Invitation to the launch of ‘The Lost Revolution: The Story of the Official IRA and the Workers’ Party’ September 5, 2009
Posted by WorldbyStorm in Irish History, Irish Politics, The Left.trackback
I’ve been asked by Brian Hanley to publicise the following…the launch of The Lost Revolution. Brian adds…
‘All are welcome. The authors would particularly like people who assisted the book in any way, but we have been unable to contact, to come along. There will be music from South Dublin Union following the launch.’
Invite attached…
Just finished reading a review copy of the book. Some of the stuff in it is nuts. Good to see it being aired.
I agree with Jason. It is a fascinating read. But reading about the Greek Tragedy of the unfolding of the faction fights within the OIRA/SF let along their feuds with the IRSP and the Provos, the abiding impression is the appalling, almost psychotic disregard for human life. Executions are seemingly agreed and implemented with barely a thought – let alone any kind of due process. The fact that so many fine men and women with the highest ideals were involved only makes the tragedy all the more searing. There is one even more chilling account of what militarism can do to left wing political ideas at that is “INLA – Bitter Divisions” by Holland and McDonald.
It is a curse in the medium to long term… I don’t know if I’m looking forward to comparing and contrasting the two books.
John,
I took the opposite message from the book, and indeed from the development of The WP. It was not an easy thing to walk away from violence, given both internal and external pressures. But people did it when it would have been both easier and more popular to stick with it. At a great cost.
I have more or less finished it, very informative, I think as Garibaldy said in his original post that the book is a narrative and is not analytical or judgemental, which is probably for the best.
What you can see is the transition over a long period of time from the Republican Movement into a Party with a single tier of membership, this process obviously interrupted by the outbreak of the recent troubles in the North.
The authors shed some light on a number of incidents, why Larry White was shot in Cork for example and the killing of 2 Loyalists on the Grosvenor Road in 1972.
I was concerned about the version concerning the murder of David Walker in 1973. The Authors say the OIRA said nothing about the killing. In Fact they issued a statement denying involvment. They said the soldiers who found the body arrested a 16 year old member of the Republican Clubs because he lived in the street. This was the guy who got life for the killing. I am sure this statement was in the next issue of the UI. Whoever killed Walker I think the denial should have been included.
On the question of the ‘ Secret Branches ‘ there are some Oganisational lessons relevant to any Party of the Left in this account.
all in all, a good read.
there is a great difference between this book and the INLA one. This book covers the opinions/views/politics of many of the participants whereas the INLA book took the lazy option of relying on the views of a few individuals namely Brown. Same with the UVF book which used the memory of one or two people. I think the research in this book is a credit to the authors and again, its a pity we will not see some of their work due to legal concerns.
The history in the INLA book isn’t bad. Never sure about the conclusions drawn. And there’s a lot missing there as well come to think of it.
I thought the INLA book was more based around interviews with Harry Flynn rather than Brown or anyone else. I thought it was more reasonably balanced than most Irp supporters in spite of that.
Not read the Sticks book yet, but looking forward to it!
‘I was concerned about the version concerning the murder of David Walker in 1973. The Authors say the OIRA said nothing about the killing. In Fact they issued a statement denying involvment. They said the soldiers who found the body arrested a 16 year old member of the Republican Clubs because he lived in the street.’
Claims or the lack of them do not prove anything. The OIRA denied killing Hugh Ferguson, the Ebrington bomb, the attempt on Costello in 1975 etc. They also did not claim several of their own operations, eg. mortars in Tyrone, Derry and Armagh December 1972. David Walker was killed because he was thought to have recognised a number of senior OIRA officers. At the OIRA men’s trial the judge noted that while the young men present had killed Walker, they had done it on the orders of others. You will note Maddog, that while there were campaigns to free young Officials from Beechmount and elsewhere who were framed for certain activities, there were no campaigns to free those imprisoned for the Walker killing.
Leeson Street
Thanks for that.
Eamonn Dublin
What legal concerns?
i can’t wait to read it my father was interviewed for it and when the split occured within the OIRA those that chose politics over violence had their lives put in danger as a result, and doing something like that i feel takes more courage
Authros on Matt Cooper this evening. Today FM
Ta Ghandi…
Hey Louise I know this isn’t an ex-WP social networking site but will you say hello to your brother Robbie…I used to know him in the good ole days in the WPY, including memorable visit to the no longer existing state of Czechoslovakia.
Apologies to WBS for misuse of award-winning political blog…lowering the serious tone and all that!
will do but if your on facebook you should add him too, he’s off livin in china now!
and if you ask anyone that’s know’s me then you will know all i do is lower the seriousness, it’s over-rated! lol
That’s for sure…
Best of luck with the launch. Still awaiting my copy.
MDW – Some of the people involved in “extra curricular activities” are still alive and did not appreciate any attempts at naming them. Simple as that. We will have to wait for the grim reaper before we get the whole story. Good book all the same.
Nah Colm… this is precisely what the CLR is for, a networking site for those on the Left and the Republican Left. No problem at all…
Re: Matt Copper, interview was recorded yesterday and is expected to now air today, Taxation Commission appears to have over run, in more ways than one.
[...] official Penguin invite is below (as already featured on Cedars), and I’m also posting an interview with Brian Hanley and Scott Miller on a recent edition of [...]
Anyone know have the seating arrangements for the launch been finalised yet? Which faction will be sitting where? And where will the people who were too unimportant to be in a faction sit?
Looking forward to seeing you all there, sad bastards that we all are.
“i can’t wait to read it my father was interviewed for it and when the split occured within the OIRA those that chose politics over violence had their lives put in danger as a result, and doing something like that i feel takes more courage”
Sounds good but and it is a big but the winning faction had no qualms in using violence against it opponents eg the first INLA/IRSP to die was Ferguson, a “game lad” according to Liam MacMillan.As far as I can remember he died before there was retaliation.
I opposed all the republican feuds and think it did more than British Imperialism and its allies ever did to destroy and put off course the aims of Republicanism.
It is all a matter of history hopefully. PANA meeting used to have everyone around a table. I didn’t even notice the odd glare.
I ahve had the odd pint with an old friend who returned from exile. Admittably he had no involvment. I have had civil words with another person and hope to say hello to one or two others.Anyway I have no interest in knowing who did what, to whom and when. It would only lead to a renewal of bitterness. It is an historical question and should be kept hat way. Let history judge.
Let sleeping dogs lie.
We have Lisbon, Nama and beleive it or not all the same problems now as we did in the 60s and 70s to deal with. Hopefully the new generatiion of radicals will have better luck and keep the disagreement to discussions and at most the odd shout rather than shot.
Joe, I wont be there coz of my exile in another jurisdiction but I’d recommend you take one of the seats allocated to the secret branches coz nobody will want to sit there..coz its a secret. Still waiting with baited breath to read my copy, oh its like being a kid at Christmas again.
