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“In times of acute social conflict such as will be engendered by the present war, the so-called minimum programme of the socialists becomes merged directly with the maximum programme – the struggle for power.” Starting from the above fundamentally correct premise, Robertus arrives at the amazing conclusion that the task of the Irish socialists is to prepare for – the “Irish Republic” – as a first step, to be sure.
He is able to reach this contradictory conclusion by abstracting the struggle for national liberation from its economic base, and presenting it to us on the place of psychology. “Until then the goal of national liberation will appear to them as the universal panacea.”
The key to his argument is to be found in the question, “Can the partition of Ireland be ended under capitalism?” Not only Robertus’ answer to the question but the question itself is completely un-Marxian and untrustworthy of serious consideration by the working class. The Irish socialist is concerned only with the questions, “What will the elimination of the Border mean for me and my class? Does the struggle to eliminate the Border under capitalism command my support?” To the first question Robertus answers with the abstract phrase, “National liberation”, and to the second he answers “Yes”. Let us examine the meaning of the term “National liberation”, and clothe in the flesh and blood of Marxism the abstract words of Robertus. Let us discover the motive force of the struggle for national freedom.
The classical national liberation movements began about the time of the French Revolution (1789) and finished with the Franco-Prussian War (1870-71). The nascent bourgeoisie, struggling to abolish the reactionary feudal property rights and the autocratic feudal state, carried out the task of unifying the economy of the nation, breaking up the old feudal lands and introducing a form of political democracy.
Capitalism, in comparison with feudalism, was progressive, and thus the movements of national liberation were able to play a progressive role. The development of imperialism, the seizure of colonies, the export of capital, and the partitioning of the world, which commenced about 1876, have, however, restricted the character of the National revolution. The development of the world market and its monopoly rights precludes the solution of the national bourgeois revolution.
Already in 1896 James Connolly was able to perceive this fundamental proposition, and in Érin’s Hope – the End and the Means he had already come to the conclusion that “The Irish working class must emancipate itself, and in emancipating itself it perforce must free the nation.” He repeatedly warned the workers against the Patriotic Irish middle-classes and the close ties which bind this class, even when it protests, to British imperialism.
He showed that since the attainment of national independence could not be carried out by the bourgeoisie, it would be a by-product of the struggle for socialism. History was to prove this magnificent prognosis of Connolly to be basically correct.
Repeatedly strangled by the “men of property” and by the nationalist defenders of the rights of property, such as Daniel O’Connell, the Irish movement for national freedom was to experience its greatest betrayal at the period when the working class had pushed it to its greatest heights. When the bourgeoisie took up arms against British imperialism in the post-1916 period – or, more precisely deputed the working class to do the fighting – no thought of class struggle clouded the minds of Érin’s unselfish patriots. The illegal Republican courts attempted to deal out equal justice between man and man, according to middle class ideals. So successfully did they do this that in areas where they became a recognised power, the pro-British landowners were forced to go to them for the protection of their “right” as landlords against the land-hunger of the Irish peasants. So it came about that landless men, demanding the break-up of the cattle-ranchers’ estates into small tillage holdings, were forcibly restrained by the very Irish Republican Army which was fighting the British occupation.
It was no accident that the royalist, Arthur Griffiths, came to the head of the bourgeois-republican movement. Unable to complete the national revolution, Irish capitalism capitulated to its British master, and since 1922 has groaned, but accepted the partition of Ireland into North and South.
Under the Cosgrave junta – the administrative and political arm of Big Business and cattle-ranching – the native bourgeoisie was able to hatch out and flap its puny wings. [1*] Before long, however, the small farmers and the small manufacturers, the most radical section of the petty-bourgeoisie, began to understand the benefits of their former ally’s compromise. In 1927 de Valera, the political architect of their demands, entered the Dáil, and in 1932 assumed power. By 1937 he was able to gain, not without a little bad blood being stirred, the ending of the annuity payments, the surrender of the British forts within the Free State, and a number of other minor concessions. Today Irish capitalism, still angling for the Six Counties, has developed all the trappings of the familiar bourgeois state, with a native class of landowners. It has organised a Republican form of Government and an independent military force.
Behind the tariff wall, the petty Irish industries increased for a while, but this process has already begun to falter before the outbreak of war. The countryside, as a market for industrial goods, is nearing saturation point. Lacking raw materials, unable to break into the monopoly market, Irish industrialism is incapable of further advance except under very unusual and essentially temporary circumstances. Industrialism in the North, under British imperialism, has reached a degree of even greater decline. Modern Irish capitalism cannot advance one step. From this point only a workers’ republic can mean historical progress.
What trends will the expansion of the second world war bring? What significance will the Border have in the coming battles? Who carries the banner of national freedom? What is to be the role of the socialists? These are the questions which must be answered.
