, the entry of both Britain and Ireland into the
EEC, and the penetration and increased domination by European, US and other
foreign capital over the Southern economy. Ireland remains a tenth rate

capitalist state, with a ruling class who, although they have grown in selfconfidence, are in reality just as toothless as ever.
Economic weakness and lack of political ambition are two sides of the same
coin. The weak Southern ruling class have lacked both the will and the desire
to reunite the country and attempt to build a single national capitalist
economy. Their consciousness is of what they are - the ruling elite in the 26
county state. In the decades since partition they have been almost completely
cut off from the North economically as well as politically.
Today only 6% of the Republic's total exports are to Northern Ireland. Only 8%
of the North's exports go South. Most of this trade, in. both directions, is not
industrial but agricultural, the export of live animals; food, fertilizer, etc.
Facing difficulty enough retaining their grip over the Southern population who
at least have some adherence to the state, they have no wish to add in the
unstable mix of one million hostile Protestants and a Northern Catholic working
class now well tutored in the politics of resistance.

Articles 2 & 3
Articles 2 & 3 of the 1937 constitution, which appear to stake out a territorial
claim over the North, have to be seen in this light. What these two Articles
really do is provide constitutionally for the fact of partition.
They pay lip service to reunification while allowing Irish governments, 'in the
meantime' to legislate only for the South. As far as Irish capitalism is
concerned, for 'in the meantime' read 'forever'. The aspiration for unity
contained in these Articles has as much meaning for them as the socialist
objectives of Clause Four of the British Labour Party constitution had to the
reformist leaderships of that party.
Partition and the subsequent Treaty with the South were a satisfactory
outcome for British imperialism. It was in their interests thereafter to preserve
this status quo. Their hold over the North was a useful counterweight to the
moves by De Valera to go beyond the original terms of the Treaty. The North
also proved of military importance during the Second World War. Its heavy
industry was turned to war production. Its ports, especially Derry, and its
airfields were vital in the Atlantic war against the German U-boats.
It was only during the 1950s, more than three decades after partition, that
British interests began to change. One by one the factors which led them to
introduce and then to maintain partition disappeared.
This period saw an unprecedented and unstoppable revolt which spread from
country to country and continent to continent across the colonial world. It

became impossible for the imperialist countries to continue to rule their

colonies in the old way. They were forced to retreat, ceding power to local
rulers, mostly drawn from the independence movements.
Bit by bit the British Empire was dismantled. India won its independence in
1947. The late '50s and early 1960s saw the wave of de-colonialisation spread
to British possessions in Africa. The biggest of these, Nigeria, gained its
independence in 1960. It was in that year that Tory Prime Minister, Harold
MacMillan, made his famous 'Winds of Change' speech in which he argued that
there was no choice but to relinquish direct control over those colonies which
remained.
In the South a republic was declared in 1948. Yet far from lessening Britain's
dominant influence, the subsequent moves away from any form of
protectionism increased its importance as a market for British goods and as a
destination for British investment. The 1965 Free Trade Agreement reinforced
this and by 1969 the Irish Republic had become the fifth biggest market for
British companies.
Meanwhile the old manufacturing base in the North, suffering from decades of
under investment, was in decline. Even in the context of the post war world
economic expansion, the North experienced severe recession after 1958.
Between that year and 1964, one third of its linen plants closed. 40% of
shipbuilding jobs were also lost between 1960-64. The area was of lessening
economic significance to British capitalism whose sights were beginning to shift
to the new opportunities for profits south of the border.
Those military strategic factors, so vital in 1920, and to an extent during the
second world war, were no longer of importance. Whether or not the Royal
Navy would have access to Irish ports was of scant military significance in this
post-Hiroshima age, where even the British fleet contained long range Polaris
nuclear submarines. In any case Britain was no longer a major military power,
more of a bit player acting on the side of the US in the new cold war era.

Relative stability
Overall this was a time of unprecedented economic expansion and of relative
stability for the major capitalist powers. The threat of social revolution, of
Bolshevism, which had preoccupied the capitalists after 1917, was no longer an
imminent danger in the advanced capitalist world.
The tactic of divide and rule was superfluous to the immediate requirements of
imperialism in Ireland. What they sought were conditions of political stability to
allow them to increase their economic penetration of the island as a whole.

Partition was fast becoming an anachronism, serving no particular purpose but

rather providing an unwanted source of potential instability.
Something along the lines of the offer made and then dropped by Lloyd George
during the 1921 Treaty negotiations, was increasingly the preferred option of
the ruling class - but for very different reasons.
Understanding that the Northern state, into which they had deliberately placed
a one third Catholic minority who did not and would not accept its permanent
existence, was an explosive mix, they preferred to wash their hands of the
problem. They favoured transferring ultimate sovereignty over the North to an
all-Ireland parliament, possibly still leaving the two regional parliaments in
place.
The 1960s presented the capitalists with the most favourable opportunity they
were likely to get to implement some such solution and lay the national
problem to rest. There was economic upswing and political stability. Even
Ireland North and South benefited to some extent from the boom in the form
of new inward investment by foreign multinationals.
In 1963 Terence O'Neill, representing a more moderate face of Unionism,
became Prime Minister of the North. O'Neill recognised the economic sense of
greater co-operation with the South. His Dail counterpart, Sean Lemass, head
of Fianna Fail, was of like mind. Twice in 1965 they broke historic ground by
meeting together, first in Belfast, then Dublin.
Yet, under these the most favourable circumstances that would arise, nothing
was done, the border remained, the national problem was left unsolved. The
British ruling class encouraged every measure of North-South co-operation.
The Times praised O'Neill for meeting Lemass, describing him as one of "a new
generation of Ulstermen concerned with the challenge of economic necessities
and free from the urge to fight old battles over again". (54)
Beyond such encouragement they took no concrete steps to fulfil their real
ambition which was to withdraw. They did not even apply pressure on the
Unionists in government at Stormont to end the blatant discrimination against
the Catholic minority.
That they did nothing was because they feared that Protestant resistance to
change would lead to civil war, a civil war that would have disastrous
consequences for British capitalism, and would end with a worse problem than
before it started.
Civil war would immediately threaten British property and trade in Ireland. It
would overspill to Liverpool, Glasgow, London and other centres of large Irish
population in Britain. Across the world it would be Britain which would bear the

blame. Boycotts of British goods, especially in the United States, would likely
result.
And in the end it would produce only more instability. The outcome would
probably be the repartition of Ireland, leaving a smaller and exclusively
Protestant state in the north east. Ethnic cleansing, Bosnia style, would mean a
flood of Catholic refugees across the border. The weak Southern state would
not be able to assimilate this new influx, whose eyes would be turned, like the
Palestinians, to regaining the land and homes they had lost - all in all a recipe
for further upheaval and violence right on Britain's doorstep.
For these reasons the British ruling class could not proceed to implement the
changes they would have liked. They retained their preference for withdrawal
but contented themselves with making do with the status quo for the time
being at least.
In short, partition, once consolidated, created a problem which could not be
solved on a capitalist basis. To nationalists it is a simple matter. It created a
sectarian state which must be dismantled before progress can be made. This
was the theoretical stance upon which republicans began their military struggle
in the early 1970s. It has been thoroughly discredited by all that followed.
The real problem is that partition created not one but two sectarian states. The
Northern state was, justifiably, unacceptable on a permanent basis to those
Catholics who lived within it. But the idea of being merged with, or as they saw
it, submerged into the Southern state was also unacceptable, and with just as
much justification, to the Protestants.
In this is the real core of the national problem and the real explanation of why
there cannot be a capitalist answer. So long as the choice is a capitalist one either two poverty ridden states or their merger into one - so long would
conflict and violence be inevitable. This was the problem as it presented itself
to, and confounded, the strategists of capital in the 1960s. Despite the
changes wrought by the Troubles it remains the core of the national problem
today.
That there can be no capitalist solution - this is the starting point of Militant
Labour's programme. We reject all capitalist solutions - the status quo, Ulster
independence, integration with Britain or capitalist reunification, as various
roads to ruin.
We do not share the view of nationalists, left republicans and some socialist
groups, that because partition was a crime, we have to support every capitalist
step to reunification as 'progressive'. This position has been one factor leading
the Communist Party towards a split and an early grave over the issue.

This line of argument ignores the fact that the problem is not of one but of two
sectarian states. In working out our approach we have to weigh things
concretely, measuring precisely their effects. There is no road to a capitalist
united Ireland and it is not the role of socialists to sow illusions that one can be
found. Were events to move in this direction the result would be civil war and a
disastrous setback for the working class.
This is why we say we are just as opposed to moves in this direction as we are
to the other capitalist options, all of which, either in the short or the long term
also point to civil war. Those 'socialists' who take a different view need surgery
to have the cataracts formed by overexposure to romanticised nationalist ideas
removed from their eyes.

chapter 9

two nations?
Those who argue that there are two nations in Ireland, whether they
say a Protestant nation or a Northern nation made up of Protestants
and Catholics, look into the mists of time to prove their case. As we
have seen, their argument that the existence of two nations, formed
through history, brought about partition, is quite false.
However there is a follow on argument which needs to be answered. Did
partition and the prolonged existence of two states so amplify the divisions
which had been there, that two separate nations eventually did develop?
It is certainly the case that the formation of new states can lead directly to the
emergence of new nations. The Jews in Palestine at the time of the British
Protectorate were a distinct religious community, but not a nation. However
when Israel was formed, and then with the influx of Jews from Europe and
North Africa, a national consciousness quite different from the consciousness
which had existed among Jews in the area before, was forged. It is now
possible to describe the Jewish population of Israel as belonging to an Israeli
nation.
Partition did cut across those tendencies to assimilation which had been so
pronounced in 1919. The fact of two states following separate lines of
development surviving over decades, across generations, could not but
reinforce divisions.
Greater division - yes. But two nations - this is a different matter. So much
rubbish has been written on this especially by those who have argued this
idea, that it is difficult to clear away the theoretical fog which surrounds the

issue. In fact anyone who sets out to do so, but who lacks the essential tools of
a marxist analysis, is virtually certain to end up quite lost.
Formal logic, the stuff of much philosophy and the approach of too many
political scientists and historians, teaches us to divide all that we see around us
into rigid fixed categories. We are taught to identify things by placing them into
their appropriate mental box; structures of a certain sort are houses, of a
different type are flats, rocks are of certain types, animals belong to species
and people are of nations. Each category is viewed as distinct, equal to itself
and quite separate and apart from all others.
Marxist philosophy, dialectical materialism to give it its scientific title, sees the
world differently. It views things not as fixed and eternal, but as ever
changing. It begins from the basic premise that everything which exists does
so in a continuous and unending process of change. All things come into being
and pass away. They do not appear from nothing but come from something
else and ultimately become something else again.
Houses are constructed from various materials which only in their proper place
make them identifiable as houses. Once in existence they are subject to an
unending process of decay. Even the best DIY expert can only delay and offset,
but not counter the erosion of nature and the decay of materials. The
seemingly eternal rock formations around us were once of molten form and
have been changed by wind, rain, glaciation. Even the most durable become
sediment and change into another form. Species too evolve and alter, new
species develop as old ones disappear. And nations are the product of a
particular time. They are a general bracket which we put around people, but
none, not even the most settled are fully homogeneous. None will endure
forever. Under capitalism in this the period of its death agony there is a
tendency to fragmentation, as internal differences grow - under socialism
nations and nationalism would be redefined and have an entirely different
meaning from the present.
In criticising formal logic marxism does not reject all its categories as
completely invalid. If we went to the opposite extreme and viewed the world as
simply a melting pot of change without definition we would be unable to make
sense of anything around us. We not only maintain the categories of formal
logic - the division of society into classes is one example - we give them added
meaning by understanding their limitations.
No two things are the same, nor does any thing stay the same, but so long as
the differences or changes are within certain limits we can comfortably place
them under a single heading. Although a car is produced to one specification,
no two models coming off the production line are exactly identical. But so long

as the differences are slight they are not important for all practical purposes
and the cars can be grouped together as of a particular make or model. On the
road each car faces different conditions, different treatment and each one
becomes progressively less like the rest. Still so long as the differences are
within limits of tolerance the original name and model are still appropriate to
identify them.

