11.04.1996

Militant in Ireland

Ian Mahoney reviews 'Troubled Times - the national question in Ireland' by Peter Hadden (Herald Books, pp159, £5.99)

Peter Hadden is a leading member of Irish Militant Labour, an organisation that recently won over 11,384 votes in the Dublin West by-election in the south of Ireland.

This slim book - originally a resolution adopted by the July 1995 Irish Militant Labour national conference - purports to be an “outline of a socialist position which could unite, rather than divide, the working class” (p9). In practice however, Hadden offers the nationalist section of the working class the perspective of dropping the national question in order to facilitate this unity.

Hadden suggests that in the situation where republican leaders were also talking about ‘socialism’,

“inevitably the distinction between what socialists wanted and what nationalists were fighting for became hazy. In the minds of the protestants they were one and the same ...

“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 ... The first issues of Irish Militant, published in 1972, carried a subheading ‘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’” (pp106-107).

Of course, the ‘important section’ of the class unwilling to countenance any mention of the national question is the protestant one. In order to accommodate the reactionary prejudices of this part of the class, Hadden obscures the essential political difference between these two communities under the banner of “workers’ unity”. Both the loyalist and republican military campaigns, he says, have been essentially “sectarian”.

This is a reactionary position. The nationalist masses of the north of Ireland have supported the struggle for a united Ireland, a primary democratic question that the working class vanguard must address itself to in order to win the revolution. Hadden simply wishes it away:

“At times when the tempo of the revolution is on the ascendant all the strata of the oppressed, exploited and downtrodden tend to unite, while those divisions of religion or region which have at times stood between them tend to be pushed to the background” (p21).

In fact, the history of contemporary Ireland illustrates the precise opposite. This is because there has been a fundamental difference between the republican and loyalist sections of the working class in the north of Ireland. The nationalist masses have supported a revolutionary fight against the existing state for a democratic right of a united Ireland: the loyalist section of the class has largely supported the existing sectarian state and the link with the British imperialist state as the source of relative privilege over their catholic fellow workers. The protestant working class has been a reactionary labour aristocracy, complicit in the suppression of the catholics in alliance with their own bourgeoisie.

This is not to write them off: they are after all workers, with the same fundamental interests as workers everywhere. But any strategy for ‘socialism’ that does not start from this basic truth ends up - like Hadden - acting as a ‘Marxist’ cover for loyalism.

Revolutionary programme is the key. Without it, ML comrades tend to be pulled in the direction of sectional struggles - black or liberation, gay politics, youth or trade unionism. Hadden and Irish Militant Labour are victims of the same centrifugal process, only in their social context the result is rather more drastic.

One last point. When Phil Hearse left Socialist Outlook (International Socialist Group) to join ML, he underlined that his “differences” with his new organisation included its line on Ireland. Given ML’s openly stated position that “trends, groups, organisations, factions, etc, are a perpetual reality of political life” (Socialism Today February 1996), I wonder whether he now plans to makes his differences open?

Ian Mahoney