BTW Joe I’ll test WBS’s patience even more (give em an inch and they’ll take a mile) by saying thanks for the Facebook message, sorry I didn’t get back to you. Maybe I’m subliminally just trying to get expelled from CLR (tried it in the WP by refusing to work for Robinson campaign but they had gone soft by then at they didn’t even discipline me or fellow culprit J.O.N.!).
“Expelled”… Won’t work…
Has anyone ever gotten expelled from CLR? This site needs discipline!
Colm a chara, the book reveals that you are following in the footsteps of one Sean Garland who sojourned in said jurisdiction in 1970/71.
On the Robinson campaign. I left my good wife’s side (and her a week overdue with our first) to stand outside the polling station in Glasnevin. Every woman that passed by just said “Mary, Mary” and the poor FFers were dumbstruck. I then brought her (the wife, not Mary) to the RDS to see the count. The poor woman was nearly knocked over and trampled by a bunch of overexcited liberals who charged across the room singing “Here’s to you, Mrs Robinson” when some count was being announced. She reminds me of this inhuman and degrading treatment of an innocent woman and her unborn child every so often.
The boy was born a few days later and he’s starting in Trinity in a fortnight (blow, blow). A joke on the radio this morning: Q: “How do you know a Trinity student?” A: “They tell you.”
That’s not as funny as it sounds. I know of one guy, recently there who changed his name when he arrived… Glad I never got in to the place (although, I was a member of their Science Fiction club for a while).
For the over-45s among us the authors are on Tom McGurk’s show on 4fm today between 5-7pm.
Do you know what time they were on at? I can’t seem to be able to pick the minutes into the programme in, and don’t want to have to listen to two hours of Mc Gurk. I could leave it running while not listening to it
They were on after 6.30, about an hour and a half in I suppose. Just after The Hollies I think, just the stuff to get us OAPs up and moving….
Thanks for that. I’ll have a listen soon.
[...] History, Irish Politics, Northern Ireland, The Left. trackback I know, I know. There’s another book out on the history of an Irish political party which is central to the interests of many of us here, but… it might be worth doing an [...]
Is anyone here going to this?
(By the way,WbS, if you are going to be there let me know and I will finally bring that archive stuff for you)
I’ll be there. You know my first name, ask Brian Hanley and he’ll tell you who I am…
Right. I’ll ask about.
Or is there a way I can identify you? (Bar the large parcel you’ll be holding under your arm?)
I’ll stand about pretending to be on a Socialist Party of Ireland paper sale circa 1971. Get your Advance, only sixpence.
That’lll do the trick
Speaking of going to things, would the Greaves Summer School be worth venturing forth from the boondocks for?
What I’ve heard of it it looks good to me.
Eamonn, if you’re coming up, say hi. I’m going to be flogging DVDs of the Looking Left series at the Greaves School.
That was an interesting event, with very good speeches. Really big crowd as well.
Nice to put some faces to names too.
Likewise, I’m mighty impressed by comments at this time after the event. Many thanks for the docs Mark P, they’re fantastic, email winging it’s way to you but if you’re free to meet up for coffee next week that would be great.
A Sticky night with a Provo band… good speeches too. Very large crowd for something many would consider a minority interest. A few leftie Shinners present but afaics, no Éirigí in the house. Surely the next link in the chain?
Still negotiating chapter where NI Republican Clubs follow FS comrades to become WP. Still gobsmacked at all the killings…
Yeah, certainly an eclectic mix. All the better for it too. And the crowd was very big. Now, if it were possible to
mobilize that number…
Speeches were interesting, another days work though.
Great night, interesting that SDU are considered a Provo band, by Anarchaeologist, some who where there late may have noted that they were joined on stage by Joe Mc Gowan a former member of the group who is a long time Stick.
A very interesting and surpringly large crowd who very unusually at an Irish event appeared to arrive on time.
Just to remind people the is a briefing of the Extradition of Sean Garland followed by music & craic in Liberty Hall on Friday next the 18th September 2009. Hopefully a large crowd will attend.
A good night for sure. I was a little disappointed that I knew so few well enough to talk to. Two conversations. One never-WP person who was much taken with the stuff in the book showing co-operation with British Army and RUC (I haven’t come to the incident he told me about in the book yet) – he was gobsmacked, I think, that all these people at the launch seemed so proud of their WP history and unashamed by this stuff in the book.
Second conversation was with a current and long-time WPer. He complained that the authors hadn’t specifically acknowledged the party giving access to its archives in their speeches. His partner said that the book didn’t do justice to the Party in the 80s and the amount of really serious work it did in terms of debating, researching and developing progressive socialist policies. I haven’t got there yet but I am a little concerned that the book seems to give an awful lot of time and space to OIRA and Group B. They were there of course but the vast majority of ordinary WP members were just that and the Party did great work both on the ground and in terms of policy – I hope that isn’t minimised. Should have it finished soon. Then I’ll start the memoir.
“… the vast majority of ordinary WP members were just that and the Party did great work both on the ground and in terms of policy – I hope that isn’t minimised.”
Me too. I was a party member in South Down throughout the 1980s. I can honestly say that I didn’t hear one mention of the OIRA/group B during that period, except in reference to the past (i.e the ’70s).
Not my experience at all. From very early on I was told about the need for ‘protection’, etc, etc…
Hmmm. I certainly don’t remember being told directly. And I wasn’t sure about the longstanding member who might have hinted the odd thing… I wasn’t sure whether this was sort of wishful thinking/fantasy on his part. But it’s complicated… I didn’t want to hear about the existence of the OIRA or Group B or whatever but then again, if I heard that they were facing down the Provos in some row in Belfast, I’d think “well done, lads”. This was during my party membership 85-89. I must say I would have been pretty surprised at the time to learn that a dozen Group B people were in Nth Korea practicing with heavy machine guns – as revealed in the book.
Overall though, I think the book overly concentrates on Group B etc and doesn’t talk enough about ordinary Party work in the 80s – both on the ground and at a policy level. I remember a quote from Harris that “the best and the brightest joined our Party” (which was all down to Eoghan himself of course). But there was certainly a lot of truth in it – there were loads and loads of really capable and clever people in the WP in the 80s (I would say that wouldn’t I?) and they did produce some great policies for the future direction of Irish society. Other parties robbed a lot of this work. Brian Hanley should get one of his students to do a Phd on WP policies 85-90 and the influence they had, how many were robbed and by whom, how much was implemented…
But isn’t that the perfect description of the dynamic of these things you give in your first paragraph?
I’ve not quite finished the book, but I agree that on one level there is a strong focus from mid way on on Group B, and it is true that there was excellent work on the ground (which was later used by others from all points on the political compass as well we know). In a way though that’s difficult to quantify, isn’t it?
The book gets a mention in Phoenix, in the “Fit to Print” section of the mag. (The “hook” for mentioning it is the prospect of it being reviewed in the irish Times given the presence and role of WP members or supporters in the Irish Times).