From quantity to quality

It is when small quantitative changes added together produce something quite
different, when a thing is no longer essentially the same as what it was, that
old definitions become outmoded and new ones have to be applied. A well
treated car may still be on the road while one produced alongside it has been
scrapped and turned into a cube of compressed metal. It is now neither the
original make nor model, the difference is of quality, not just of quantity.
Marxism deals therefore not with fixed final results, but with processes, with
the constant process of change to which everything from inorganic matter to
social phenomena is subject to.
The manner in which this change takes place is also important. It is not that a
thing starts at one point and marches in an undeterred straight line until it
becomes something else. No. Changes take place in a more erratic form as a
result of the dynamic interplay of conflicting pressures.
H20 at one point of extreme temperature forms as ice. At another point it
becomes steam. In between it is water. In its state as water it can never be at
an exactly constant temperature. It unceasingly becomes either hotter or
colder always moving either towards the state of ice or that of steam. Yet we
know from the water around us that it can remain in this liquid state for a
lengthy period, so long as a form of equilibrium exists in which changes in one
direction are cancelled out by changes in the other.
The answer to the question whether or not two Irish nations, or an Irish and a
British nation in Ireland, developed after partition, can only be answered by
posing another question - did the changes brought about after partition
amount to a qualitative difference or not?
From the moment the new states became consolidated there were tendencies
towards separation, but as with the heating and cooling of water in the earth's
environment, there were also countervailing tendencies.
On a practical day to day basis the people of the Southern state quite quickly
adjusted themselves to its existence. Their immediate and most pressing
concerns were with improving their lot within it - the North was a long way off
politically if not geographically. The fact that new generations have come and

gone, living their lives with the reality of partition has tended to reinforce this
separation.
On the other hand there is a deeply felt national feeling, a sense that an
injustice was committed through partition, and a desire for ultimate
reunification. This is an antiimperialist sentiment which has never quite died
away. It has arisen at different times in various forms, re-firing passions about
the North which otherwise over time had cooled. It took a particularly
nationalist form in border areas during the 1950s when Sinn Fein was
temporarily on the rise North and South. In 1966, with the celebrations of the
Easter Rising it found a more radical expression. Concern for the plight of
Northern Catholics moved tens of thousands in the South into action of some
form during the August 1969 pogroms, after Bloody Sunday and again during
the hunger strikes.
For those living in the North the same factors of a separate government,
separate laws, separate economic development, a very largely separate news
media etc., tended to set them apart from the South. A sense of a Northern
identity was certainly heightened, especially among those living away from the
border areas.
But this tendency which might theoretically have led over a period to a
separate national identity has been countered by opposite tendencies. The new
state quite deliberately excluded Catholics. It garnished itself in the trappings
of Protestantism. Its first Prime Minister, Craig, later Lord Craigavon, boasted
that; "we have a Protestant parliament for a Protestant people". (46) The
Catholic minority, treated as second class citizens, never gave their allegiance
to this state and were never fully integrated within it. Whatever sense they felt
of Northerness, of a common fate with Protestants, was challenged by their
feeling that progress for them would have to go hand in hand with the
dismantling of the state.

Working class unity

Among the advanced sections of the working class the sense that their
movement was an all-Ireland movement was maintained. In periods of ebb of
the class struggle and especially when trade union and Labour leaders, North
and South, courted unionism and nationalism respectively, this all-Ireland
sense was reduced. When the class struggle was on the upbeat, when class
issues came to the fore, it tended to be reinforced, very often through grass
roots solidarity.
The most significant organisational expression of this cross border unity was
the fact that the trade union movement remained united on an all-Ireland
basis. There were serious attempts by bigots on both sides to break this unity,

as with the Fianna Fail promoted split off of the Congress of Irish Unions in the
1940s, but it survived.
Politically the movement has in reality been divided since partition. Although
the ITUC and LP remained nominally a single industrial and political
organisation, in practice its all-Ireland political arm never grew. The Irish
Labour Party and the NILP were separate parties from the time of the latter's
foundation in 1924.
Even they did not escape the tendency to unity whenever class questions came
to the fore. Both parties grew and shifted to the left during the 1960s. As they
did so their leaders came under pressure from their ranks and from trade
unionists to move closer together. The 1967 NILP conference adopted a call for
a Council of Labour to bring both parties together. In 1968 the motion was
implemented and the Council of Labour established with the NILP, the Irish
Labour Party, the small Northern Republican Labour Party of Gerry Fitt, all
participating. Among its aims was the following:
"to promote socialist principles and policies in both parts of Ireland and to
secure the return of socialist governments in Ireland, North and South." (47)
Tendencies towards the emergence of a Protestant, as opposed to a Northern
nation have likewise been rivalled by counter tendencies. Once in power the
Unionists did their utmost to cultivate a Protestant ethos and identity.
Protestants were British, distinguished by their 'British way of life' and in this
were unlike their Irish Catholic neighbours. While Catholics in their separate
church-run schools learned Irish history with a nationalist and church
influenced slant, Protestants were taught to recite the kings and queens of
England. They learned nothing of their own country, nothing of 1798, nothing
of partition and nothing about this state they were growing up in.
There is no doubt that the fact of a state which leaned on and promoted one
section of the community and discriminated against the other did widen the
division between Protestant and Catholics.
Against this was the reality that, whatever the discrimination, the state could
not deliver a secure future to the Protestant working class. It was born in
recession, after 1929 much of its industry was faced with collapse, the thirties
were a decade of hunger and poverty for Protestant workers as well as
Catholics, and even during the 'boom' years after the war unemployment
stayed stubbornly at twice the UK average. Housing in Protestant working class
areas was in the same deplorable condition as in Catholic areas, the huge inner
city ghettos of Belfast stayed this way until after the collapse of the Stormont
parliament in 1972.

Despite the defeat of partition, the powerful tendency to class unity quickly reestablished itself. New struggles began to take place from the mid 1920s. In
1932 the strike by Outdoor Relief workers left an indelible mark of class unity
in this supposedly Protestant state. It was followed by many similar occasions
when Protestant and Catholic workers fought together against the employers
and against the government
That aspect of the difference between the two communities which partition
accentuated was primarily political, not cultural or national. The Unionist
movement had never been a national movement - it had never asked for nor
sought a state. There were certain cultural differences between Protestant and
Catholic which the Unionist leadership attempted to widen. They make it their
business to be on the platforms of all the main Orange parades. The Orange
marches in which some Protestants participated repelled Catholics, just as
Hibernian parades in which some Catholics took part repelled Protestants.

Two cultures?
For all their efforts - unionists and nationalists - could not elevate this into the
existence of two distinct cultures. When it comes to broader aspects of lifestyle and culture there have always been far greater similarities than
differences. Even the music played by Orange and green bands is essentially
the same.
What partition did do was widen the political polarisation and make it more
difficult to overcome. The two communities were more rigidly divided than
before on the questions for or against the existence of the state, for the link
with Britain, or for a link with the Southern state.
Even this division has never been uniform or complete. Political unity of
Catholic and Protestant workers has been possible as and when class politics
have risen to challenge those based on religion. Within a few years of the
founding of the state the newly formed Northern Ireland Labour Party began to
eat into the Unionist vote. It scored spectacular successes in successive
elections in 1945. Between 1958, when it returned four MPs to Stormont, and
the late 1960s, it offered a serious challenge to Unionists and Nationalists and
threatened to emerge as the most powerful political force in the state.
Partition meant that a single nation state was not built and could not be built
on the basis of capitalism. There were two states but still only one nation,
albeit that within this nation there were pronounced differences, aggravated by
history between North and South and between Catholic and Protestant.
Further it set in motion tendencies and counter tendencies each drawing
society in an opposite direction. Were the tendency to division to dominate

over a period the likely result would be two nations. But this qualitative
transformation would only be possible on the back of big events and would be
a change which would not come about unnoticed.
In the case of Israel it was the extreme circumstances of the formation of the
state which created a clearly visible Israeli national consciousness. In the
background of its formation stood the holocaust and the profound
psychological effect this mass murder had on Jews generally and on those who
formed the European exodus to Israel in particular.
The state itself arose out of civil war in Palestine, the expulsion of the Arabs,
expropriation of their lands, the destruction of their villages. To survive it had
to defeat the surrounding Arab states in war. Its Zionist rulers went much
further than the Unionists could go in moulding a new national ethos and
culture and were much more successful in doing so. They invented - or reinvented - a language which all citizens had to learn from scratch. They
created the symbols not just of statehood but of nationhood and developed a
national psyche. Today those who wish to take out Israeli citizenship must go
through an intensive residential induction course in which they not only learn
the Hebrew language but have to undergo indoctrination in the values of the
state, must learn its history and are expected to adopt its customs.
What exists there today bears no resemblance to the Palestine of the Ottoman
empire or the British protectorate. Fundamentally altered in terms of culture,
language, as well as politics and geography, there is no question but that a
nation made up of the Jewish people of Israel has emerged.
Were there to be events of a similar magnitude in Ireland the result would be
the creation of a new nation based on the Protestants. This would become
possible for example, on the basis of civil war, repartition and the emergence
of a new Protestant state in the north east.
On the other hand should the tendencies towards working class unity become
dominant the way would be opened to the ending of partition and the
establishment of a socialist Ireland in which all differences, whether regional,
cultural or religious would be respected.
Partition did not draw society past either of these poles. The Ireland which
emerged was short of being a nation state but someway short of being two
nations either.

chapter 10

a mood for change

There was no fundamental shift of consciousness, outlook or of
relations between the various sections of the working class during the
first few decades of the new states. Then, from the 1950s the ground
began to shift away from sectarian division. It is no accident that
during the 1960s, right up to the eve of the Troubles, the idea that
there were two nations as opposed to two states held very little
currency.
By 1968 all the critical indicators pointed to the opposite, and had done so with
increasing force for more than two decades. Throughout the 1950s and the
1960s the tendency was to the breakdown of the old sectarian divisions and to
the unity of the working class.
Old sectarian housing patterns were dissolving. The new housing estates being
built around Belfast tended to be mixed. Even in the inner city areas the lines
of delineation were becoming more blurred.
There was a greater social integration in clubs and bars. The thriving rock
scene in Belfast in the mid and late '60s was of no particular sectarian
colouration. There was even nothing uncommon or unusual for some Catholic
youth to join in the drinking and 'celebrating' at the 11th night bonfires.
In this more relaxed atmosphere loyalist gangs such as those which had
attacked Catholic and socialist workers before partition and were still at the
same business in the 1930s, seemed more and more anachronistic. By the late
'50s they were not much more than a memory.
This is not to say that sectarianism on the Protestant side had died out. Far
from it. The Unionist Party was in government and still attempted to play the
Orange card mainly to slow up the march of Labour. However the growing
support for the NILP did demonstrate that Unionism was losing its grip over
sections of the Protestant working class.
This was the time when Paisley began his evangelical crusade against the
'Rome ward trend' of the Protestant churches. His publicity-seeking activities
drew scant support. To most Protestant workers and youth he was a crank,
obsessed with issues about which they cared very little.
There were no loyalist paramilitaries. The tiny handful of hard line loyalists who
briefly formed a UVF in the mid 1960s were out of step with their communities.
Their new formation was ineffective and short lived. The murder of a Catholic
barman who had gone to a Shankill Road pub for a late drink one night in 1966

provoked only disgust among Protestants. The O'Neill government replied by

banning them - to the relief of most Protestants - and the organisation
disintegrated.
The idea that there is a direct organisational line from the present UVF to this
earlier outfit is false. Individuals such as its founder Gusty Spence may have
overlapped, the Paisleyite inspiration may have been the same, but the UVF
had to be re-formed from nothing when the Troubles began.
Paradoxical as it might seem, the start of the Troubles came after an historic
shift away from the ideas of nationalism and of republicanism among the
Catholic population generally.
In 1956 the IRA launched a military campaign with raids across the border
modelled on the flying column attacks of the 1919-21 War of Independence.
For the next six years this 'border campaign', so called because it was confined
to border areas, continued in the form of sporadic and ineffective attacks.
Catholics in the border areas looked on passively while those in Belfast paid
little or no heed. The leadership called it off in 1962 admitting that it had failed
to draw broad support. Their ceasefire statement acknowledged:
"Foremost among the factors motivating this course of action has been the
attitude of the general public whose minds have been deliberately distracted
from the supreme issue facing the Irish people - the unity and freedom of
Ireland". (48)
The border campaign served to educate the next generation of Catholic youth
of the futility of individual terrorism. To most of the fresh generation who
poured onto the streets at the beginning of the Civil Rights Movement, the IRA
was a museum relic, not relevant to present needs.
Nationalism likewise was on the wane. Briefly it flared up as a force in the
1950s only to rapidly die away. In 1955 Sinn Fein, through a combination of
circumstances which gave them a clear run for nationalist votes, managed to
poll 150,000 votes in the 1955 Westminster election. In a Southern general
election two years later they polled a credible 65,000 votes, in part a rural
nationalist vote, in part a radical vote which defected from Labour following its
participation in coalition. In elections in 1959, by which time it was clear that
the IRA border campaign would flounder, the Northern vote virtually halved, to
77,000. The presence in the South dwindled away also. It was a brief flurry of
national sentiment, not betokening a new revival, rather a concentration of its
force on the way to its eclipse.

Nationalism declines
By the late 1960s nationalism both as an ideology and as an organised force
was losing its grip on the masses. The Nationalist Party was seen as feeble and
inept, doing little more than provide a convenient foil for the Unionists.
This is not to say, as is often suggested, that Catholics had abandoned the idea
of a united Ireland and were moving towards an acceptance of the Northern
state, content merely to seek change within it. Among middle class Catholics it
is true that a pragmatic view was taking hold. As far as they were concerned,
since nationalism could hold out no hope of ending partition, it was better, for
the time being, to concentrate their energies on securing better treatment in
the North. John Hume was a representative of this view.
There was a different outlook among the Catholic working class especially
among the vibrant generation of youth who emerged into struggle at the end
of the '60s. They saw only poverty and discrimination in the North, but in the
South what they saw was as bad if not worse.
Changes since the war had widened the gap between North and South, making
the South less attractive by comparison. The Unionists, against their
judgement, instinct and will, had been forced by the pressure of the working
class to follow the post war Labour example and introduce the Welfare State.
The Northern economy had grown in the 1950s, only to stagnate in the 1960s.
For the South the '50s had been another decade of stagnation; unemployment
rose and a colossal figure of 400,000 people were forced to emigrate.
Turning away from nationalism, the Catholic youth did not embrace the
Northern state but began to look to more radical solutions. Deep down the shift
was to a socialist consciousness; after 1966 the socialist ideas of James
Connolly underwent a revival among the youth, North and South.
The '60s was a decade of growing class unity. It began with significant
struggles by workers in the Belfast shipyard, in the Shorts aircraft factory and
other big industries against redundancies and threatened closures. Other
important strikes took place during the middle years of the decade, although
overall this was not a time of intense class struggle. Then in 1967 and into
1968 a strike wave developed which affected broad layers of the working class
and indicated an underlying radicalisation.
Politically this industrial anger was reflected in the growth of support for
Labour; for the NILP in Protestant and Catholic areas, and for the smaller
Republican Labour Party in some Catholic seats. The NILP did not just gain
electorally, its branches filled out and it began to shift to the left, away from
the 'Labour Unionism' espoused by its most senior figures.

