Workers Unity – Only Way Forward!
| Date: | 1974 |
|---|---|
| Organisation: | Labour Party Young Socialists |
| Collection: | The British Left on Ireland |
| View: | View Document |
| Discuss: | Comments on this document |
| Subjects: |
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Commentary From The Cedar Lounge Revolution
2nd August 2010
Many thanks to Jim Monaghan for this document. Originating with the Labour Party Young Socialists and dating from the early 1970s this document is notable because the LPYS, the youth section of the British Labour Party, was effectively a part of the Militant Tendency within the Labour Party during most of the late 1960s and 1970s and through to the 1980s. The document itself was issued by the LPYS Irish Campaign Committee and deals with the conflict in Ireland. But a brief perusal of this short four page text would, from the policy positions adopted centre it within Militant thinking on the issue.
Under the headline "Workers Unity - only way forward!" it gives an analysis of the situation that welcomes 'the Provisional Ceasefire". It continues that the LPYS...
'from the beginning of the Provisional Campaign have argued that a guerilla campaign in N.Ireland would lead only to defeat and demoralisation. Any organisation that turns away from the road of the mass struggle and the involvement of the workers in their own liberation, courts disaster and defeat. Particularly in N.Ireladn where the working class was already divided on a sectarian basis, a guerilla campaign coming from one side of that religious divide could only further deepen that divide".
The stated aims of the LPYS Irish Campaign are:
• An end to the Tory Bi-Partisan Approach: For Socialist Policies and support for the Irish organisations of Labur. • For a Trade Union Defence Force to defend all Areas, Catholic and Protestant, from sectarian attacks and to defend workers while going to and while at work. • Withdraw the Troops • End Internment and all repressive legislation • Release all political prisoners in Ireland and Britain • Trade Union rights for the Armed Forces • For a Conference of Workers Organisation from Ireland and Britain to forge unity in Action against the common enemy of capitalism
The rest of the document deals with Unemployment - North and South, Housing in Northern Ireland "The Worst Housing Crisis in Europe" and the Prevention of Terrorism Act.
It concludes the main article with the slogan...
"For a Socialist Ireland linked to a Socialist Britain!"
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By: neilcaff Thu, 05 Aug 2010 10:15:40
In reply to WorldbyStorm.
Yes you’re right. Good old Alan isn’t as modest as us. He thinks time has no beginning or end so Militant has been right for an infinite length of time!
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By: Jim Monaghan Thu, 05 Aug 2010 11:39:02
http://www.marxists.org/archive/serge/1938/04/kronstadt.htm
Above Victor Serge on Kronstadt.As Serge elsewhere pointed out the Bolshevils has seeds of a lt of things, Stalinism was one of them. Personally I have doubts about K. I think Trotsky saw what was happening a little late. But marxism/socialism is not about clairvoyance. The Bolsheviks got boxed into a corner and this caused what happened. It was a pity that the left SRs staged a botched op. to try and resart a war with Germany. Ideally a coalition of the Bolsheviks, Left Srs and left Mensheviks would have helped preserve Soviet Democracy.
I strongly recommend this site for thsoe interested in any aspect of marxism and indeed anarchism. It contains original texts from all the major players and not just of the marxist schools.
I see Mark P can not see a difference between movements with mass support and elitist groups with no connections with the masses.The Spanish anarchists were really in to individual acts, but because they grouped the best and most committed.fighters in a mass movement and he tried a failed to get the Spanish Trotskyists to engage with them in a friendly manner. Alas, they preferred to engage with those who had better positions on paper and no doubt better positions on individual violence.
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By: fergal Thu, 05 Aug 2010 12:17:58
In reply to Jim Monaghan.
Looks like a great site Jim,cheers.
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By: Jim Monaghan Thu, 05 Aug 2010 12:46:12
http://liammacuaid.wordpress.com/2010/08/05/its-all-lenins-fault/
For those who want more on Kronstadt
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By: HAL Thu, 05 Aug 2010 12:52:19
In reply to Jim Monaghan.
But marxism/socialism is not about clairvoyance
Could’nt agree more.
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By: WorldbyStorm Thu, 05 Aug 2010 15:24:00
In reply to WorldbyStorm.
It’s a tricky one neilcaff. I think there were justifications for the use of armed struggle in the earliest period of the conflict, particularly defensive justifications. Indeed given that the nature of the conflict changed through fairly clearly defined phases, Stormont, direct rule, an effort to establish power sharing, direct rule again, Ulsterisation, local assemblies, etc, etc, and the nature of the state response changed throughout all of these from fairly direct assaults at times, or at the very least collusion with armed militias against Republican/Nationalist areas, on to attacks such as Ballymurphy and Bloody Sunday, and so on it’s difficult for me to see no scope for armed struggle at certain points during this process.
That’s laudable about a socialist alternative, and of course they weren’t the only ones doing that either, but truth is that actual dynamics on the ground supplanted whatever prescriptions any organisation of the left might attempt to promote.
Re your last point, I think the issue is now moot (btw, I wouldn’t pillory Militant for not supporting armed struggle – but I think the situation was more complex and the responses particularly so). It seems to me that there’s no capacity for armed struggle to either open up a space or to support political activity in any way that is positive. I’d hope that might be one lesson learned over the lifetime of the previous armed struggle.
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By: Left Archive: Final Agenda For the Twenty Third National Conference of the Labour Party Young Socialists (British Labour Party) – Ireland Section, April 1984 « The Cedar Lounge Revolution Mon, 04 Oct 2010 06:29:17
[…] an insight into how the issue of Ireland was perceived by sections of the UK left. As has been noted here… the Labour Party Young Socialists were… …the youth section of the British Labour […]
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