Just came across this
http://www.indymedia.ie/article/94024
It really was a huge crowd. And a really interesting mix of people too. The speeches I thought were very interesting (thanks Garibaldy for the link) but there certainly was something of a buzz around the hall, or an expectancy that something was going to happen. As someone said to me on the way out, you could smell the revolution in the room. Ferriter pointing out the description of FF as a party for property developers in the 1980s (plus ca change) went down particularly well. I must admit that I stole another great phrase someone said to me last night in writing a blog piece about the launch this morning – it was a book rally more than a book launch. (The link to that piece is http://puesoccurrences.wordpress.com/2009/09/11/book-rally/ but ignore that, or, remove it WorldByStorm if it counts as shameless self-promotion.)
Not at all. Good to see…
I should add I know exactly what you mean, it was almost like people were awaiting news of the ‘reconstitution of the WP’ or a New Workers’ Party or somesuch, it had that air to it.
WBS’ comment here reflects part of the problem with the approach that many are taking to the book, from a WP point of view of course (I’m not saying he is doing the same, but it brings the issue to mind). Which is that The WP is being spoken about in the past tense.
The WP continues to exist, and continues to wage its struggle for a better type of society in Ireland. Certainly the book deals with what is now one distinct phase of the history of The WP, but the story of the Party is far from complete. Fair play to Scott Millar for taking a strong and open stand on the Garland issue. Yet what makes Garland such an attractive target for the neo-cons is precisely that he is still working to build a socialist future, in conditions even less promising than when Goulding, Garland, Mac Giolla and others launched the rethink in the 1960s. Perhaps ‘The Delayed Revolution’ would have been a better title than the Lost one
As for Ferriter’s speech, good in parts, but very disappointed that he failed to say more about the genuine significance of the Party in Irish political life in the period covered by the book, and what it said about broader changes in politics and society, partly because he followed the structure of the book too closely.
That’s a fair observation. Certainly the fact it exists wasn’t uppermost I suspect in peoples minds.
The sticks were pro-extradition when it came to republicans yet now they want cross party support for their o/c. How ironic. The launch was very good and Ferriter gave a good speech. Several of the old timers did not have any time for Ghandi as they were aware of his past. Hope the book sells well.
‘I was a party member in South Down throughout the 1980s. I can honestly say that I didn’t hear one mention of the OIRA/group B during that period, except in reference to the past (i.e the ’70s).’
I don’t wish to mock disability, but you are not by chance deaf, dumb and blind are you?
Justin could have played the “deaf, dumb and blind kid” in the non-existent slot machines in the sticky clubs.
Trevor,
Nope. I suffer from none of those disabilities although the eyesight is getting worse as the years pass. I can honsestly say (again) that the discussions in the branch meetings I attended was always and entirely about politics. I recall a lot of talk about Economy 7 (one
[ex]-comrade became something of an Economy 7 bore), electioneering, the rise of SF and getting the Northern People out. But nothing about the OIRA.
Believe me or or believe me not. And in conclusion comrades, I actually do play a mean pinball.
‘discussion at branch meetings’ ‘hearing one mention’ is not the same as what’s really happening outside branch meetings. For my part I can say that as a member of the WP in Dun Laoghaire from 1982 onwards I gradually became aware, mainly through talking to members from other parts of Dublin and the North, that Group B did exist and was a functioning part of the movement. Initially I did not have a problem with the existance of Group B regarding it as a legit part of revolutionary activity but eventaually I came to see the contradictions between its existance and what I saw as a correct socialist position.
I am not questioning Justin’s honesty and personally I think it’s quite possible that a WP member in the South would not know of the existance of Group B, indeed I believe a majority of rank and file members did not know or believe Group B existed until the 1991-92 split.
However I find it very difficult to believe that one could be a member of the WP in the North and not know of its existance. Im not accusing Justin of fibbing: I note that he did not state that he did not know of the existence of Group B just that it wasn’t discussed or spoken about. I stress here that Im not being holier than thou: with the benefit of hindsight I think maintaining Group B was disastrous in a whole series of ways, political, moral etc. but I think the situation the rank and file members in the North found themselves in (partly as a result of the direction taken by the party, partly as a result of the actions of the PIRA, INLA and of course Group B itself) was especially difficult. I think the people who led the DL side of the split were particularly insensitive to this factor and grossly hypocritical in condemning the Northerners out of hand when most of the same DL faction leaders had known and tolerated to a greater or lesser degree the activities of Group B. As it emerged with the ORM split later many of those active in the party in the North were unhappy with many aspects of the party’s development and activities.
BTW I still have a few chapters to read but broadly speaking I think the descrition of the WPs history in the book is as accurate and objective as is possible.
Justin, I’m sure you play a mean pinball. According to yesterday’s Belfast Tele someone else in South Down does as well…
‘A promising young GAA player shot twice in a vicious paramilitary-style attack is facing serious assault charges.
On Wednesday four masked men abducted James Telford, 20, as he walked along the Saul Road in Downpatrick.
He was taken in a car to the Vianstown Road area where he was shot in both legs.
Last week Telford, from Kildare Street in the Ardglass fishing village, appeared in court charged with assault.
The alleged victim claimed Telford held him while his pal Paul Crangle, 25, threw a punch.
Crangle’s younger brother, 19-year-old Brian Crangle, has also been accused of attacking the injured party.
A witness denied a claim that Telford had been trying to break up the altercation, which occurred on Strangford Road, Ardglass, in March 2008.
The defendants were freed on bail to appear again before Downpatrick Magistrates Court on September 17.
However, it is not clear if Telford will be well enough to attend after being shot in both legs.
Friends of the gun attack victim said he is now planning to flee the Downpatrick area when he gets out of hospital.
They also revealed that the gun attack has ruined Telford’s promising gaelic football career.
“Telford is a great player, but it will be a long time before he is back anywhere near a football pitch,” said a pal.
“He was shot in both legs and can hardly stand up.
“Naturally he’s devastated — as well as not playing football again he is telling people that he will move out of the area.”
There has been local speculation linking the gun attack to the Official IRA.
A PSNI spokeswoman appealed for information on the shooting.
Officers particularly want to hear from anyone who saw a dark coloured Renault on Saul Road around 9pm on Wednesday.
South Down SDLP MLA Margaret Ritchie condemned the attack.
She said: “This act of thuggery, retribution and summary justice belongs to the violence of the past and is alien to the people of Downpatrick.”
Read more: http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/local-national/gaa-player-shot-in-paramilitarystyle-attack-facing-assault-charge-14490651.html#ixzz0RB9embV1
“There has been local speculation linking the gun attack to the Official IRA.”
Jesus H. Christ wept. I noted Garibaldy’s point on another thread that the WP still exists and is still active. Which begs the question.
It might be of relevance that the last time the media reported speculation of this nature ( a few months ago) the attack was claimed by the Real IRA. What question does that beg? Perhaps whether people ought not to believe everything they read.
It might also be worth noting relative to Colm’s comment that the main problem the people who formed the ORM had was that there was no Official IRA, and they wanted there to be one so they could swan around calling themselves ex-prisoners and part of a movement. And with the exception of Newry, very few of those were active in The WP by the mid-1990s. The numbers expelled were tiny.