The sectarian division remained but the various sections of the working class
and the youth were moving away from the old ideas and, albeit setting out
from different points, were shifting in a common direction. Northern militancy
was matched, at times surpassed, by a rising level of struggle in the South. In
1965 the South topped the world strike league. Strike figures rose the
following year. Under this pressure the Irish Labour Party, not only grew in
support but, like the NILP, began to fill out. By the end of the decade its
slogan, for the future, 'the seventies will be socialist', illustrated that even its
tops had been swayed by the radicalisation.
As well as a tendency to unity in the North, there was the beginnings of a
drawing together of the Labour movement North and South. The split in the
trade union movement had been healed since 1959 when the Congress of Irish
Unions re-merged with the ITUC to form the Irish Congress of Trade Unions
(ICTU). The formation of the Council of Labour was another step in this
process.

Civil rights agitation

World factors - opposition to the US over Vietnam, the revolutionary events of
May 1968 in France, support for the Prague Spring - gave added impetus to
this burgeoning socialist movement. The first months of the mass civil rights
agitation from October 1968 until the end of the year saw it reach the height of
its potential. Had a revolutionary leadership, with sufficient social weight to
affect the situation, existed at that time, sectarianism could have been broken
and both the Unionist state and its green reflection across the border could
have been swept away.
For reasons explained fully in Beyond the Troubles? (by the author) and
Militant publications this potential was not realised. The situation began to
move in the opposite direction, towards sectarian rather than class conflict.
Even then the possibility existed for quite a time that in this period of intense
and turbulent mass activity, events could reverse themselves and ground lost
to sectarianism could be made up.
The events of August 1969 acted as a pivot marking the change from one
generally favourable period for class ideas to a period characterised by the
onset of sectarian reaction. In the form of pogroms, barricades and the
introduction of troops to the streets, it spelt out the real beginnings of the
Troubles.
Yet even within this gathering tempest there were opportunities for socialist
and revolutionary ideas to take on flesh. When the initial fighting died down
large tracts of Catholic Belfast and Derry were sealed off behind barricades. For
weeks the state forces, including the army, were kept out of these areas.

Behind the barricades, especially in the Bogside and Creggan areas of Derry,
there was intense discussion and debate about what way forward. Despite
efforts by right wing nationalists to stifle this debate, the ideas of socialism
held a powerful attraction.
The single issue of defence against pogroms had caused the barricades to go
up. But as was shown by the 1920 general strike over the release of prisoners,
a struggle begun on a single question, if deepened and developed, irresistibly
raises other questions. The 1920 general strike posed the question who would
run the industries, who would distribute supplies and keep order once the
strike ended. The existence of the barricades likewise posed broader issues
-what would be the form of the state which would eventually be allowed back
into the areas, would it be a bosses state or would the working class be in
control?
Had the barricades stayed in place long enough it is quite possible that, even
though they started out by physically sealing Catholic workers off from
Protestants, a message would arise from within them around which class unity
could be rebuilt.
It was because they were aware of this that the state quite frantically leaned
on all shades of 'moderate' and non socialist opinion, including the most hard
line republicans within these areas to try to talk the barricades down. This was
also the reason a significant section of the Southern ruling class decided to
play the 'green card'. They went out of their way to finance and arm a right
wing section of the republican movement, both to halt the shift of
republicanism to the left and to create an ogre which would repel Protestants.
The Civil Rights Movement rallied around basic demands for reforms within the
state. It exploded as a mass movement in anger at the state's response which
was to baton civil rights protestors off the streets in Derry in October 1968.
Overnight it became a virtual uprising of the Catholic working class, especially
the youth. The message from Civil Rights 'moderates' may have been that this
was just about reforms but the reality was that the movement was leaning
much further, to complete opposition to the state.
This was no turn to nationalism, but a firmer than ever rejection of
nationalism, of its symbols, of its ideas and of the individuals who put these
forward. Later in the Troubles the various symbols and slogans of resistance
raised in the Catholic areas would become indistinguishable one from the other
but at this stage those of left and right were sharply distinct. They were raised
one in opposition to the other.
When on one occasion a tricolour was raised on a Derry barricade, the
defenders debated whether or not it should be there and voted to take it down.

The Starry Plough was flown in the area because it was recognised to
represent something different. It stood for the ideas of Connolly and of
socialism.
When, at this time, the slogan of a workers' republic was put forward it did not
sit comfortably alongside the idea of a capitalist united Ireland. It was seen as
a rejection of that idea and as an alternative to both the Unionist and the
Southern states. The slogan of a socialist united Ireland meant specifically not
capitalist unity. At this stage - before they became blurred by long association
with republicanism - these socialist symbols and slogans had both meaning
and content.

Protestant working class

The Protestant working class had never settled comfortably under the umbrella
of Unionist rule. The 1960s saw them move in industrial and political opposition
to the Stormont administration. They were frustrated and angered by the
poverty, and by the class discrimination from which they also suffered. The
more advanced sections of the Protestant working class were also actively
repelled by the repressive and sectarian nature of the state, and by its
aristocratic and reactionary overlords.
When a sectarian reaction developed among Protestants it began as a defence
of the state and in opposition to democratic rights for Catholics. It was made
up of people like Paisley, his eccentric adjutant, Major Bunting, the neo fascist
John McKeague and others whose message was that supposed Protestant
privileges should remain and that Catholics should be put back in their place.
There was not a homogenous Protestant response to the civil rights struggle.
The most reactionary elements came out in violent opposition, the advanced
sections of the working class and youth gave support, the great majority were
unsure. Only if the defence of one state were to become mixed up with
opposition to being swallowed up by another state would the majority of
Protestant workers go behind the bigots.

Collision with state

Those Protestant workers involved in unions, Labour and socialist organisations
had found that, since the Unionists and the state were one and the same thing,
their battles with the Unionists brought them into collision with the state. While
a section of backward Protestants rallied to defend the state, the more
advanced and class conscious had been moving into opposition and were
drawing socialist conclusions, perhaps expressed differently but essentially the
same as the conclusions being drawn by the Catholic youth. Which way the
broad mass of Protestant workers would move was not yet decided.

In this situation, to have pronounced that there were two nations and to have
drawn the programmatic conclusions which follow from this would have been
the height of folly. Militant would have ended up defending the fact of two
states, arguing for socialism within the confines of each and only then putting
forward the idea of a socialist federation to link the two.
This position would have cut us off from the most revolutionary section of
society - the Catholic youth. We would have found ourselves arguing against
their best instincts in having to defend the fact of partition. It would have left
us lagging behind the most advanced of the Protestant working class,
reinforcing sectarian prejudices rather than opening up class divisions.
In examining what Militant did say it needs to be borne in mind that we were a
small propaganda group - hardly even that - and could reach only a layer of
Catholic youth and of trade union and labour movement activists, Protestant
and Catholic.
We fully supported the struggle of Catholics for democratic rights. Our
difference with the leadership of the Civil Rights Movement was our insistence
that this should be linked to the overall struggle for jobs, houses, decent
conditions and democratic rights for all.
We stood for a socialist united Ireland linking this slogan with a call for a
socialist federation of Britain and Ireland. Even then we did not raise this in the
crude manner which the ultra left sects have always put it forward. We called
for a conference of all Labour forces, notably the NILP and Republican Labour
to build a broader socialist challenge to the Unionists. We demanded that the
Council of Labour, which in the hands of the Labour leaderships was a toothless
talking shop, be built into an active campaigning organisation tying together
the socialist struggles, North and South. We explained that it would be out of
such practical unity of the working class and of its organisations, that a new
socialist society could be built in Ireland.
This general position was accepted without difficulty by the best of the Catholic
youth and the most advanced Protestant workers. The question has arisen in
discussion whether it would have required modification if we had won the ear
of the broad mass of Protestants.
This question itself belies a mistake of method. For Militant to have gained
such a broad influence presupposes a significant development of the class
struggle and a raising of class consciousness among both Protestants and
Catholics. Under these circumstances our ideas would have seemed more real,
more concrete; they would have been backed up by the example of actual
events. We would have had to explain our position skilfully - the slogan of a
socialist united Ireland would not always have been to the fore. It could only

have advanced as an immediate campaigning slogan when events pointed to

its necessity. Perhaps a slightly different emphasis might have been given in
exclusively Protestant workplaces or areas - but the position itself would have
been maintained. It was the setbacks suffered by the labour movement, and
the resulting lowering of consciousness which caused any subsequent
difficulties with this demand.
Slogans which are crystal clear at one time can become debased and devalued
as circumstances change. In discussions on our general programme we have
pointed out that the slogan for Britain of 'Labour to power on a socialist
programme' which at one time brilliantly and succinctly encapsulated our
orientation and our objectives, has become meaningless. The shift to the right
of the Labour leaders has been so great that the idea of them introducing
socialist policies is now met with complete disbelief.
If at the outset of the Troubles, the slogan of a socialist united Ireland clearly
meant not a capitalist Ireland, not so after a time. Many of the first wave of
recruits to the IRA joined believing that they were fighting for socialism. But
when the old guard leadership spoke as they did of a democratic socialist
republic it was quite clear to those looking on that behind this mask of rhetoric
they meant something different.
The situation was not helped by the myriad of self styled revolutionary groups
in Britain and Ireland who, from the word go, chorused their approval of the
Provos, acting as 'socialist' cheerleaders on the sidelines.
Inevitably the distinction between what socialists wanted and what nationalists
were fighting for became hazy. In the minds of Protestants they were one and
the same. With everyone talking about a socialist republic or a workers'
republic and at the same time chanting 'victory to the IRA' the idea of a
socialist united Ireland to many meant nothing more than a united Ireland.
The purpose of slogans and of language generally is to explain and clarify.
When a slogan no longer does this it is time to find a better form of words to
express the same idea. The first issues of the Irish Militant, published in 1972,
carried a sub-heading 'For a socialist united Ireland'. Even at this early stage of
the Troubles things had already moved so far back that this proved a barrier
rather than a bridge to important sections of the working class. It was quite
quickly replaced with the more finely tuned slogan 'For workers' unity and
socialism'. The original idea was retained as the position of the organisation
but was presented less in headline fashion, more through careful explanation.
More than a decade later the Anglo-Irish Agreement was interpreted by
Protestants as a deal signed over their heads aimed at eventually delivering
them into a united Ireland. They closed ranks in opposition.

By this time the word 'united' in the slogan was a barrier even to explanation.
To Protestants the issue was simply yea or nay to a united Ireland - if the
answer was yea in any form there would be no hope of going further to discuss
the niceties of what type of society this would be. Consequently we dropped
'united' from the slogan and put forward the more open formula of 'a socialist
Ireland and a socialist federation of Britain and Ireland'. This has served well in
allowing Militant to stress the idea of a socialist society first, and then being
able to deal with how it would be structured after.

chapter 11

after the troubles

Ten years on from the Anglo Irish Agreement we have arrived at a new
situation. With the IRA and loyalist ceasefires in place there are fresh
openings, real possibilities of making inroads in Protestant and
Catholic areas and especially among the youth.
But a condition is that we maintain a clear class position on the national
question, one that diminishes both unionism and nationalism and reinforces
working class unity and socialism.
To do this it is not enough to mechanically repeat old demands and old
formulations. Nor can ideas and slogans be simply sucked out of the air
because they may be momentarily popular in this area or that. Rather a
number of things must be taken into account - the method of marxism on the
national question, the history of Ireland, before partition, events since then and applied to the situation today.
In moving on from the programme Militant put forward at the beginning and
early in the Troubles we have to estimate the changes which have taken place
since. If we were to hang an arrow indicating the main thrust of events above
the decades leading up to the Troubles, it would point towards integration and
away from sectarianism. If we did the same for the two and a half decades
since it would point firmly in the reverse direction.
During the 1970s and early 1980s the sectarian reaction which over the first
few years was particularly fierce, was in part compensated for by world events,
by what was happening in Britain and to a lesser extent in the South. The huge
industrial movements against the 1970-74 Heath government helped the
labour movement in Northern Ireland sustain itself at a particularly difficult
time.
The toppling of the dictatorships in Greece, Spain, and especially Portugal, the
defeat of US imperialism in Vietnam, victories over Portuguese imperialism in

Angola and Mozambique, struggles in Central America, revulsion at the

dictatorship in Chile, and other tumultuous events of this time helped maintain
a socialist consciousness among the youth.
At the end of the 1970s and in the early '80s the working class of the North
participated in the vanguard of the industrial movement against the incomes'
policy of the Labour government and then against the anti-working class
assault of Thatcher.
In these years world developments acted to slow up the drift to sectarian
division. During the latter half of the 1980s and in the nineties, although the
sectarian reaction had dulled somewhat compared to the early '70s, the
setbacks it inflicted were compounded by what was taking place internationally.
First there were the defeats suffered by the working class, notably the defeat
of the inspirational miners' strike of 1984-5. Then there was a significant shift
to the right at the top of the workers' traditional organisations, the trade
unions and the Labour and socialist parties. There was an emptying out of
these organisations and the virtual disappearance of any left currents within
them. Finally there came the collapse of Stalinism after 1989. A wave of
revolution against the rotten totalitarian regimes in Eastern Europe ended in a
wave of victorious counter revolution which saw capitalism, in a particularly
palsied form, restored both there and in Russia.
If the 1960s were characterised by a raising of class consciousness and a
stirring of revolt among the youth, the 1980s and early 1990s stand out as a
time when consciousness was lowered all round and in which the working class
felt itself inhibited from engaging in battle. One effect has been that the idea of
socialism is not as readily accepted and understood as it was in the earlier
period. There is a lingering feeling that socialism would not work, that it did
not work in Russia, and that one area in which it most acutely failed was in
dealing with the national question. Therefore, young people in particular, do
not automatically see that a socialist united Ireland would be an answer where
a capitalist united Ireland is not. There is need for ever greater care, for more
explanation of this concept, than there was a decade ago.