The base of Irish economy is still the land, although the weight of industry is certainly heavier in the North. The present war will give a fillip to cattle-raising; soaring prices in that field will be followed by a similar trend in butter and other agricultural products. The “enrichment” of the farmers will have its reflection in the increased demand for manufactured goods. Rising unemployment, due to the collapse of the smaller importing industries, will be partly checked by the increased demand for industrial goods. In the North this process will not be so pronounced, and the numbers of unemployed may be increased. Contrary to the statement made by Robertus, the land in small-holdings is mainly untilled, because of uneconomic prices and lack of capital equipment in the hands of the smallholders, four in five of whom employ no labour. The lack of transport and market facilities also hits the farmer more cruelly the smaller he is. The tillage scheme which will probably be accompanied by some form of forced labour, will react in favour of the middle farmers and perhaps of the small. The biggest farmers will still base their farm economy on cattle. In general, the trends of 1914-18 will be repeated.
Bound tighter than ever to the British market, the farmers will tend to link their political ideas to the source of their wealth and take a conciliatory attitude to British imperialism. In the economic strikes which have already taken place, they directed fierce blows against the Fianna Fáil Government. The demands of the farmers are for higher prices, cheap labour and cheap government.
Meanwhile the capitalists will press an attack against the organised working class. Far from being lost in “national” daydreams, the workers will sharply be called to defend their existing standards. Their minimum demands will pose the struggle for power.
Freshly organised and not quite so numerous, they were able to give a lead to the national movement in 1916. But today they are at the peak of organisation. In the Irish Transport and General Workers Union alone, the membership doubled from 1932-37. The “national” content has gone from their struggle; experience has taught them who are their masters. The workers now have no choice but to take the lead in the struggle against capitalism. The question before them is – Is it possible for the workers to do this successfully? Is it possible for the Socialist Revolution to succeed now?
It is a significant fact that, whenever the workers have acted in a militant and organised manner, not against Britain but on trade union lines, they have been able to draw into their ranks the best revolutionary elements from the Republican forces. This was clearly demonstrated at the height of their struggle in 1934 when the majority of the IRA split in support of the workers’ demands, leaving the reactionary clique in the Army Council who refused to budge from their bourgeois position. The continuously changing leadership of the present IRA expresses the instability of the class it represents. Consisting of the urban lower middle class, the present GHQ is anti-semitic, rabidly clerical in outlook, and, politically, definitely pro-fascist, notwithstanding the proletarian character of the rank and file. GHQ can only play the role of reaction in future.
Known socialists never get “upstairs”. Any attempt at political activity is ruthlessly curbed. Their organ War News, is permeated with petty-bourgeois sophistry: No politics, they say, let’s get on with national freedom first. In reality, their political programme is the seizure of British property in the North and Jewish property in the Twenty six Counties. Lacking any broad support from the countryside, they are completely isolated from, even hostile to) the organised mass of the working class. It is a regrettable fact that not a single trade union, for instance, has protested against the death-sentences on the members of the Army in England.
The rank and file are definitely proletarian, but are largely held in the Army by the tradition of the past and the promise of early “action”. Precisely because of this, it is necessary for the workers to participate in united demands (against coercion, for instance) although they stand openly opposed to such reactionary suggestions as armed invasion of the North.
A possible solution may be found to the Border question in a compromise between de Valera and British imperialism, by which the Six Counties would be fused with the Twenty-six to present the appearance of an Irish Republic. We believe this would best suit the interests of the British and Irish capitalist class. The early entry of Italy into the War, with the blessing of the Church, and the march of Yankee boots, would create a favourable atmosphere for the exchange of the Six Counties for Irish participation in the War. Irishmen will be wanted again to handle British guns. Whether this solution will be offered or not we cannot say, but it is certainly a possibility and one which would not be favourable to socialism.
On the other hand, the ending of partition by a rising of the “Army” would be equally unfavourable. It would provoke a murderous civil war in which the majority of the workers in the North, who are Orangemen, would see “Catholic oppression” on the march. The success of such a rising would not mean freedom for the workers to agitate, as Robertus assumes, but could only mean a military dictatorship in the North and the South, as the Constitution of the IRA quite clearly proclaims.
Ruined by the civil war, [the] economy could be rebuilt under capitalism only by ruthless attacks against labour. While this might disillusion the nationalists, the Orange workers would see not Capitalism but Catholicism as their oppressors. The old ideological division would go on as before.
The solution for the problem has already been shown. At the Republican Congress Conference in Rathmines in 1934, two resolutions were presented for the delegate decision – the Workers’ Republic or the Irish Republic. The delegates from the oppressed North voted solidly for the first. Two delegates from an Orange Lodge were able to state, “We can get support for the Workers’ Republic, but could get none for the Irish Republic.”
Here lies the key to the division in the North. The class nature of our programme will determine our success. With Connolly as our guide, we must boldly proclaim: “The Irish working class must emancipate itself: It perforce must free the nation.” The workers of North and South must unite for a Workers’ Republic!
1*. Note the similar construction used by “V.F.” in his letter to New International, dated June 1939. [editor]
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