Im “not now nor ever have been” a member or supporter of the ORM but my understanding of the ORMs emergence is certainly contrary to Garibaldy: Their problem was not that there was no OIRA but with what the OIRA had been doing and why it had been doing what it had been doing. As for the flippant ‘swanning around’ remark I do know that many ORM members were just that: former OIRA prisoners who had sacrificed a large slice of their lives to build and defend the movement.
More pertinently, it is quite clear from the Lost Revolution, and other sources, that Group B/OIRA continued to exist right up until the ORM split. Surely Garibaldy does not deny that? Whether it still exists is something I have no knowledge about and in any case I would not expect a member of the WP to admit even if it did but a least let’s be honest about the past and then we can agree or disagree about the rights and wrongs of that entities (recent) past existence. There is nothing to be gained by repeating a blatant fiction, as the WP did in the 1980-90s, and again I include myself in that category as I used to vociferously deny the existence of Group B when I was in the WP even though I knew right well that it existed and why it existed and indeed approved of it until c.1988-1989.
The reason I said Jesus H. Christ wept, Gari, is that I’m sympathetic to the WP. But this just seems to go on and on and on. A post on another thread here a few days ago was from an ex-WP member who stated that he, along with Eamonn Smullen, was dishonourably discharged (or some similar military term) from “the Officials” in 1992. The Lost Revolution book says that some of the ORM people were court martialled and discharged from the OIRA/Group B (again that may not be the exact terminology used). When was that? The mid to late 90s?
It’s 2009 and I believe that within and closely connected to the WP is some kind of military grouping (which may or may not have a name but which once was the IRA) with access to weapons. I believe that that is a massive liability to the WP.
Colm,
Fair play to people who did what had to be done. But the fact that people had gone to jail 20 years before did not mean that they had any right to any say over WP policy and direction. Those are issues for members only. There was an expectation among many that they were owed status and deference because they had been in jail. The very opposite of the whole political development since the late 1960s. If people’s ambitions extend as far as being acknowledged as equals by the ex-prisoners of other groups, that is up to them.
Joe,
You’ll note that I raised a concern about one of a number of competing versions being taken as the correct one in the book, without acknowledgement that other versions exist. This is the sort of stuff I was thinking of. I’d have to look to find that comment, but my memory of it was more that they left the same time Smullen did.
These accusations do emerge. And I find them as depressing as you do. But now that I think about it, not only the last one but also the last two times that people raised them, it turned out that dissident nationalist terrorists were responsible (a shooting in Turf Lodge of a man accused of invovlement of drugs, and an incident where a teenager lost a leg to a shotgun attack).
Here’s the quote: “I remained with the Officials until the early 1990s when I was “constructively dismissed” along with Eamonn Smullen. because of my opposition to the dominance of the Dail party.”
I suppose that could be interpreted in many ways. Let’s leave it at that.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constructive_dismissal
It’s an industrial relations term – not sure where you’re getting military connotations from.
Other version exisit but there is only one truth – personally I don’t see a problem with the Officials still being in exisitance its the denials that a most damaging
‘History repeats itself: first as tragedy, then as farce’.
If the reason for denying the existence of B/OIRA during the 1980s was to avoid damaging a party on the road to power then what the hell is the reason for denying it now?
Well whether there is only one version of the truth when it comes to intentions is a very suspect proposition, as we all know. There are facts that can be verified or not. Truth is a different matter.
Horrible, fascistic thuggery. Hopefully the cops will get the perpetrators.
“There has been local speculation linking the gun attack to the Official IRA.”
Unless solid information emerges speculation will remain speculation. And even if soemone decides to give a name to his gang of thugs, does that connect them with the WP?
“what the hell is the reason for denying it now?”
And when did I stop beating my wife?
I disagree with Garibaldy’s analysis of the ORM, it does not accord with what Ive read and what Ive been heard re that organisation but I’ll leave it to ORM members to outline their position which was based on a much more wide ranging criticism of the WP than what you attribute to them.
What G. does not deal with is my second point. I do not expect a current WP member to openly acknowledge the current existence of the OIRA/Group B and anyway I don’t know that it still exists. But it is quite clear that at least up until the ORM split in 1998 the military wing did exist. Everyone (or at least ex-members from all factions and none, knowledgeable journalists, political opponents, academics studying the movement, the general population in urban working class Catholic areas of Belfast areas, etc. etc.) knows this to be true and the Lost Revolution details it in chapter after chapter.
Do you think Hanley and Scott made up those chapters on Group B? Did all those past and present members lie to them about Group B? Wouldn’t it be a preposterously successful conspiracy if all those people believe that Group B existed if it had been wound down in the 1970s? I just can’t understand how you can’t just acknowledge that fact and then get on with the arguments about whether it was justified or not.
Colm,
I did say main problem as opposed to only problem. Frankly, I’m entirely uninterested in discussing those people. One only needs to look at how they have developed since to see that politics was clearly far from the top of their agenda.
I have not and am not accusing the authors of making up anything, and that’s not at all a reasonable inference from my comments about competing versions. As I said in my response to the book, it is an excellent effort. Having said that, clearly ALL those interviewed were self-interested, and seeking to promote their own version of events. Everyone here is happy to say that such and such was lying about this or that, but somehow I am egregious when I say there is more than one version put forward for some of the things in the book.
Of course every one interviewed would seek to promote their version of events or what they regard to be the truth. What you are avoiding though is not whether this or that version of a specific event is true but whether a crucial fact which colours the whole narrative of the book is accurate: that Group B/OIRA did exist (for whatever reason) at least up until 1998.
So its not about versions of events, its about one of the fundamental fact that underpins the whole narrative. I note that you don’t deny this fact but only avoid it by saying that there ‘is more than one version put forward etc.’. Well there’s only two possible versions of the truth regarding the existence of Group B/OIRA and these are mutually contradictory: either it did exist until at least 1998 or it did not. Once this simple fact of existence is acknowledged, whose version of its activites and purpose is most accurate can be debated rationally but IMO we have to start from that simple truth which you have avoided addressing directly up until this.
Thanks to Paddy Matthews re the reply to the reply to Comment 52. I guess I got the military connotations from my muddled head! Apologies to the original poster for my misinterpretation.
Colm B
Why is it important whether OIRA existed up till 1998? Is this some attempt in retrospect to justify the DL split?
The thing that gets to the heart of this is, in a way what Rosie notes, not whether Group B existed/exists – that’s a given, but that this simple fact was … well I guess submerged is the best term for it. That did impact enormously on the credibility of the party in the 1980s and afterwards. I also agree that in some respects it is a distraction, but it’s impossible to ignore the reality that that must have had some impact on the potential growth of the party and its appeal to the Protestant sections of the working class (amongst many other issues). I tend to the view all here are discussing this in good faith and it’s also true there were many sides to each story.