The change in the North

The diminution of class consciousness and the corresponding tightening grip of
sectarian ideologies has been quite marked in recent years. It is rooted in a
physical separation into two communities which leaves the Northern Ireland of
today a very different society from that which existed twenty five years ago.
The August 1969 pogroms ended the process of integration of areas. After
internment in 1971, the widespread intimidation resulted in the greatest
population shift then seen in Europe since the second world war. Overnight

some mixed areas became almost entirely of one community or another. The
campaigns of random sectarian assassinations carried out by the loyalist
paramilitaries in the main, meant that many people preferred the security of
living among others of the same religion. This has led to the situation where
nearly half the people now live in areas which are either 90% Protestant or
90% Catholic.
Side by side with geographical separateness there is now a political polarisation
which is virtually complete. Labour, as a force to unite sections of both
communities - 100,000 votes in the 1970 general election - has all but
disappeared. Alliance, which makes much of its non-sectarianism, bridges only
sections of the middle class and in any case is both pro-state and pro-union.
Even the trade unions, once a powerful force for unity, have been diminished in
stature by the feeble role of their leaders. In many Catholic working class
areas the trade union leadership is seen as little more than a pliant tool of the
state, as collaborators rather than evangels of struggle.
As soon as the Troubles began they deserted the stage of politics, and thereby
gave the sectarians a hand up to the monopoly position they now enjoy.
In truth the union leadership was no less craven twenty five years ago. But at
that time there existed alongside them a substantial layer of activists, Catholic
and Protestant, who were motivated by class issues and were actively opposed
to both sectarian ideologies. There was a shop stewards' movement which was
powerful, confident and capable of acting independently of the union
bureaucracies.
Today this layer has thinned. There are many good shop stewards, but not with
the confidence their predecessors once had. They are much less an
independent factor drawing the advanced sections of the working class
together.
In the past this layer was united industrially and politically. Now it is more
often the case that they are united industrially but stand apart politically. When
the Troubles began the most class conscious section of Protestant workers
were opposed to the Unionists and leaned towards opposition to the unionist
state. Now their equivalents may be among the best class fighters, may
describe themselves as socialists, but are likely to also sternly defend partition,
the link with Britain and vehemently oppose a united Ireland. This
consolidation of Protestants in defence of partition is in no small measure down
to the IRA campaign which in the name of overthrowing the state has only
managed to reinforce it.

In Catholic areas the beginning of the Troubles took the form of a rejection of
nationalism on the part of a growing section of the working class and the
youth. The idea of class unity had a powerful appeal. So too had the call, not
just for change, but for socialist change.
This was particularly the case in Derry which was the cradle of the civil rights
struggle. In the months after October 1968 the city was in a ferment of
discussion, it became a laboratory in which socialist and revolutionary ideas
were put to the test.
The Catholic working class areas of Belfast had had a long and proud Labour
tradition. The old style nationalist ideas which maintained a base in border
areas died as a force in west Belfast in the 1930s. Republicanism never had a
broad base of active support in these areas before the seventies. If nationalists
or republicans wanted to present themselves in the area they had to do so with
a Labour or socialist face.
The Falls and West Belfast seats at Stormont and Westminster, when not in
Unionist hands, more often went to some variety of Labour candidate Northern Ireland Labour, Republican Labour, Anti-Partition Labour or Irish
Labour. Even in 1983 when Gerry Adams took the seat from Gerry Fitt, who
stood as a socialist, Sinn Fein's nationalist message was clouded in radical
socialist sounding rhetoric.
An interview with Adams in Magill magazine in July 1983, just after his election
victory, shows the radical note he was striking at the time:
"I have found that once you explain things on the basis of the proclamation,
saying the ownership of Ireland should belong to the people of Ireland and
what Connolly and Pearse said, and how this should be updated by the
nationalisation of major industries and how financiers and multinationals
shouldn't be allowed to suck the wealth out of Ireland, people start coming
around." (49)
It is a long road from this to lunches on Wall Street, meetings with investment
bankers, sordid deals struck with the representatives of Irish capitalism, and
handshakes with British ministers. Adams and Sinn Fein have taken this road
and in so doing have dealt a blow against the class traditions in Catholic
working class areas, supplanting these with a banal nationalism.
The result? - just as there are many good Protestant militants who see
themselves as Unionists so there are many Catholic shop stewards and union
activists who are tireless on the class questions but who deride the prospects
of class unity and see themselves as republicans or nationalists.

The difference is reflected in the current use, really the misuse, of language. In
the past, areas were described as being Catholic, Protestant, mainly Catholic,
mainly Protestant or mixed. They could be given a religious but never a
uniform political label. Then during the Troubles new terms were used which
have gradually gained acceptance. Catholic working class areas are known as
'nationalist areas', Protestant as 'loyalist areas'. We have always rejected these
adjectives as an oversimplification of reality and as an insult to the many
people within them who are not loyalists or nationalists. What is however
significant in showing how consciousness has been thrown back is the fact that
these labels are accepted and used without hesitation by many people in the
areas themselves.
The gap between the working class North and South has also widened. After a
decade of pronounced downturn in the class struggle the result is a growing
separation. There is no longer a Labour organisation in the North to provide a
basis for political unity. From the Southern side the turn to the right by the
Irish Labour leadership, their readiness to form an alliance with the devil if it
would keep their seats on the ministerial chairs, and their common front with
every political representative of Irish capitalism on the issue of the North,
denies them any positive influence or effect on the working class movement in
the North.

Trade union unity

All-Ireland trade union unity has remained, but in an ever more nominal form.
As the union leadership has moved to the right, the Irish Congress of Trade
Unions has become ever more bureaucratised, more removed from trade union
members. Its conferences are not allowed to discuss political matters, great
effort is made to ensure that anything which might even prove controversial is
not debated. The move to biennial conferences, an all-Ireland conference one
year, a conference of the Northern Ireland Committee the next, is a step away
from a single movement in any meaningful sense.
There has also been a further drawing apart of peoples North and South. Apart
from poignant moments such as the death of Bobby Sands, the predominant
attitude of workers in the South has been to leave well alone. Northerners,
they feel, should compromise and sort the problem out themselves
Once again the question arises, have two nations now developed? There is no
doubt but that events have moved several notches along the scale in this
direction. Still, just as all-Ireland trade union unity has become tenuous but
still exists, so that decisive point whereby a new nation could be said to have
emerged has not been passed.

No matter to what degree a sense of Northernness has been reinforced by the

Troubles, this is countered by increased Catholic alienation from the state.
While the Catholic middle class are in practice prepared to adapt to the state,
provided they continue to do well, the Catholic working class feel more
alienated than ever. Nothing can be sold in their communities which smacks of
a return to the old days of Unionism and which has no 'Irish dimension'. The
idea of a Northern nation - in other words that a purely Northern settlement
would be acceptable to Catholics - is fantasy.
Not a Northern nation - and still not two nations within the North either! The
stronger side of the recent social and political equation has certainly been
sectarian division but there has been another side also.

Workplace unity
While virtually every change over twenty five years has deepened the religious
divide, there has been one important exception. Catholics and Protestants still
come together in the workplaces. In fact, if anything, the change has been
towards greater integration of the workforce. The old Unionist owned industries
with their 'Catholics need not apply' policy have declined. New foreign owned
companies have no interest in maintaining discrimination. The expanded public
sector, with a few exceptions such as teaching, is integrated. Fair employment
laws have had a certain effect in evening up the religious balance. The fact that
Catholics are still more than twice as likely to be out of work shows the
problem is not solved, but does not contradict the fact that in most factories
and offices, the workforce is mixed.
In the 1930s, exiled Bolshevik leader Leon Trotsky, discussed with his
supporters in the US whether or not they should raise the slogan of selfdetermination for the blacks who were then concentrated in the southern
states.
Although the blacks were not a nation Trotsky considered that given their
separation from whites, their ill treatment and the ongoing chauvinism of white
workers, they could develop a national consciousness under certain
circumstances. He argued that the Trotskyists should support the slogan of
self-determination if the demand for it came from the blacks themselves.
However Trotsky had an open attitude on the question whether the blacks who
were a racial, rather than a national minority would evolve in the direction of
separation or not. He allowed that under certain conditions - the invasion of
the US by Japan for example, a feeling might develop among blacks of a
plague on both your houses and the call for a separate state -a 49th state might gain support. On the other hand he wanted to probe the question of
whether there were points of unity between black and white workers which

might cut across this and would affect the slogans to be raised. The fact that
the newly formed trade union centre, the CIO, made a turn after 1936 to
recruit blacks was an important consideration in the background of the
discussions.
In the event the situation changed when from the beginning of the second
world war a large migration of blacks began out of the southern states to the
cities and factories of the industrial north. The issue of separation receded.
Similarly the fact that workplaces in Northern Ireland have stayed mixed and
that growing out of this the trade unions, with very few exceptions, organise
Protestant and Catholic together, is of immense significance. If it had been
otherwise, if this point of contact had been broken, the Troubles would have
gone much further, possibly to the point of civil war.
Despite the blows inflicted by the ruling class, by bigots from both camps,
despite an indolent and rotten leadership, the trade unions held together. More
than this they were able to act as catalysts for the recent huge movements
which united Protestant and Catholic workers against the sectarian killings. The
mass protests called by a reluctant ICTU leadership after the Teebane atrocity
in 1992 and again after the horror of Shankill and Greysteel in 1993, showed
the unbroken determination of the working class not to be pushed over a
sectarian precipice.
When Trotsky discussed the problems of the southern states of the US it was a
matter of two races who were quite apart in all aspects of their life-style and
living conditions. Catholic and Protestant workers in Northern Ireland face
basically the same problems. Tory attacks on the health service, rising
electricity prices, the threatened privatisation of water, affect both communities
alike.
In the absence of any political party which could represent working class
interests, and given the tendency of the union leaders to keep their heads
down on these questions, a myriad of campaigning community organisations
have sprung up. Although most often based in one community or the other, the
idea of building cross community campaigns is increasingly accepted as a
sensible and practical way to get things done. In other words the tendency to
class unity from the bottom up continues to reassert itself.

Protestant identity
All of this has acted and acts as a check on the development of a separate
Protestant 'national' identity. Protestants remain, in terms of Ireland as a
whole, a minority religious community, not a national minority. The idea of
independence put forward, half-heartedly it is true, by the UDA is not taken

seriously. Apart from the powerful economic arguments against, the fact is
that, despite all that has happened, Protestants have not developed a sense of
being a separate nationality.
They have a sense of Northernness, a sense of being British, which is more
political than cultural or national, and a sense also that they are one strand of
what it is in total to be Irish. Former loyalist prisoner Eddie Kinner, interviewed
in the Irish Democrat, expressed some of the conflict of attitude which makes
up the Protestants sense of who they are:
"The unionist people need to have the strength to say that they are both Irish
and British and proud of it. They shouldn't have any fear of identifying their
Irishness. They get a real culture shock when they go over to England and get
called Paddy". (50)
Trotsky's method in relation to the black question in the US was to weigh
possible future, as well as present, developments. In Northern Ireland we have
just had the ceasefire announcements by the IRA and loyalists. Like the August
'69 pogroms these announcements are likely to prove an historic turning point.
The former marked the real beginning of the Troubles, the latter probably
registers their ending in the form they have taken.
It would therefore be light minded in the extreme to base a programme on
things as they were before the IRA and then the Combined Loyalist Military
Command called a halt, and not take into account both changes which have
already taken place and also possible future changes.
We cannot offer up a blueprint for what is going to happen. But we can state
for certain that the situation has changed profoundly and, if the ceasefires
hold, the changes to come will work their way through into every nook and
cranny of political life. Generally, the longer the 'peace' holds the less the
situation will resemble what went before.
While nothing has been solved and while none of the fundamentals of the
problem will be solved on a capitalist basis, the greater likelihood is still that
the 'peace' will last for a period, perhaps even a protracted period. The key
factor is the mood in both Protestant and Catholic working class areas that
there must be no going back to the killings. The bigots are still there, the
politicians are the same motley crew, but it is already noticeable that their
sectarian verbal jousting is increasingly at odds with the general mood.
By the time the ceasefires had been declared the strands of working class unity
were delicate and worn thin. Now there is a new period in which there is every
prospect that they will be re-woven and strengthened. The vital integration in
the workplaces may take on new significance if there is an increase in strikes.

