Ireland

A Basque Marxist was on a speaking tour of the North of Ireland at the end of October. He spoke to audiences in Belfast, Strabane and Derry mainly composed of republican socialists, but not only. There was keen interest in seeing how the experience of the Basque situation could be applied to the North of Ireland, and vice versa. We make available here a report, originally published in The Plough, the journal of the Irish Republican Socialist Party.

Last week the Executive in the North of Ireland presented its budget. It has been presented as a budget that will create jobs, improve services and reduce poverty. A closer look reveals tax concessions and incentives for the bosses and cuts in jobs and social spending and increased taxation for the workers. They are preparing social turmoil in the future.

Michael Collins was a great Irish revolutionary and nationalist who more than any one person may be considered to have created modern Ireland. His political tragedy, like other well-meaning nationalists in the age of imperialism was to attempt the impossible; to try to achieve meaningful national independence, in Ireland's case uniting both Catholics and Protestants, without breaking free from the binds of capitalism.

A Speech delivered in Barcelona Wednesday August 1st 2007 to a gathering of Marxists from around the world by Gerry Ruddy, a member of the Irish Republican Socialist Party

Some disturbing events have been taking place in the south of Ireland, where two IRSP members have been arrested and are being held under the notorious “section 30”. This is clearly a case of political victimisation and should be condemned by all socialists.

As Gerry Ruddy explains, “The issue of the national question in Ireland is at heart a class question. The division of the country into two separate states has encouraged sectarianism, seriously dividing the working class and allowing the continued exploitation of all workers.” This while in the recent period the IRSP in the South of Ireland has come under attack from political policing.

In spite of its social and economic policies – and the corruption scandals - the ruling Fianna Fáil party held its ground in the recent Irish elections. This can be understood on the basis of the prolonged economic boom and the lack of a credible genuine left alternative.

The armed struggle is over. Class struggle is the only option. Those who ignore the class question and stand alone on their “republican principles” stand condemned to remain in splendid isolation. We now live in different times and the old certainties now no longer hold. We all on the left need to forget our petty differences and become relevant to the lives of the working classes in Ireland while keeping alive our vision of socialism.

The power-sharing executive involving Sinn Fein, the DUP and others, that should emerge from last week’s elections to Stormont, will be called on to apply the anti-working class policies dictated from London. Socialist Republicans now face the task of offering a class alternative.

The replacement of the old Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) with the PSNI has received the support of Sinn Fein leaders. This has opened up a heated debate among Republicans on whether this is acceptable or not. Here we provide three articles written by comrades of the Irish Republican Socialist Party, where they explain why Republican socialists cannot accept such a force.

Twenty five years ago British imperialism demonstrated its cold, calculating cruelty in the face of Irish Republican prisoners who felt they had no alternative but to make the ultimate sacrifice in the struggle for political rights, embarking on a hunger strike that would tragically end with their deaths. Gerry Ruddy of the Irish Republican Socialist Party has sent us an excellent and intimate analysis of those events, highlighting the need to build a revolutionary movement based on Marxism and rooted in the working class across all boundaries. Read the article on the Socialist Appeal website.

This latest of Ken Loach’s films is well crafted and well thought. It has been thoroughly researched and really gets under the surface of the processes and the events that helped shape the current situation on the island of Ireland.

“We urge all republicans to turn towards the working class movements, get active in the unions, and raise issues that while relevant to the immediate interests of working also form a bridge towards more radical and revolutionary demands.” We reproduce the editorial from the latest e-mail newsletter The Plough (Volume 3, Number 25, 14 June 2006) of the IRSP. We have their kind permission to reproduce it.

The recent announcement that the Provisional IRA had decommissioned all its weapons has been drowned out by the blasts of the loyalist paramilitaries using theirs. The Good Friday Agreement is dead. Instead of peace we have a dramatic increase in extreme sectarian violence. More than ever the call for working class unity in the struggle for socialism is the only answer.