Just heard Matt Cooper say the book is getting discussed on his show tonight
The central problem as far as I can see is this: the Workers Party had an inspiring vision of a socialist Ireland, and sought to win support from working class people on the basis that the capitalist system was corrupt and that Fianna Fail and the other right-wing parties were defenders of that corruption. In order to defend that corruption Fianna Fail lied. The WP demanded the truth. But the WP also lied, to the Irish people in general, to it’s voters and supporters, and worst of all to many of it’s members. It said that there was no Official IRA. There was. And it was intrinsically linked to the WP. Which makes a mockery of the idea of democratic socialism.
In a way that’s true, but in a way it’s not. For most of us on the ground the existence or not of the OIRA was not the central issue, it was about providing a left of Labour alternative which in many respects the WP did. Yes, there were significant problems with the stance of denial taken and for me personally this reached its apotheosis with the absolute inability to see that PSF might be undertaking a parallel if not entirely similar journey of their own albeit decades later, an inability which led to absurdly hypocritcal statements from people who knew otherwise (particularly it has to be said on theDL side post split)… But look, joining WP was always going to present contradictions…
Just got my copy of the book yesterday. Looking forward to jumping in. For what it’s worth and I’ve noted this before, a union official up north was threatened by individuals claiming to represent the OIRA within the last two years or so (I brought it up here once before and someone was good enough to find the appropriate link).
oh and by the way how did Gerry Adams get on the cover for a book about the OSF/OIRA? ; P
I believe other luminaries of OSF are in there… GA? Hmmm…
To answer Maddog:
First lets deal with why its important to accept/admit the OIRA existed (or exists for that matter), from my perspective at least:
1. If a party consistently lies about a major aspect of its organisation, i.e that it has an armed wing and at the same time denounces others for having an armed wing, in fact denounces the very concept or need for an armed wing in a bourgeois democracy, then it raises questions about any and all of its positions and pronouncements. If you lie about such a fundamental fact its fair to assume that you can lie about other fundamental facts. This does not mean I believe that everything the WP did in the past was rubbish: there were some important activities it engaged in which were clearly progressive in the sense of furthering the interests of working people. Its just that at its core there was this massive contradiction that in the end outweighed those progressive aspects.
2. The exitence and structure of the OIRA raises a question of key importance for revolutionary socialists. We do not accept bourgeois legality since we see the state as being a structure dominated by the ruling classes. We may sometimes work within those structures but we do not confine ourselves to them since our aim is to replace them with total power in the hands of working people. But the difficult question arises when we begin to think about what this means for our everyday practice: The correct strategy in my view entails mass open direct action, willing to break the law if necessary as happened in the anti-bin tax and anti-water tax campaigns, the anti-poll taxampaign in Britain etc. etc. Having a small elite secret army whose sole purpose is fundraising is not in my view legitimate revolutionary activity. In fact, while Im not a pacifist I strongly believe that armed organisation is always problematic and invariably carries with it problems of elitism/gansterism etc. though at times it is a necessary evil. (BTW I happen to believe that it was necessary to have an armed wing in the conditions of the North in the early 1970s).
In reply to your question regarding DL my views on that split are on record and I have made it quite clear that in retrospect I personally made a mistake in enthusiastically siding with the DL faction. I believe both sides in the split were radically wrong. The irony is that what both sides said about each other were broadly correct. Now there is hardly any idependent observer who would deny that what the DLers said about the OIRA was true: it existed, it was engaged in illegal activity, it was used as an internal faction etc. Of course the key fact is that many of the DL leaders knew this all along and had no problem with it until the end of the 1980s and in fact some of them had been in the leadership of the army as well! It also goes without saying that history has shown that they were what the WP side accused them of: social democrats.
So I have no desire nor reason to ‘justify’ the split. It probably was inevitable and my greatest regret is that it did not happen later so that there would have been a oppurtunity for a third current advocating democratic revolutionary socialism to develop within the WP. But thats life, all we can do is try to learn the lessons and apply them to our current engagement in struggle.
Colm,
Even if everything that was said was true (and as far as I am concerned it wasn’t), the idea that it outweighed the progressive aspects of The WP is one I find unfathomable.
As for the existence or otherwise. As far as I am concerned there was a final and irrevocable decision to dismantle the structures of the IRA in the mid-70s. Now that clearly did not take place overnight but as far as I am concerned it did take place.
‘As far as I am concerned there was a final and irrevocable decision to dismantle the structures of the IRA in the mid-70s. Now that clearly did not take place overnight but as far as I am concerned it did take place.’
Then you are either a) extremely naive or b) extremely duplicitous
I’ll opt for the latter given the experience of the WP.
Do you really believe the above Garibaldy? Were you a member of the party 1989-91, when it was quite clear that ‘B’ still operated? That it had a structure that gave it’s members authority over us mere party activists? That when people raised it we were lied to and dismissed as ‘liberals’? As someone else said above, first tragedy, then farce.
“As far as I am concerned there was a final and irrevocable decision to dismantle the structures of the IRA in the mid-70s. Now that clearly did not take place overnight but as far as I am concerned it did take place.”
Have you read the book Gari? If such a decision was made, it took a long, long time to implement it – if it was ever implemented.
I can just imagine the meeting where that decision was made ending with the Army Council prayer: “Lord, make the Party democratic… but not yet.”
I suppose we just have to let people judge for themselves: The book details minutely that the Group B structure, far from being disbanded continue to function and have a function, mainly for ‘fundraising’ but also as a ‘revolutionary’ pole or faction within the party. It is clear that some of the leaders wanted it disbanded by the late 80s primarily because they saw it as an electoral embarrassment (no moral problem for them) but most of the army leadership did not accept this: so it did continue to operate until and after the 1992 split. Its also clear to any objective observer that Group B played an active role in the events of the ORM split, regardless of your view of that split.
I would doubt whether anyone other than some current WP members believe the view put forward by Garibaldy and with the publication of the book his argument becomes very difficult to sustain. I take Garibaldy’s word regarding his own view but that strikes me as either complete trust in the line of his party (never a good thing IMO) or a kind of head-in-the-sand attitude that we all engage in sometimes when presented with unwelcome facts that challenge our political position.
I’ve made my position clear. I’d also like to make clear that it was democracy within The WP that saved it from those who would have liquidated it (including those on this thread who took that position), and so I simply do not accept the idea that there was a cabal of people kept in power by underhand means. People were elected to the CEC. ELECTED. Apart from a few who were appointed on the basis they had something to contribute. And we all know who had most of them appointed and where they subsequently went. The very name adopted by those who failed to take control of the Party about 1997 shows what role was played by the notion of an armed movement.
History has shown that these allegations were used to muddy the waters by those who wished to abandon the vanguard party model to cover their changing politics. And they were defeated by the votes of the members. That is the fundamental reality here. Any objective observer – not that there are any on this thread – can see that. So yes, let’s leave people to judge for themselves and get back to the business of opposing NAMA and Lisbon.