It is too early to say whether the lifting of the fear of sectarian assassination
will promote any significant reintegration of working areas. However as social
issues such as cuts, closure of facilities, privatisation come to the fore there
are likely to be more community based struggles. Many of these will have the
potential to cross the sectarian divide. New issues will arise - for example
opposition to the problem of drug trafficking and abuse - which may link
Protestant and Catholic areas.
The demand for integrated education at both primary and secondary level will
probably increase, and not just from middle class parents. Among the youth,
as with their counterparts across Europe, there is a holding back from politics
and a general disdain for politicians. The easier atmosphere in Belfast means
that young people from the more hard line districts are more likely to go out of
their area to mixed city centre bars, to clubs, raves or whatever.
As far as young people are concerned all the political parties, Sinn Fein
included, are part of the political establishment. The sectarian message of
these parties is likely to increasingly conflict with whatever tendencies may
develop among youth to mix with people of their age from the 'other side'. A
sustained period without substantial sectarian violence could prepare for a new
rebellion of the youth against the political old guard, just as a previous
generation rebelled twenty five years ago.
The almost total political polarisation is a key feature of the present, on the
negative side. Yet one possible scenario is that future industrial and political
struggles, future integration of the working class in other ways, could see flesh
put on the call for a new Labour or socialist organisation. The bond of political
unity extinguished in the early 1970s with the demise of the NILP and all other
Labour forces, apart from ourselves, could be re-tied, the negative could
become a positive.
It is by no means definite that this will happen, or that working class unity will
develop in the other ways outlined. The peace process could come apart at an
earlier stage, or sectarianism could develop in other ways. However even the
fact that the more positive perspective is a possibility and quite a strong
possibility, is something which has to be taken into account when working out
demands and slogans. It would be entirely wrong to base a programme on the
fact of the sectarian division as it is now, when a more favourable situation
may be in the process of developing.

Discrimination
It is not just the changed form of the sectarian division but the changed
content of the national question itself, that has to be taken into account.
Twenty five years ago it was the issue of democratic rights for the Catholic

minority which was to the fore. From this flowed the question of the odious
nature of the state itself and the need to unite Catholic and Protestant workers
as the only force which would bring about a change for the better.
Today much of the discrimination in housing, jobs and in the drawing up of
electoral boundaries has gone. That which remains is a residue of the past not
the result of current policy. Even on issues such as facilities and funding for
Irish language projects the state is prepared to move. It is in the best interests
of the ruling class to defuse the situation by eliminating discrimination as far as
is possible.
Militant Labour continues to oppose every aspect of discrimination which
remains. Where, for example, there is adequate demand from parents for Irish
speaking schools we support the call for funding on a par with other schools.
The Department of Education put up bureaucratic arguments to justify its past
refusal to provide full funding. It used the same enrolment criteria as for every
other school to decide the issue.
This is an example of extreme insensitivity to the rights of minorities. Where
there exists a clear cultural minority demanding educational recognition,
special criteria have to be applied. Just as we recognise special needs in
education and demand the resources to cover these, so we recognise and
uphold the wishes of groups of parents to ensure that their language or culture
is catered for in their children's education. The idea of a positive allocation of
resources to minority needs in education has to be linked to the struggle for
adequate funding for all schools, employment of more teachers, reduction of
class sizes etc. The call for positive discrimination in employment is a
somewhat different matter. We are not in favour of replacing the old
discrimination against Catholics with a new discrimination against Protestants
when it comes to appointments and promotion. Nor are we in favour of putting
Protestants at the head of redundancy lists to even up the religious balance of
a workforce.
In short we are not in favour of visiting the sins of the past onto the current
generation of Protestant youth coming out of the schools seeking work. Our
position is essentially a negative one - against all forms of discrimination in
relation to appointments and promotion.
This must be linked with the demand for jobs for all. Instead of begging US
multinationals to give us work we demand the public ownership of industry and
services so that the state can provide jobs. This is the way to bring jobs to
areas of high unemployment along the border and west of the Bann.

Repression
There are other immediate democratic questions which have arisen during the
Troubles. These are less to do with discrimination and more with the huge
repressive apparatus built up by the state and leaned most heavily against
Catholic working class areas.
Our programme on the national question needs to include the call for the
dismantling of the means of coercion and repression currently in the hands of
the state.
We demand the immediate repeal of all emergency legislation and the
restoration of the basic democratic rights denied by these laws. Alongside this
we need to put forward demands for repeal of other Tory repressive legislation
not aimed directly at Northern Ireland but rather introduced specifically to curb
working class protest against government policies. This includes all the antitrade union legislation and the more recent Criminal Justice Act.
We call for the immediate repatriation of all prisoners serving jail sentences in
British jails for offences arising out of the Troubles. Further to this we demand
the release of all prisoners convicted of offences arising purely out of the
Troubles. While advocating this as a general position we make clear that we
would not campaign for the release of those whose motivation was not political
but purely sectarian and who remain the enemies of working class unity.
We have always supported the call for the immediate withdrawal of the troops,
but have linked this call to the need for action by the working class to provide
defence against sectarian attack. The new circumstances allow us to put it
forward in a much more straight forward manner - although we still urge action
by trade union and community organisations to stamp out the low level but
ongoing sectarian clashes.
The RUC are not an acceptable police force in Catholic areas. However the
more supportive attitude of Protestant workers compels us to take up the issue
of policing in a skilful manner, avoiding terminology which is likely to be
misinterpreted and misunderstood in any area. For this reason we deliberately
do not use the slogan 'Disband the RUC' but neither do we retreat from the
position that they are not an acceptable force. We say replace the RUC with
community police services which should be under the control of locally elected
committees.
Every national movement has two sides, a more forward looking side which
revolts against oppression and leans towards socialism, and a more reactionary
side which expressed itself as the desire of its leaders to become the new
oppressors of 'their' nation.

Insofar as the revolt of the Catholic working class after 1969 was the
beginnings of national revolt, it was the more forward looking aspect which
was on view for the first period. Hence the need to be particularly sensitive to
the aspiration of the Catholic masses in this period.
Today that aspect is still present in the form of the struggle against repression
and against whatever residue of discrimination remains. But increasingly it is
the other face of nationalism, the face of would be rulers and would be
oppressors which is on view. This is something which will bring right wing
nationalists into collision with the Catholic working class, especially the youth,
over a period. As repression eases, military bases are closed, and the army is
pulled back and probably withdrawn, this is likely to be the more pronounced
feature. Take away the issue of prisoners and policing and, apart from a long
term objective of a united Ireland, what is left is Sinn Fein's demand for equal
treatment, involvement as equals in the political process.
While of course opposing the petty restrictions imposed on Sinn Fein such as
the old and ineffective policy of TV dubbing of their spokespersons, we can see
that if this is the new content of the national struggle it amounts to very little
indeed. The demand for equal treatment put forward by Gerry Adams, Martin
McGuiness and Co., is, given their current right wing nationalist policies, simply
a demand that they should have the same authority as Paisley, Trimble and
others to misrepresent people.
It is a view which measures a peoples' freedom not by actual changes they
have won, but by the respect which their leaders are given by the world's most
powerful - and most reactionary - politicians. Just as our earlier programme
had to be very sensitive and sympathetic to the mass resistance of Catholic to
oppression in the first years of the Troubles, so we must in equal measure be
unsympathetic to the attempts by the Sinn Fein leadership to ingratiate
themselves into the US and Southern Irish establishments.
For Protestants the content of the problem has changed even more decisively.
Twenty five years ago Protestant reaction developed in defence of the Unionist
state and the abuses upon which that state was based. It took the reactionary
form of Paisley's counter-demonstrations at Civil Rights marches, of the
burning of Catholic houses in Belfast organised by John McKeague's Shankill
Defence Association and of the intimidation of Catholics from the shipyard and
other workplaces in 1970. Buried somewhere within this reaction was a more
democratic motivation; fear of being forcibly coerced into a united Ireland.
Today the balance between the democratic and the reactionary aspects of
Protestant resistance has tilted some-what in favour of the former. Stormont
has gone, killed off in 1972, buried ever since and now accepted by all to be

beyond resuscitation. Not even the DUP call for a return to the good old days
of supremacy. Catholics are wise enough not to take Paisley and his colleagues
at their word, but the fact that they have to take the position they do shows
that there is no deeply felt mood anywhere in the Protestant population to go
back to things as they were.
Every recent survey of attitudes confirms this. For example a Belfast Telegraph
poll taken at the time of the IRA ceasefire found 54% of Protestants in favour
of power sharing. In a survey soon after, this went up to 65% with only 21%
against. 58% even said the Unionists should participate in the Dublin Forum for
Peace and Reconciliation. 49% said the broadcasting restrictions then in force
against Sinn Fein should be lifted, this at a time when only 9% of Protestants
believed the IRA ceasefire to be permanent. There has been a considerable
relaxation of attitudes since then and few voices against equal treatment for
all, including power-sharing, in the North.

Dublin involvement
The issue which did provoke broad Protestant opposition among Protestants
was Dublin involvement. Only 37% of all surveyed were in favour, 53%
against. A separate breakdown for Protestants was not given but if can be
assumed that since most Catholics would have been in favour, a overwhelming
majority of Protestants must have been against.
It is fear of being delivered by Westminster into the arms of Dublin, not a
desire to preserve Northern injustices, which is the most pressing concern of
Protestants today. This fear has been heightened by the IRA ceasefire and
what has followed.
This is a paradoxical situation. The IRA ceasefire came about because of the
failure of the tactics and strategy of the republican movement, not because
they had succeeded in shifting the British government.
Gerry Adams now argues that it is around the table that progress can be
made, compromise reached. In 1983 an IRA spokesman argued differently:
"We recognise that, even if the entire nationalist population in the six counties
voted for Sinn Fein, that wouldn't be enough. There must be an increase in
political activity in the 26 counties so that they also demand that the Brits get
out. Even that wouldn't be enough, because the only thing colonial rulers will
listen to is force. There must be a big escalation of military activity by us - and
there will be". (51)
In an interview published alongside this Adams echoed these words.

"I believe the use of force in the six counties is justified by the British
presence. They don't give people much choice. At the end of the day they
won't be argued or talked out. A movement that wants them out will either
have to use force or the threat of force." (52)
The threatened escalation - the big push - attempted by the IRA, backed by
Libyan arms, in the mid-1980s ended in failure. They were back to the strategy
of a long and unwinnable war of attrition.
On the political side significant advances were promised:
"Our longer term objective is to become the majority nationalist party as well
as of course making considerable inroads in the 26 counties" (53)
The actual outcome was failure on both counts. Hopes which the republican
leadership had in developments beyond Ireland coming to their assistance
proved completely misplaced. At this time they entertained illusions in the
contacts they had built up with some Labour MPs.
"Ken Livingstone thinks there maybe a big swing to the left and the party
(Labour) might eventually come to power committed to withdrawing from
Ireland." (54)
All of this came to nothing. The ceasefire was declared on the back of a
strategy in tatters. In reality it marked a setback, an historic blow against
republican ideology and republican strategy, the full measure of which will only
become apparent over time. Yet this was not how it was presented. The
republican leadership have covered the tracks of their retreat by deliberately
creating an impression of progress having been made, and of a huge
breakthrough in the offing. It is with the feigned air of a victor that Gerry
Adams has been strutting around the US, seeking the political backing of
bankers, businessmen and politicians. The alliance with the SDLP, the linking of
arms with Dublin governments plus the applause from Clinton have given an
impression of stridency to nationalism. British ministers now saying publicly
what they have thought privately since the early 1960s, that their best
interests in Ireland lie in withdrawing from the North - has seemed to add
substance to this impression.
Demographic changes have brought about an increase in the Catholic
population of the North. The 1991 census estimated them to be 43% of the 1.6
million population as compared to 37% in 1971. According to some estimates
there will be a Catholic majority in about 40 years. A1though there is a
question mark over this due to a falling Catholic birth rate and the uncertain
effects of immigration/emigration the idea of an eventual Catholic majority has
come to be widely accepted.

United Ireland?
The result of this, in the context of a seeming strengthening of nationalism, is
a general feeling that somewhere down the road there will be a united Ireland.
Paradoxically this weakens rather than strengthens republicanism and instead
adds to the hand of what are termed the 'constitutional nationalists'.
The feeling that there will be a united Ireland is also a feeling that it will come
about in the medium to long term and certainly not in the short term. A survey
of opinion in the South published by the Sunday Tribune in October 1994 found
that 83% were in favour of a united Ireland at some time in the future. Of
these only 28% wanted it in 12 months, 35% thought it should take five years,
31% thought 20-25 years and 5% more than twenty five years.
In Catholic areas of the North there is a similar feeling that a united Ireland
will come but likewise a consensus that it will take a considerable time,
probably closer to the 20-25 years than the five. It is this feeling which deals a
powerful blow at all aspects of republican ideology and tactics.
If the mass of Catholics expect a united Ireland - but accept that they have to
wait - it leaves no room for a military struggle to force it now. It also puts
pressure on republican politicians to join the ranks of those they once
disdained as quislings, to become 'constitutional nationalist' and to accept a
compromise solution 'in the interim'. This is the process of transformation
taking place within the republican movement at present.