Could it not be said that the WP, to some extent, suffered the same problem that SF have suffered over the past few years. I don’t think the continued existence, in some shape or form, of the OIRA in the eighties was the most important thing about the WP or that it invalidates the party programme. In fact that reading seems to me deliberately wrongheaded and indulged in for the sake of propaganda rather than rational argument. It surely would have been better had the WP broken altogether with the OIRA and contrived to end its existence. Nevertheless is it not the case that this would have been practically very difficult, just as it has been very difficult for SF to disentangle itself from the PIRA. In the same way as the spectre of the OIRA was used to great effect electorally against the SFWP, I think the murders of Robert McCartney and Paul Quinn were a severe blow to SF electorally on this side of the border. They obviously had nothing to do with SF politicians yet there was enough of a link there for the party’s opponents to make capital out of it. It is easy from this distance, and it’s something I’ve done in the past, to decry the fact that political parties had armed wings attached to them. Yet we are not talking abour normal times, the PIRA and OIRA enjoyed such power and influence because there happened to be a war going on in one part of this country, the WP then and SF now faced pressures which FF, FG and Labour did not. This was a very different time, and it’s ahistorical to judge it by today’s standards. Having said this, I would agree with WBS that perhaps the WP’s greatest fault was a certain self righteousness when it came to SF and a refusal to acknowledge that their rivals, eventually, were in the process of trying to make a similar transition. And perhaps this is why people are so harsh on the WP over their OIRA links. But the fact is that the seventies were a violent time and that there were many people on the left who had links which today would be seen to disqualify them altogether from political office. Another problem for the WP was that when those who founded the DL wanted to make the move from marxism to social democracy, the OIRA links provided a handy pretext for such a move and a handy stick with which to beat the left wing of the party. As has been pointed out here, those links didn’t bother them when it suited them. In my opinion, reducing the question of the WP down to the question of who knew what about the OIRA is immensely, crazily reductive.
Crazily reductive indeed Eamonn, Colm B I disagree with your take on the ORM split and think Gari is pretty much on the money.
Regards Group B etc, I think its continued existence is unfortunately a by-product of the situation WP memebers found themselves in in the north. To live in Catholic/Nationalist areas (sometimes ghettos) and to clearly state that you do not identify yourself as either Catholic or Nationalist but as a Socialist and to oppose the Provisionsla and others within your own community was a dangerous thing. As the book states in the Pogrom chapter, after 75 there was an air of constant opposition to the Provos and of a fight for survival. there had been an attempt to wipe out the organisation and that scar never healed.
It is in this environment that the existence of Group B was I imagine seen as a necessity rather than some sort of luxury or sop to militarism.
No doubt about it there was an element of defence involved but it is quite clear from the book that the primary function was fundraising and internal politics. It was seen as a necessity to raise money for the party and to push ‘revolutionary’ politics within the party: the defence of members in the North was a tertiary and gradually receeding function. So in fact the only function that a socialist could argue for legitimately, defense, was the lesser of its functions.
Viz Garibaldy, we could debate the split of 1992 all day. I have made my own position clear many times: I think both elements of the leadership were politically wrong and it was a great pity that there was not time/space for a democratic revolutionary socialist current to emerge. As for the standard ‘liquidationist’ phrase, no one liquidated the WP. It was a split: one group wanted one sort of party another wanted another sort of party. The DL side won the majority of the votes at the Special AF but did not get the 2/3 majority they needed so they left and set up a new party.
Unlike Gariabldy, who has the luxury of looking at this historically, I lived through it and therefore my role is open to scrutiny. To repeat, for the record: it was a mistake on my part to take the side of the parliamentarians. I was strongly opposed to social democracy as I still am and I, along with some others, thought that a party led by the parliamentarians would allow space for a radical left current to emerge. My biggest misjudgement was regarding De Rossa whom I thought was committed to radical left politics of some sort as opposed to Rabbite et. al. It did not take long for events to prove me wrong and I resigned from DL in 1994 as soon as they voted in favour of entering coalition.
But it was not a mistake to oppose the continued existence of the OIRA/Group B and the traditionalist group whose views and actions were anthitecal to my understanding of the principles and tactics of radical socialism. To cite just two instances:I have outlined above my objections, from a revolutionary position, to the existence of a secret military force in the context of a bourgeois democracy. I also was and am fervently opposed to any links to or support for anti-worker regimes such as China, North Korea (a country I visited) etc. Regarding revolutionary activity, it was quite ironic that some of the most hardline ‘revolutionaries’ had been the very ones who had been most annoyed at the fact that a number of members including myself refused to campaign for that well-known revolutionary Mary Robinson.
My thinking on where the party should be going at the time is well documented and evidenced by a document submitted by me and other members (some of whom stayed with the WP after the split) to the consitutional committee in 1991. This document which outlines a political position different from both leading factions is available in the Irish Left Archive on CLR. I politics have developed since then but I would still assert that the position I and others argued then was more progressive than either of the leadership factions. More the pity that we could not have sustained that political argument into the split period and that events forced us into one or other of the camps…but you can’t re-write history eh?
We all make mistakes (even, I presume, Garibaldy!) and its much easier to identify them in hindsight. Having said that, I am quite proud and would stand over much of what I and others did in the WP including the many grassroots campaigns which made a real difference to peoples lives. A late 1980s housing action campaign, initiated and sustained by grassroots members of the WP in Dun Laoghaire, that mobilised thousands of people and led to hundreds of council houses without indoor/bathrooms and toilets being modernised springs to mind. I would add to that the very active role I played in opposing the Harris faction’s attempt seize ideological control in 1989-90, when some of the ‘revolutionaries’ and their parliamentary opponents were very reluctant to take that faction on. To have played a part in stopping Harris last grasp at infeuence in the party still warms the cockles of my heart, even more so to have been denounced by him as a trotskyist!
“and of a fight for survival”
I don’t doubt that the Provos would have liked to eliminate opposition but the Officials were the same. I remember leading Officials saying how Joe Stalin knew how to deal with dissidents half joking. There was talk of how a preemptive strike vcould have taken care of the Provos at birth. I feel that this talk fed into the attacks on the IRSP and the counter attacks which caused such havoc and death. How the Brits must have laughed?
Mind you it is next to impossible to prevent young men from retaliation when they are attacked or perceive themselves to be under attack. I could quote a current ex IRSP idiot who goes in fro this macho nonsense.
On a foreign note Ben Bella when released form jail by his ex associates went and apologised to the relatives of members of a rival liberation organisation who were repressed by the FLN under his leadership.
Colm my understanding is somewhat different, the fundraising and internal politics were indeed the primary function but not the reason for existence. If the circumstances allowed I think the armed wing would of been disbanded or stood down, the circumstances in the North didn’t and instead the focus of Group B was directed away from armed campaign and towards supplementing the political movement.
I’m sure there was a fear, a real one to many that 75 could happen again.
Jim, the legacy of the splits are probably the saddest part of recent republican history. Reading the book it’s astounding how quickly former comrades turn into the bitterest of enemies.
Colm,
I don’t think there’s any need to debate 1992 as I tried to indicate at the end of my last comment. The reason The WP was not liquidated was because the members opposed the attempt to liquidate it in sufficient numbers. I brought it up not to attack anyone on the thread but because I thought there was a need to restate the fact that for all the claims about this and that, the issue was decided democratically. I’m perfectly happy to admit I make mistakes, as we all do. My point however was that some of the statements made by some people on this thread tended to obliterate the very real and very significant progressive role played by The WP throughout this island from the time when Goulding and others began the transformation of a narrow militarist movement into a working class political party. And they did so because of a profound commitment to the democratisation, secularisation and modernisation of Irish life, from NICRA forward.
“the very real and very significant progressive role played by The WP throughout this island from the time when Goulding and others began the transformation of a narrow militarist movement into a working class political party. …. a profound commitment to the democratisation, secularisation and modernisation of Irish life, from NICRA forward.”
A good description. Unfortunately I don’t think the book gets that across well. I’ll say it again – there’s too much in the book about Group B / OIRA and not enough about the party’s progressive socialist politics. My experience of about 7 years of membership was pretty much all the latter and none of the former. Not saying that our politics was perfect by any means but there was some serious revolutionary reformism going on and the book just doesn’t capture that. I demand another book!
From what I can see the book has two short chapters on Group B post 1977 and six chapters on the party in the same period really can’t see how the authors could have put more emphasis on a party whose Left credentials are well laid out in the earlier period. Also there is mention of campaigning for gay rights, pro-choice, community centers, better transport, council housing improvement condemnation of the church, women’s clinics, anti slots. maybe your letting you own experience overwhelm you Joe. Whats the big campaign you think is missing?
Fair enough Rosie. I’ll have to read it again. It could be that the OIRA stuff jumped out at me because I’ve been not wanting to know about it for so long! As you say there is MENTION of all that good progressive work. My feeling is there’s not enough detail – not enough detail of seriously worked out party policy on all those areas. But then again the book is long enough as it is. So I am seriously suggesting another book…
I’d pretty much agree EamonnCork. To me it was never the fact of the OIRA that was a problem. Indeed there were strong reasons for its continuation in some form post late 1970s when the hot war turned cooler. And that’s not to whitewash the actuality of actions it took or to be an apologist for criminality which did – clearly – exist, as it does to a greater or lesser extent once people take up guns in that context.
To me it comes back to the ‘what us guv?’ approach we saw over the years of simply not acknowledging the past or actively running from it.
Let’s reframe it in the current context. PIRA has disbanded but you’d be a chump to believe that there were neither individuals or whatever who if there was a doomsday situation, civil war, whatever, couldn’t be called upon to pitch in. And that works on lesser scales right down to the level of providing a degree of personal protection to individuals. Exactly the same could have been said about WP and with even greater justification arguably given that it had ceasefired etc.
As regards the OIRA, I’ve said it before, it clearly existed when I was in the party up to the split in the early 1990s, I can’t say about afterwards.
My greatest complaint with WP was that it ignored its own history and then lambasted others when that history provided the perfect legitimation for itself and its activities in the 1980s and after. And worse by not doing so our opponents both externally (and ultimately internally) were handed a perfect political weapon to hit us with again and again.
It’s certainly possible to argue that those who left particularly in the early 90s were wrong to do so, but on the ground and more broadly the charges against the party were rising throughout that period. That didn’t worry me hugely albeit the lack of response other than stone walling appeared inexplicable but I’m certain that however much used as an excuse by some it did have a currency in helping to make peoples minds up and I’m certain many of those people who made that choice weren’t ‘liquidators’ but were honest good socialists who felt rightly or wrongly that the party they had been a part of was living a lie and that it was becoming increasingly difficult to remain within it.
And none of this is to take away from the concrete achievements of the party during those two decades in generating a progressive political structure which gave a powerful voice at precisely the right time – given the sharp right tilt to Irish politics during that period. That so many members and former members were pivotal to the sometimes derided civil society formations Rosie mentions above is a testament to the broadness of scope of the party.
It’s also worth pointing out that one can obsess too much on this as EC says. In terms of engagement on the ground one can at least argue that the authority of the party didn’t derive from the gun amongst working class people. It didn’t come up so whatever about knowing stuff on the inside there was little or no eating out on the past to try to impress/intimidate the electorate. Indeed on a number of instances, and perhaps Joe can attest to this, there was in my direct personal experience (as with dealing with drugs) an aversion to any hint of the gun to support actions. And I suspect voters were voting for the hard work and effort on the ground, not what even by then was something that was quite nebulous (not least following the jettisoning of the SF in the name – something in retrospect I think was a pity, but not necessarily a mistake)…
One thing which the discussion about the split sometimes leaves out is the international context. It tends to be portrayed in terms of a parliamentary cabal seeking a shift towards softer, social democratic politics, or in terms of a reaction to the self-defeating continued existence of the OIRA and while both of these narratives contain substantial amounts of truth, they both tend to ignore the wider context.
The Stalinist system was in the process of collapse. Although WbS rightly points out that in an earlier period the Officials were quite ideologically varied and open to different political trends, by this time the Workers Party had well and truly hitched its star, its entire conception of socialism, to the Eastern Bloc regimes. (And that continues today in a form approaching grim parody, with the WP still sending ritual congratulations to the God Emperor of North Korea each year).
This period saw shockwaves from that collapse hit the Stalinist parties across Europe. At the same time, the CPGB and the CP of Italy, to give two obvious examples, were also undergoing splits between “modernising” social democrats and “hardline” Stalinists. There was clearly some significant interchange of ideas between factions in different countries, with the parliamentary faction in Ireland hastily adopting some of the language of eurocommunism to give ideological weight to their arguments. In all three countries the “modernising” wing ended up called Democratic Left (and in all three countries that was merely a staging post – in Ireland on the way to the neo-liberal Labour Party, in Italy to a merger with the rump Christian Democrats and in Britain into an irrelevant non-socialist think tank).
By the way WbS, I belatedly emailed you about that coffee. Very short notice though, sorry about that.
Yes I agree that we have missed the wider context, perhaps because many of us were involved in the events, which probably makes us focus a bit on the detail.
While I don’t dispute Mark P’s overall analysis he misses some important subleties:
1. Despite the party line on the stalinist states I would say that there were a considerable number of members who, for a variety of different reasons, didn’t buy that line. Some were already social democrats, some just felt at a gut level that the ‘socialist motherland’ stuff was a load of b****ks. Now this was never articulated in the party press and rarely spoken in public but it definitely was there prior to the fall of the Berlin Wall etc.
2. It’s inaccurate to characterise it as a straight fight between stalinists and social democrats. I agree that Rabitte et al. were already plain old social democrats who adopted ‘eurocommunism’ as an ideological cover with the intellectual/academic wing of Patterson, Hazelkorn etc. providing the necessary material. But its also true that a significant minority of the party including, I suspect, De Rossa and Eric Byrne who at that stage probably really believed in some sort of left-reformist model that could be characterised as eurocommunism though they soon drifted over to social democracy proper in DL. As Ive pointed out before a small grouping I was involved in advocated a more radical ‘gramscian’ model but we had very little influence on the debate.