Protestant mood
In Protestant areas the sense that a united Ireland is a real possibility
translates itself very differently politically. Contrary to what the more bellicose
politicians in and around the DUP had hoped, there is no mood for war. The
advantages of peace in the hard hit working class areas far outweigh the long
term prospect of partition ending.
Rather it reinforces a mood for compromise. Better agreement now - provided
it does not stray over the line of constitutional change - than no agreement
and forced change at a later date.
The feeling that the politicians should talk is particularly strong in the working
class areas and among the so called fringe loyalist groups, the PUP and UDP.
Working class Protestants are no longer prepared to act as unthinking foot
soldiers of middle class Unionists.
This feeling rests on a platform of fear and great uncertainty about the future.
There is a sense of isolation, a sense of betrayal at the hands of the British
government, a sense that Catholics are united with powerful backers while

Protestants are divided and left to shiver on the windowsill of the union.
Overall this translates into a sense that, when it comes to minorities the
modern minority are the Protestants.
In 1968-9 Protestants were opposed to a capitalist united Ireland but they did
not see it as a very real prospect. Today the feeling is very different. The
opposition has been hardened and the prospect seems frighteningly real.
Protestant fear of coercion is now something which has to be given more
weight in a programme of democratic and transitional demands on the national
question. The democratic right not to be forced into another state against their
will must be upheld.
This is one reason why we have always opposed the slogan 'self-determination
for Ireland' as put forward throughout the Troubles by various ultra-left groups
in Britain and more recently raised by Sinn Fein as one of their 'core' demands.
At first glance this might seem a democratic enough call. But demands cannot
be separated from their actual meaning or the effect they would have in
practice. Closer inspection reveals that far from democratic, it amounts to
nothing more grand than a different device to coerce the Protestants - coercion
by ballot rather than coercion by bullet.
Self-determination in the shape of an all-Ireland referendum simply means
control the destiny of the Protestants by out-voting them. It is an unworkable
idea. Should an all Ireland referendum on a united Ireland take place,
Protestants would refuse to take part and would not accept the result. The
actual effect of this democratic sounding but light minded proposal would be to
hugely increase the conflict.
There is no possibility of such a referendum and the call for self-determination
for Ireland as a whole is therefore quite meaningless. The so-called
constitutional nationalists, the SDLP and all the major parties in the South,
have, in reality, also come round to this view.
Gerry Adams still talks of self-determination, but is now always at pains to add
that once British interference is gone, the Irish could decide how that selfdetermination should be exercised. This is simply a coded way of saying that
he and Sinn Fein accept the right of the people of the North to decide their own
future. In fact the principle of no change without consent is now accepted by
all except a few ultra-left groupings and some fringe republicans who, rather
than face reality, prefer to live in the past.
These people invoke the authority of Lenin to justify their call for selfdetermination for Ireland. In fact their approach has nothing whatsoever in
common with Lenin.

Lenin put forward self-determination as a guarantee of the right to secede. If it

were to be raised at all in the current situation it could only have meaning as
the right of the people of Northern Ireland to secede from Britain. It has no
meaning as the right of the two states in Ireland to come together, something
which could only be achieved by the agreement and clear consent, separately
arrived at, of the majority of both states.
But, object the advocates of this demand, Ireland is a single nation and as
such must enjoy the single right to self determination accorded to all nations.
In approaching the question in this way they have forgotten Lenin's advice - to
avoid turning demands into meaningless generalisations but rather to apply
them to time, to place, to actual circumstances.
Ireland is not unique in its position as a single nation divided between different
states. The Kurdish people are a single nationality who live in a number of
states, notably Iran, Iraq and Turkey.
Do we put forward the demand for a referendum of all the Kurds to set up a
new Kurdish state? No - such a call would be even more meaningless, further
removed from reality, than the call for one referendum in Ireland. We uphold
the right of the Kurds in each state to secede from that state.
If Kurdish peoples were to secede from their various states, the decision
whether they would amalgamate into a new Kurdistan could only be by the
agreement of each group. In practice such a peaceful and democratic
redrawing of the borders of this volatile region would only be possible on a
socialist basis.
The case of the Basque peoples is a similar example. Here is a single
nationality denied a separate state and divided between two countries. The
majority of Basques live in Spain but a minority live across the border in south
west France.
When we raise the call for self-determination for the Basques living in Spain,
we mean specifically the right of the people of the four Basque provinces in
Spain to secede. In France the same right must be applied to the two Basque
provinces on the French side of the border. The idea of a single referendum on
the setting up of an independent Euskadi (Basque state) would mean in
practice that the Basques of Spain, being the majority, could determine
whether those in France stay within that state. This is not only impractical, it is
undemocratic and we do not put it forward.

chapter 12

a programme for today

The starting point of a programme must be the need for unity of the
working class in the North, between North and South and with the
British working class also. This means preserving and developing trade
union unity. It means a programme for the democratisation of the
trade unions and for the building of links, top and bottom, between the
unions in both parts of Ireland and in Britain. Side by side with the
task of building political organisations of the working class goes the
need to also link them together as far as is possible.
Should Militant Labour change its position and now advocate a socialist
federation of Ireland? No. This demand would emphasise separateness. It
would not appear as an interim step to a single country but as an acceptance
of two states. A federation on the basis of the existing border would not satisfy
Catholics as it would seem to fall somewhere short of their raised expectation
of unity.
If posed as a repartition it would stress to Catholic workers and to Protestant
workers their differences, it would be telling them that they must be prepared
to stand apart from one another - just at a time when there is a possibility of
the re-building of class unity. At this stage this slogan would tend to lower,
rather than raise, class consciousness.
The reasons which caused us to drop 'a socialist united Ireland' as a slogan
during the 1980s are even more powerfully valid today. Protestant workers see
in this only the 'united', not the 'socialist'. Posed thus baldly it would be a
barrier to explanation, not a bridge.
We have been putting forward the alternative formulation 'for a socialist
Ireland and a socialist federation of Britain and Ireland'. This remains the best
way of presenting our ideas. The slogan is sufficiently open not to lead to
mistaken interpretations, it is sufficiently removed from republican
formulations not to immediately trigger Protestant sensitivities. It emphasises
the need for socialism before it raises the specific nature of a socialist state in
Ireland. Thus it points to the need to change society, not just remove a line
from the map.
Given the long history of conquest, and now with a European consciousness
developing, the reservation may come up, why a particular relationship with
Britain? We have a responsibility to counter nationalist prejudice at home. We
have to be able to distinguish between class opposition to imperialism and

anti-British or anti-English sentiment. We defend the former but oppose the

latter. In so far as reservations about a federation with Britain are out of fear of
domination we are prepared to add the clarification 'on a free and equal basis'.
But in as much as they are merely prejudice against the English we need to
counter this, explaining that on a socialist basis our geographical proximity and
common language would argue for a special relationship.
However the sense of being part of Europe does need to be taken into account.
If a socialist federation with Britain was seen as an alternative to links with the
rest of Europe it would appear even less ambitious than the capitalists with
their idea of a European union. We should therefore add also 'as part of a
European socialist federation'.
The advantage of the slogan 'a socialist Ireland', that it is an open formulation,
is also a disadvantage unless we ourselves are clear what lies behind it. The
slogan is there to invite explanation, it is open so as not to turn people off
before we can clarify it. But this is useless if we are not agreed on the
explanation, if we give different answers to the question does it mean a united
Ireland or not?
Our answer to this must be that a single socialist state is our preferred option.
Any other alternative raises the prospect of an ongoing division between the
working class. To Catholics, North and South, the idea that we tear down every
aspect of capitalist rule, but leave the border, would seem both absurd and
unacceptable. If this were proposed we would have to recognise the right of
Northern Catholics to say no and to opt to join the Southern socialist state.
This would mean drawing a new line between Protestants and Catholics in the
North, when, to get this far presupposes that they would be united as never
before.
To Protestants we argue the case for one state - with strong links with the
working class in Britain. However given the entirely legitimate fears of
Protestant workers that a united Ireland in any form equals coercion, we have
to be able to provide an assurance to the contrary.
By opposing a capitalist united Ireland we have stood against the forcible
coercion of Protestants. Now we need to add the firm guarantee that there
would be no element of coercion on a socialist basis either.
In practice this means a guarantee that, should the majority of Protestants
firmly oppose being part of a socialist united Ireland, they would have the right
to opt out, that is to establish their own socialist state. They would not have
the right to co-opt a substantial Catholic population into that state and so the
boundaries would have to be redrawn.

This would create difficulties. Under capitalism it would mean a Bosnian-style

civil war for territory. Even under socialism it would be extremely complex, but
it could be done by agreement. It might mean for example that Belfast would
be an open city shared by two populations who formally belong to different
states. A similar status would have to be accorded to Brussels and to
Jerusalem on the basis of socialism.
Such a solution would pose many difficulties but it would be possible. Precisely
because of the complexities and even allowing that two socialist states would
have open borders which would give permanence to sectarian division, it
makes much more sense to have a single state.
What we say to Protestants is that it would be better to have a solution which
can unite Catholics and Protestants and put old capitalist inspired enmity to the
side, but the choice is yours. A socialist society will accommodate you in
whatever decision you make.
We will always accord this right to Protestants, but it may not always be
necessary to raise it. The strengthening of class unity, development of a party
of the working class and of a socialist consciousness, may mean that the issue
will recede and the idea of a single socialist state will become acceptable
without reservation. For now we do not need to present the right to opt out in
our list of demands. Rather it is for use when we set about more fully
explaining our programme, verbally or in more lengthy written material.
The left republicans will of course squeal 'sell out' to Unionism. We have never
taken much notice of their opinions and are all the better for that. When they
do criticise us we need to ask them what would be their answer if Protestants
were to say no to a socialist united Ireland. Either they would coerce them or
they would accept our position. There are no other options open.

Autonomy
Finally there is the question of autonomy. Would we advocate autonomy for
Protestants? Lenin was clear that the main criteria for granting autonomy was
not culture or religion, but the fact of a territorial basis upon which it would be
exercised.
Where there is a demand and a basis for autonomy we do more than uphold it
as a right, we advocate that it be introduced. The problem with the idea of
autonomy for Protestants is that it would have to be exercised in a real
territory with real boundaries. To bring this about means working out the same
lines, if not the degree, of separation of Protestant from Catholic as would
come about with two states. To say now we are for a single socialist state but

with autonomy for Protestants means that we would be advocating this

division.
At a time when the thrust and emphasis of our programme has to be to stress
class unity this call would be both unnecessary and divisive. In effect we would
be saying to Protestants and Catholics, you must unite to build a socialist state
but once we get it we think its better that you each should administer your
affairs separately. This would educate in division, not unity.
A possible alternative is the idea of autonomy for the North or part of the
North. There is a certain case for this since things have been run in a different
way in this area for three quarters of a century. There are different approaches
to schooling, house building, road construction, etc, etc. However it would be
premature to raise this at this moment. A socialist state means the maximum
amount of decision making devolved to local level in any case. Whether an
area, the North, or perhaps several counties of the North, would want to
operate as an autonomous administration unit is impossible to determine now.
If a demand for such autonomy was clearly present leading up to and in the
course of the transformation to socialism and after we would support it, as we
would for other parts of the South also.
Dealing with a living process and with ever changing consciousness, to give a
finished programme to the national question would be like a doctor giving a
single prescription to cover all illnesses. We have to respond to issues as they
come up, being consistent, not in always parroting the same answer, but in the
method by which we come to our conclusions.
At present the British ruling class have clearly and with virtual unanimity,
stated their preference to withdraw from Northern Ireland. This is a
fundamental factor in determining the current shape of the national conflict.
The fact that the Sinn Fein leadership have become convinced that this is
Britain's real intent has been important in propelling them along the road of
peace.
That this is the current strategy of the ruling class does not mean that it will
necessarily be their last word. just as their interests and their policy shifted
and altered in the decades before partition, so further shifts are not only
possible, they are likely.
There is no doubt that present government policy has broad support in ruling
circles. Even in the Tory party there has been no evidence of any substantial
unionist wing opposed to the government's declaration of no "selfish" interest
in the North.

One reason is the fact that Protestant opposition offers an insurance against
Northern Ireland leaving the Union. Those among the ruling class still with
unionist leanings, can take comfort from the fact that, while the government's
Framework Document offers the right to secede, a majority are clearly against
exercising this right.

Again the Orange drum

Were it to come to secession and complete withdrawal from Ireland the present
unity among the ruling class would likely fracture. Fear of the knock-on effect
Northern Ireland secession would have in Scotland or in Wales, would likely
drive a substantial section into opposition.
The issue of Scottish nationalism could itself cause a change of heart on British
'neutrality' over the North. During the pre-1914 Home Rule crisis Ulster
provided a convenient theatre upon which the more conservative wing of
Capital did battle against Liberal reforms and in defence of the Empire.
If at some future time there was a development of Scottish or indeed of Welsh
nationalism to the point where independence was threatened, it is possible that
a section of the establishment would once again beat the Orange drum.
Protestants in Northern Ireland could again be called upon to resist, this time
not for the sake of the Empire, but for the sake of the union between England,
Scotland and Wales.
A new period of industrial upheaval would also cause sections of the ruling
class to drop the notion of neutrality and whip up sectarian division. Divide and
rule as a tactic to de-rail the working class movement, has been put on hold,
not abandoned. Today the threat of socialism is quite distant. If in the future
there are movements along the lines of 1918-20 it is probable that sections of
the ruling class will bring it forward again.
Any developments of this character would cast the national question in a new
light. Our general programme and our more immediate demands and slogans
would have to be reviewed and updated.
Even now new issues are arising which we need to consider. The publication of
the Framework Document, for example, poses questions we have to address.
One is our attitude to a new Assembly for the North. In the past, while Militant
Labour has been prepared to participate in elections to a new local parliament,
we have not called for the establishment of such a body.
The reason was that any return to a local administration, smacked in Catholic
areas of a return to Unionist domination. Having swept Stormont away there
was understandable opposition to anything that might smack of its
reestablishment.