Its hard to quantify but I would say that by 1992 a majority of the rank and file did reject stalinism and were committed in a general way to democratic socialism i.e something to the left of Labour.
The anti-DL section also included a variety of views ranging from old-fashioned republican socialist to full blown stalinism and many just ‘something left of labour’ people as well as those with more radical views.
Mark is of course correct to bring up the fall of the USSR. In fairness though every other time this has been discussed that has been central. This debate has focussed on one particular aspect by accident.
Colm, those are fair points and add important detail to the discussion.
I certainly didn’t want to give the impression that every last member of the Workers Party was a committed devotee of Socialist Bulgaria. People often just sort of ignore inconvenient things about a political organisation and muddle along. For some no doubt the sucking up to the Stalinist regimes was just a vaguely irritating bit of dogma that came with joining what they essentially saw as the party fighting for workers. During the most extreme community activism focused period in the Socialist Party’s history, just after the water tax struggle, there were a few people in the party who had joined on the basis of that activism and who just sort of put up with all the theoretical stuff rather than having any particular interest in it. As a much bigger organisation with much more capacity to involve that kind of person I’ve always assumed that applied to a large part of the WP membership particularly in the South. Not so much an opposition to the Stalinist states but a lack of interest in them.
There were also more ideological people who would have disagreed with the fixation on the Eastern Bloc for more theoretical reasons, but as you note these people were never organised (bar a small group at the very end) and their views were essentially invisible in party publications and statements. That’s one of the things that’s interesting about the book – it details the way in which the movement went from one that was open to various ideas and currents to a much more focused one where the Stalinist line was entirely dominant in the party press and public statements. The attachment to the Stalinist regimes was of course only one aspect of Stalinist politics, but it serves as a useful symbol of the wider politics.
I also acknowledge that you are correct that not everyone on the DL side was a worked out social democrat at the point of the split. Hazelkorn for instance, according to the book, wrote an article that was very critical of De Rossa’s 1989 speech from that left. People and currents were in political motion – their ideas developed. It’s clear in retrospect that the Stalinists were right about where the DL faction was heading, but that doesn’t mean that all of them or even most of them were already the wretched Labourites they are now.
Mark P
I think that some of them, especially P. Rabbitte, has no politics at all: just sort of free floating career politicians. Others such as J. Mac Manus are/were convinced social democrats.
There was also particular type who was attracted to the late WP and DL: middle class liberals who liked the strong anti-nationalist position and radical stance on ‘social issues’ such as divorce etc. A real attraction to this, largely careerist, element was also the oppurtunity to work with/get close to a TD given the small size of the party. They were a minority in the late WP period, even in middle class constituencies such as Dun Laoghaire or Dublin South but within DL this element came to the fore quickly and I suspect they fitted nicely into Labour where such types are also dominant. I remember being shocked when one of these members in Dun Laoghaire proposed, unsuccessfully, (during the late WP period) that we should accept and solicit donations from local businesses! I also recall their unrestrained enthusiasm when the decision was made to enter coalition in 1994. De Rossa was, and I suspect still is, a favourite of this set: the man of priciple, upholder of modern progressive values… yeuch… sorry now Im ranting….
BTW I think only 16 members voted against going into coalition in 1994 and of those I think only around ten at most left DL, though some others left within a few months. Interestingly some people mentioned in the book were amongst that small remnant of socialists who exited DL in 1994/95 including Fearghal Ross (son of P. De Rossa), Joe Ruddock and Fearghus Mac Aogain. Some others such as Eric Byrne and Michael Taft who had signalled opposition to coalition before then stayed on..and on…and on
I left before coalition.
Mostly in disgust at the party attitude to the peace process, the ceasefires, etc… There were other issues, running Rabbitte instead of Geraghty in the Euro’s, the curious approach on the International committee to certain issues…etc…
I’d actually been wondering how a nice social democrat like Michael Taft ended up in the neo-liberal Labour Party.
16 people is a pretty shocking figure and one that tends to indicate that by the end there was less radicalism in DL even at a rank and file level than there was left in the Greens by the time they too decided to sell all of their principles.
Do you think that the likes of Rabbitte and Gilmore were always apolitical careerists? I would have thought that they must have had at least some youthful idealism – SF/WP wasn’t the obvious place to carve out a career in electoral politics.
Also, what the hell happened to the ISN website? It’s been down for months.
I think the ISN site is being reformatted.
I agree, the issue of Rabbitte is fascinating. Why not Fine Gael is sort of my question…
Yep, the ISN website is being reformatted, run into some problems, but it should be up again all new and shiny by the end of October
Colm B: “BTW I think only 16 members voted against going into coalition in 1994 and of those I think only around ten at most left DL, though some others left within a few months.”
I don’t think that’s the case. There were definitely significantly more than that. Admittedly nowhere near enough to have prevented it on the night, but certainly more than 16.
While I was one of those who voted against, I’d make one point in defence on those who supported entering government. In answer to Mark P’s point about the numbers indicating a lack of radicalism, radicalism and purity aren’t the same thing. While, of course, there were those in the party who had by 1994 effectively become disengaged from left-wing politics, and who would pretty much have supported anything, there were plenty of others – genuine socialists – who felt that entering government at that point was the lesser of two evils. They wanted to make an impact on people’s lives for the better, and didn’t want to sit around waiting for the revolution to come along at some point down the line. The choice to enter, as they saw it, was based on the view that government with DL participating in it would be more positive than the alternatives on offer.
In hindsight, I think they were wrong. While some advances were made – particularly in the area of tackling poverty – the party was too small and underdeveloped to have continued growing as an activist movement, while its TDs were sitting on the government benches. It was inevitable that the party would fold shortly after leaving government, as many of the constituency activists floated away in the 94-97 period, often focussing their energies on community politics and other issues. (Incidentally, while there are major differences in terms of political ideology, I think the story of the Greens in government may turn out somewhat similar to that of DL).
However, that said, the argument that someone made to me just after the vote at that conference remains a very persuasive one: “Better us than the fucking PDs”.
Smiffy, I think that you are perhaps confusing people still being well meaning with people still being radical.
There is certainly a case that well meaning leftish people who aren’t politically radical can make for going into coalition government. Indeed you summarise it quite well with the “better us than the PDs” line. But that case – resting as it does on the assumption that all that can be achieved is to try to extract a few concessions from larger right wing parties at the cabinet table – certainly isn’t one that fits well with radicalism. Indeed in Irish politics I can think of no decision that has so often served as an indication that all radicalism is being jettisoned as support for coalition government.
Back when there actually was a Labour left its borders were essentially defined by the coalition issue, while the right were gung ho for it. Then we have the Greens, Democratic Left and Clann na Poblachta. And amongst those parties yet to actually go into coalition (at least in the South), Sinn Fein’s signalled desire to go into coalition has been one of the factors creating disenchantment amongst the radical element of their base.