Now there is a different situation. The ending of the IRA military campaign and
the republican leadership's abandonment in total of the idea of struggle, means
that it is accepted that the ending of partition is not an immediate option. The
tactic of boycott or abstention is only valid when there is an alternative which
can be put forward. The only alternative to an Assembly is continued direct
rule, control colonial-style by government ministers and administration by
centrally appointed quangos.
The attitude of Catholics is that provided there is also a North/South element
of a new deal, a new Assembly would not be a Stormont. They feel that they
would occupy a position of strength within it. Even Sinn Fein are lining up to
participate if there is a political agreement to set one up. Given this, it makes
little sense to oppose its establishment.
Once the idea of an Assembly begins to see the light of day it will be necessary
to back it, but go further, demanding that it be set up on a democratic basis,
that it be elected by a system of proportional representation, and that it have a
full range of powers including powers to nationalise industry, raise local taxes,
etc.
The cross border bodies recommended by the Framework Document are
undemocratic by their nature. It is proposed that powers over agreed areas be
delegated to a small triumvirate of people drawn from the Northern Assembly
and from the Dail. In opposing these bodies we need to be careful to do so in a
positive manner. Whereas the Unionists just say no we have to put forward
positive alternatives, starting with the need for the working class to link
together North and South. We are, for example, in favour of the workers
organisations examining the provision of all services and benefits, North and
South, and then campaigning to have these "harmonised" upwards on the
basis of the best available in either state.
Other issues will also arise from the Framework Document. It is likely that
there will at some time be a referendum on the removal of Articles 2 & 3 of the
Southern constitution. We can only decide our attitude to this at the time,
based on the actual wording proposed. However given the shift in attitudes
North and South, and the recognition that any change in the constitutional
position must be with the consent of the people in the North, it is inconceivable
that we could vote to leave the constitution as it is.

section three

marxism and the national question

chapter 13

international situation
The national question is, without doubt, one of the great issues facing
socialists and marxists today. Lenin described Tzarist Russia as a
prison house of nationalities - 57% of its peoples were non-Russian.
He argued that without a correct approach on this issue the Bolsheviks
would not have been able to lead the working class to power in 1917.
What Lenin said applies with increasing force to virtually every corner of the
globe today. It applies most assuredly to Ireland.
Of course the question was somewhat different in the days of Marx and Engels
and even of Lenin. Marx wrote at a time when the capitalist system was still
capable of developing the productive forces and taking society forward. A
feature, indeed one of the crowning achievements, of capitalism in this, its
progressive phase, was the assimilation of peoples into nations and the
creation of nation states.
Lenin lived in the epoch of imperialism - that period at the close of the last,
and beginning of this, century, which saw the rest of the globe carved into
spheres of control and influence of the major powers. The export of capital to
the less developed countries meant that their political and military domination
was further cemented by an economic enslavement to these mighty capitalist
states.
Marx, while faced with the progressive features of capitalism in creating nation
states was always sensitive to its other side - the domination and subjugation
of countries and of nations by the ascending capitalist states. His writings on
Ireland and his conclusion that: "The English working class will never be free
until Ireland is freed from the English yoke" (55) is an example. Marx
advocated independence for Ireland, adding that:
"after separation there may come federation." (56)
In a similar vein Lenin opposed all forms of national oppression:
"Whoever does not recognise and champion the equality of nations and
languages and does not fight against all national oppression or inequality is not
a marxist; he is not even a democrat." (57)

After 1917 the Bolsheviks used the example of the Russian revolution to
inspire as well as give concrete assistance to the national liberation movements
in the colonial countries.
Yet Lenin also in his pre-World War 1 writings on the national question
repeatedly laid stress on the tendency still of capitalism in the more developed
areas of the globe to bring peoples together into nations. He pointed to:
"capitalism's world-historical tendency to break down national barriers,
assimilate nations - a tendency which manifests itself more and more
powerfully with every passing decade, and is one of the greatest driving forces
transforming capitalism into socialism". (58)
Lenin's programme on the national question was drawn up for countries like
those of Eastern Europe and Asia which could not stand against the economic
power of the imperialist states and which were denied the route of historical
development which these had taken.
Of the national question in the more developed states, he was able to say:
"In most western countries it was settled long ago" (59) and further, that, by
1871;
"Western Europe had been transformed into a settled system of bourgeois
states, which, as a general rule, were nationally uniform states. Therefore to
seek the right to self-determination in the programmes of west European
socialists at this time of day is to betray one's ignorance of the ABC of
marxism." (60)
Even at the time this was probably a one-sided view but it is certainly no
longer apt. Lenin, who argued the need to analyse the national question within
concrete and definite historical limits, would be the first to revise this
conclusion for today. Two world wars and now with a second period of
prolonged economic depression since Lenin penned these lines, the national
question presents itself anew, not only in the ex-colonial world but in the
'settled states' of the West. Alongside the economic crisis of capitalism, the
historical failure and now outright capitulation of reformism and the absence of
any mass revolutionary alternative have laid the conditions in many countries
for nationalism to arise or re-arise in some form.
A further twist has been provided by the collapse of Stalinism. From the
Balkans, through the Caucuses, to central Asia a torch of national/ethnic and
religious conflict has been lit. In some cases this has reached the level of civil
war, elsewhere it registers still as smouldering discontent. Nowhere can it be
extinguished fully on the basis of the re-imposition of capitalism on these
societies.

Growing divisions
Broadly the tendency to assimilation of peoples into nations, apparent in the
last century, and even then most often by the most brutal methods, has, in the
present epoch, been replaced by the opposite tendency - to the accentuation
of division, even to separation. The case of German reunification, brought
about by unrepeatable circumstances, stands as a single exception.
The nation states which have emerged in the ex-colonial countries, especially
in Africa are caricatures of the nation states of western Europe. They are
based, not on the natural assimilation of peoples, but on the artificial
boundaries imposed by imperialism in the past.
A complex of identities exists in these areas. There is a general feeling, often
linked to an anti-imperialist sentiment, of a broader identity - expressed as
pan-nationalism, pan-Africanism, a sense of being Latin American or whatever.
All attempts to give this an organisational form on the basis of capitalism, for
example efforts to merge Arab states, have failed and will always be liable to
fail.
There is also a certain sense of 'national' identity based on the states which
now exist, no matter how artificial their boundaries. Arabs will describe
themselves as Arabs but also as Egyptians, Syrians, Lebanese or whatever.
Beneath this, and because of the historical weakness and economic impasse of
most of these 'nations' other identities based on tribe, religion, caste, etc, tend
to rise.
In pre-independence days, the struggle to wrest free of the control of
imperialism acted as a unifying factor and helped develop a national
consciousness in colonial countries such as India and most of Africa. After
independence, and with national movements based on capitalism in power, this
national consciousness has tended to decline. In other words once these
independence movements defined themselves as capitalist governments which
could neither break the economic domination of the West nor deliver a secure
future, they were no longer able to draw together the peoples of different
tribal, ethnic, religious or regional identities. Most often people associated with
one ethnic group placed themselves at the top of the heap and by
discrimination against others, opened the sores of future conflict.
Only the working class movement, fighting on a state and a regional level for a
socialist solution, can cut across the tendency to division. Outside of this
national/ ethnic/ tribal conflicts are bound to intensify - at their most extreme
leading to wars, mass displacement of peoples and to a situation whereby

states may remain on the map but in reality will have ceased to exist as
centralised units. In many cases their actual break up will occur.
The conflict in ex-Yugoslavia has given the peoples of Europe a close up of
what, for more than four decades, they would probably have viewed as an
African or an Asian problem. Already in some European countries - Belgium
and Spain for example - there are acute national problems. In others the lines
erased by the past assimilation of peoples threaten to reappear. National
problems, if they have not yet arisen, have the capacity to arise in all the once
more 'settled' nation states of the advanced capitalist world.
It would be wrong to have an apocalyptic view. The development of
nationalism is never in a straight line. Rather it progresses or falls back in a
series of ebbs and flows which most often are opposite reflections of the
advances and retreats of the class struggle.
A new movement of the working class in Europe could, for example, erode the
basis of nationalism and likewise could deal a blow against racism for a whole
period.

chapter 14

finding a solution
The historical epoch may be different, the problem may present itself
differently, but still the approach taken by Lenin and the Bolsheviks
remains thoroughly modern, thoroughly illuminating today.
That is not to say that a ready made programme tailored to all situations can
be found in the writings of Lenin or any marxist. No such programme exists
and those who search for it will search in vain.
Demands on the national question must be related to actual circumstances and
to the consciousness of various layers, particularly of the working class. And as
neither conditions nor consciousness are fixed or static but are constantly
changing, so demands need to be re-evaluated, fine-tuned and altered. What
was correct twenty five years ago at the dawn of the Northern Ireland Troubles
may no longer be appropriate in the changed situation brought about by
twenty five years of sectarian violence.
What we take from Lenin and from marxism generally, is a method of approach
and analysis which, if skilfully applied, can help unlock the complexities of the
national question today.
If Lenin stressed one point on this subject it was the need to be concrete, to
view things as they have arisen, as they are and as they are developing. His

advice - to avoid supra-historical dogma and abstraction, but deal with actual
historical circumstances - remains valid whether we are dealing with Ireland on
any other country.
"The categorical requirement of marxist theory in investigating any social
question is that it be examined within definite historical limits and, if it refers
to a particular country (e.g. the national programme for a given country) that
account be taken of the specific features distinguishing that country from
others in the same historical epoch." (61)
Our approach is as internationalists, never as nationalists. The development of
the nation state and of modern nations has been a product of capitalism and
has helped take society forward in the past. But modern productive techniques
have far outstripped the limitations of national boundaries. Even the regional
markets which the capitalists are attempting to create in their various spheres
of influence - Europe, North America and the Far East - are not large enough to
satisfy the productive appetites of the huge modern corporations. The financial
markets have become globalised with billions of dollars daily switching from
country to country, continent to continent, at the push of computer buttons.
The nation state is an outmoded anachronism from the point of view of
production, of finance, and of a harmonious development which can protect the
climate, environment and eco-system of the world. It is not for sentimental but
for entirely practical reasons that we are for a world plan of production to
replace the anarchy of capitalism; that is of production based on private
property and the nation state.

Unity
The starting point of our programme is the need for the unity of the working
class of all races, creeds, tribes and nations, both within the boundaries of
existing states and on an international level. We reject the reactionary 'one
nation' philosophy espoused by Disraeli in the last century and regurgitated by
modern Tories and increasingly by right wing leaders of the British Labour
Party.
Within every capitalist nation there are two distinct groups - the ruling class
and their acolytes on the one side and the working class on the other, with
various other strata in between. In items of mutual interest, life-style and even
of broad culture, especially in the modern electronic age, the working class of
one country have far more in common with workers of other countries than
with their own rulers.
Bourgeois nationalism sets out to disguise this fact stressing that we are all
French, English, German, etc, whether we live in a dilapidated terrace or a

mansion, whether we travel by bus or private helicopter, whether we are idle

and penniless on the dole, or idle and cossetted by wealth, living off shares
and investments. To this national solidarity of oppressor and oppressed,
marxism counterposes the international solidarity of all the oppressed against
all oppression.
For the most advanced sections of the working class such a straightforward
appeal to class solidarity and internationalism may be enough. But where a
national issue has arisen perhaps in the form of opposition to national
oppression, for the majority of people, workers included, it will be necessary to
go beyond this.
There will be a need to show that socialists stand opposed to all national
oppression and are the firmest advocates of the rights of nationalities and
indeed of all minorities within a state. The experience of Stalinism, which,
while it failed in every area, failed particularly visibly on the national question
only reinforces this.
Hence the need for a programme of democratic demands; against oppression,
against the suppression of language, literature and other aspects of the culture
of a nation, and including the right to self-determination i.e. the right of a
national minority within a state to secede from that state and establish itself as
an independent nation.
While nationalism itself is ultimately divisive it has two quite distinct aspects
which cannot be lumped together. The nationalism of a fascist demanding a
new Reich is not the same as the nationalism of a Palestinian in a refugee
camp striving for a homeland for his or her people.
The former is entirely reactionary, while the latter represents an elementary
yearning for freedom and for a better life. One is a brake on history while the
other, in the form of mass national liberation movements has been one of the
greatest engines of historical change in this century.
The difference is not just between various manifestations of nationalism but
also within national liberation movements themselves. Within every national
movement there are different and ultimately conflicting class elements.
On the one side is the nationalism of the emerging ruling strata or elite. They
want to establish their nation so that they can ape the rulers of other capitalist
nations, and enjoy the same fruits of exploitation as they do.
On the other side is the nationalism of the oppressed who want to break free of
domination in order to better their lot. Ultimately there is the same difference
between these two aspects of nationalism as there is between the rulers and
the ruled in states like Britain, Germany etc.

A marxist programme supports all that is progressive in national movements

but offers no measure of support to their backward features.
Essentially, this is a negative programme. We are against the suppression of
culture, language, nationality. But we do not promote any particular culture,
language or nationality over any other. We opposed the banning of the Irish
tricolour by the Unionist state in Northern Ireland as a denial of the national
rights of those Catholics who identified with it. Militant opposed the ban but we
ourselves did not, and now that it is lifted, do not carry that flag or promote it
over any other national emblem.
The aim of this largely negative programme is to say to those who look to
nationalism as a solution that it is the working class who are the only real
guarantors of their national and democratic rights as well as their economic
liberation. Its intent is not to promote nationalism, but to open up class
divisions in national movements, to develop class unity and to promote the
class struggle.
The best way to assess whether a demand or a set of demands is correct, is to
pose the simple question - does it make it easier to gain the ear of nationalist
minded workers, does it advance the class struggle?
This was the approach of Lenin:
"The bourgeoisie always places its national demands in the forefront, and does
so in categorical fashion. With the proletariat, however, these demands are
subordinated to the interests of the class struggle". (62)
And:
"While recognising equality and equal rights to a nation state, it (the working
class) values above all and places foremost the alliance of the proletariat of all
nations, and assesses every national demand, every national separation from
the angle of the working class struggle". (63)
It is with this proviso that Lenin advanced and defended the right of nations to
self-determination as a key element of the Bolshevik programme and later of
the programme of the Third International.

Right to self-determination
The right to self-determination means basically the right to secede from a
state. Marxists do not apply this right to each and every minority but to
historically evolved communities, who have a distinct sense of national identity
and who have or could have the territorial basis to realise themselves as a
nation.

The issue of whether or not such a state would be economically viable is a red
herring. No small state is independently fully viable in this age of multinational
corporations and global finance. If this were to prevent us from guaranteeing
the right of self determination it would cut us off from subject nationalities
discussing secession.
To uphold the right to secede is not necessarily to advocate secession - at least
that is to national minorities within a state. In relation to colonies or territories
occupied by foreign armies it is a different matter. Under such circumstances
marxists stand unequivocally for independence and for the withdrawal of
imperialist troops. So Marx stood for Irish independence. So Trotsky demanded
of the Republican government during the Spanish civil war that it issue a
decree guaranteeing Morocco its independence. So Militant supported the
Vietnamese in their long war against French and then US imperialism.
Where it is a question of a national minority within the boundaries of an
existing centralised state, Basques and Catalans in Spain, the Sardinians in
relation to Italy, the future of the Scottish and Welsh nations in Britain, the
question is not so straightforward.
Here Marxists hesitate before becoming proponents of independence and have
a responsibility to point to the pitfalls of this course. This is especially so of
marxists based among the subject nationality. While dealing sympathetically
with the national aspirations of that people they need to counter illusions that
capitalist independence will be an answer to their problems. Above all they
need to point to the dangers of such unity as exists between the working class
of that state being broken.
Even the idea that the national problem would be solved by secession is most
often also an illusion. It is more likely that such a 'solution' of one problem
would only lead to the creation of others.

Yugoslavia
Yugoslavia has given a living, if extreme example. The hiving off of Slovenia
and then Croatia upset the delicate balance of nationalities in what remained of
the old state and helped precipitate civil war. Slovenia was fortunate to have a
relatively homogenous population. Croatia had within it a substantial Serbian
minority and its independence created in turn the problem of a new minority
seeking to escape the clutches of the new majority in Zagreb.
In the ex-Stalinist world there are more Croatias than Slovenias. Likewise in
the countries of the colonial world, the past crimes of imperialism have left a
potentially explosive patchwork of tribal, religious and national minorities and
sub-minorities.

And in the advanced countries the question is not so different. Were Belgium to
divide between the French speaking Walloons and the Flemish, it would be a
matter of time before new tensions would arise in the new states. Among the
four Basque provinces in Spain there is a substantial Spanish minority who
actually are a majority in one province - Navarra. There are certain similarities,
but also differences, between this situation and Northern IreTroubled times 149
land where the Protestants have proven a hopelessly complicating factor to
those who seek neat and easy solutions. Does this mean that in every case
Marxists uphold the right to secede but in practice would argue against? The
answer is no. Whatever position that would be taken would depend on the
actual situation, on class relations within the state and on the perspectives
both for the development of national sentiment, and for the class struggle.
The key is the effect this stance would have on the class struggle and the unity
of the working class. In a case where the desire for separation had clearly
achieved a majority among the working class, where this had been shown to
be both deep seated and enduring and where the likely prospect was of its
increasing, we would have to consider going further than the right to secede
and demand independence. This would be more than a programmatic question.
We would have to advocate, and where possible conduct, a struggle in both
parts of the existing state to achieve independence, posing at the same time
the idea of a socialist federation.
If the working class movement in such a case did not support independence it
would risk losing the most combatative sections of the working class to
whatever radical nationalist forces might emerge. The nationalists would point
a finger at the working class of the dominant nation accusing them of
chauvinism.
The problem in Israel/ Palestine has elements of a colonial situation but also of
that of a national minority within a state. Here there can be no doubting the
deeply felt and enduring desire, cultivated by decades of oppression, of the
Palestinian masses for their own state.
In order to gain a hearing for socialist ideas among the Palestinians it is
necessary for marxists, not just to support the call for a state, but to put
forward a programme of struggle to achieve it. Anything less and we would not
be taken seriously.
The best answer is to advocate two socialist states, one for the Palestinians,
one for the Israelis. This means a redrawing of existing boundaries since a
viable Palestinian state could not just be based on the occupied territories, but

would also have to include those Palestinian areas of Israel where a majority
would opt to join it.
The alternative of a single socialist state for Israelis and Palestinians would
seem fanciful to both sides and would seem to Palestinians to fall short of their
aspiration for a land of their own. The division between Israelis and
Palestinians is far deeper, far more fixed than that between Catholics and
Protestants in Northern Ireland. In formulating a programme there is no
alternative but to accept the reality of this division and put forward the idea of
two socialist states, of Jerusalem as an open city and the capital of both, and
of a socialist federation of the entire region, as the only plausible answer.
On the other hand where the demand for separation is not at such a level,
where the working class remains torn between the conflicting pressures of
nationalism drawing it apart and of class bonding them together, it would be
foolish to advocate secession. In such a case to do so would be to stand on the
nationalist side of the working class and would serve to reinforce nationalism.

Scotland
Despite an undoubted rise in nationalist sentiment this is still the situation in
Scotland. The unity of Scottish with English and Welsh workers and the
existence of Scottish Militant Labour as an emerging force potentially capable
of playing a significant role in limiting the growth of the SNP, are not
unimportant factors.
Nonetheless it is also necessary to recognise the strength of nationalist feeling
in Scotland and its potential to grow rapidly on the basis of disillusionment with
a Labour government in Britain. At this stage we answer this with the demand
for extensive autonomy in the form of a Scottish Assembly with wide ranging
powers. If there is a further development of Scottish nationalism which is likely
to be sustained, it is possible that we may have to go further and support
independence, arguing for a socialist Scotland as part of a socialist federation
of Scotland, England and Wales.
When it comes to autonomy it is not the right to autonomy but autonomy itself
that we uphold. Autonomy means the devolution of powers to be administered
on a local basis.
What powers would be devolved would depend on the actual situation and on
what was demanded. It could mean that only defence, foreign affairs, and
some aspects of the economy would be conducted at the centre. Control over
health, education, housing and other services could be devolved. Policing could
be under local control as could environmental regulation, transport and
taxation. Autonomous powers could include the right to take control of industry

and land and to enforce legislation on working conditions and health and
safety. Local control over the legal system would mean that a devolved
parliament could scrap the Tory anti-trade union laws, substituting legislation
which protects the rights of workers.
Existing centralised capitalist states will resist such extensive powers of
autonomy. For us it is a question of setting out clearly the powers we seek and
conducting a struggle to achieve them.
Where today there is a genuine support for autonomy we would give support to
that demand - provided it was territorially based and could be realised. It is
ludicrous and also potentially divisive to argue that all minorities, even those
scattered across a state, should be given autonomy if they desire. Autonomy
needs to be based. on a region or a national territory if it is to make practical
sense. It could be applied to Scotland but not, for example, to the Scottish
people living in London.
This is not to say that we ignore or take lightly the rights of minorities
scattered across the territory of a dominant culture or nationality. We oppose
all discrimination and also uphold the rights of minorities to have their
language, culture and customs respected, especially when it comes to the
education system. But where there is not the territorial possibility of realising
it, we stop short of the demand for autonomy.
A state made up of territories, each enjoying varying degrees of autonomy, is
not the same thing as a federation. In the case of autonomy a centralised state
will agree to cede various, formerly central, powers to local control.
A federation can only come about differently. It presupposes the existence of
independent states which have agreed to combine in certain areas for their
mutual benefit. In the first case powers are devolved from the centre, in the
second they are transferred from different states by agreement, to a new
federal centre. Implicit in this is the right of each member state to cede from a
federation should it wish.
So, while we talk of the right to autonomy and to selfdetermination, that is the
right to be free of suffocating central decision making, or of national
oppression, it makes no sense to talk of the right to federate. It is the
difference between the right to divorce and the right to marry. One must be
upheld as the right of either party, while the other can only come about by
mutual consent.
Capitalist society cannot guarantee the equality of treatment of nationalities or
other minorities, the respect of all cultures, languages, etc, which we demand.

Nor can it provide the real measure of freedom from overcentralised decision
making intended in the call for autonomy and the right to secede.
Those capitalist states which call themselves federations, the United States or
Germany for example, are in reality no such thing. They are centralised states
which exercise only a degree of autonomy to their component parts, but which,
in practice, deny the right to secede.
Only within a socialist society could all these freedoms be truly applied.
Socialism would mean that the contradiction between centralised and local
power would be broken down. There would be the maximum devolution of
powers to local control.
Decisions which had to be taken at a central level would not be taken in
contradiction or opposition to local democratic bodies, but would be taken as a
culmination of discussion on these bodies and then would be referred back to
them for implementation. Such genuine participatory democracy is not possible
under the capitalist system, which drains the energies of the working class in
the workplace. A drastic cut in the working week would give the working class
the key ingredient of time to allow it, for the first time, to take part in the
planning and running of society.
A socialist federation means a federation in the true sense, achieved through
negotiation and agreement and with no element of compulsion. When we put
forward our slogan of a socialist federation of Britain and Ireland, we add the
rider on a free and voluntary basis'. We need to do so because of Ireland's long
history of domination by England and because the concept of a federation has
been debased both by the USSR and by those capitalist states who misuse the
term.
Strictly speaking the rider is not necessary. The clarification is in the term
'socialist federation' itself. Such a federation can only be on a free and
voluntary basis, otherwise it is not a socialist federation.
The method of Lenin on the national question has nothing in common with that
of Stalin, whose role was as the brutal suppresser of national rights and
culture, even of whole nationalities. Similarly, socialism is not the same as the
bureaucratic, dictatorial caricature which existed in Russia and Eastern Europe.
That offered no appeal, no model to which the working class in Ireland could
look.
Neither capitalism, nor the now crumbled failure of Stalinism, offer any solution
to the national problem. But the idea of building a genuine socialist society that is a very different thing. Socialism means taking the major industry and
all key services into public ownership and running them democratically with

need replacing profit as the motive. It means no privileged elite, only the right
of people themselves to manage their own affairs. It means creating an
international brotherhood and sisterhood, a unity based on respect of
difference and in which all national and minority rights would be guaranteed.

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30)
31)
32)
33)
34)
35)

Ian Adamson The Ulster People, Pretani Press 1991 p104

Ibid. p19
TA Jackson Ireland Her Own, Lawrence & Wishart 1971, P25
Ibid. p117
Mary McNeill The Life and Times of Mary Ann McCracken, Blackstaff Press 1988, p177
Jemmy Hope The Memoirs of Jemmy Hope, B&ICO publication 1972, p17
Ibid. p16
Austen Morgan Labour and Partition, The Belfast working class, 1905-23, Pluto Press 1991,
p240
Ibid. p240
C. D. Greaves The Irish Transport & General Workers Union, Gill & Macmillan 1982, p234
Ibid. p234
Morgan p249
Greaves p267
Ibid. p268
Morgan p255
ATQ Stewart The Ulster Crisis, Faber 1967, p57
Nicholas Mansergh The Irish Question, London 1967, p165
Stewart p55
AG Boyce Englishmen and Irish Troubles, Johnathan Cape 1994, p30
George Dangerfield The Damnable Question, Quartet Books 1979, p82
Boyce p31
Rhodes James The British Revolution,. British Politics 1880-1939 Vol2, Hamish Hamilton
1977, p142
Donny Gluckstein The Western Soviets, Bookmark 1985, p10
Ibid. p10
Rhodes James p135
E O'Connor Syndicalism in Modern Ireland, Cork University Press 1988, p71
Boyce p44
Times 20 November 1920
Boyce p49
O'Connor p71
Boyce p45
Morgan p267
Ibid. p270
Ibid. p262
Ibid. p289

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Michael Farrell Arming the Protestants, Pluto Press 1983, p32

Brian Barton Brookeborough. The making of a Prime Minister, Queens University 1988, p38
Liam De Paor Divided Ulster, Pelican 1971, p27
Boyce p140
Times 15 August 1921
Dangerfield p332
Tom Jones Whitehall Diary Vol III, p146
Farrell Arming the Protestants, p83
Articles of Agreement for a Treaty between Great Britain and Ireland, 1921
Times 15 January 1966
Michael Farrell The Orange State, Pluto Press 1976, p92
Constitution of the Council of Labour (author's papers)
Farrell The Orange State, p221
Magill, July 1983
Irish Democrat, May 1995
Magill, July 1983
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Lenin The Right of Nations to Self-Determination, Progress Publishers, 1979 Edition, p51
Ibid. p48
Lenin Critical Remarks on the National Question, Progress Publishers 1976 Edition, p17
Ibid. p16
Lenin The Right of Nations to Self-Determination, Progress Publishers, 1979 Edition, p17
Ibid. p17
Ibid. p12
Ibid. p21
Ibid. p23