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- ********* Sinn F?in and the 'Peace Process' ***********
ARRIVING AT THE END OF THE ROAD TO NOWHERE
Since the ending of the 'Cold War', many national
liberation struggles throughout the world have been
'settled'. In places as far apart as South Africa, El
Salvador, Nicaragua and Palestine these national
liberation struggles were led by groupings which were
often seen as having left leanings. However in all of
these cases the 'settlement' was far from socialist.
The current 'Irish peace process' is following exactly
the same lines and has nothing to offer the Irish
working class North or South
The announcement of the Provisional IRA cease-fire on
August 31st 1994 was almost universally welcomed. In a
statement, the Workers Solidarity Movement (WSM) stated:
"We welcome the IRA cease-fire. Over the last 25 years
over 3,000 people have been killed and 40,000 injured.
Thousands have been through or are still in prison. The
primary blame for these deaths and all the associated
suffering belongs with the British state..." (1)
Our welcome for the cease-fire was based on our
recognition of the fact that the armed struggle was a
flawed tactic, one
"...incapable of achieving a solution as it is incapable
of delivering a military victory and defeating the
British army..." and one which "...relies on the actions
of a few with the masses left in either a totally
passive role, or one limited to providing intelligence
and shelter to the few..." (2)
However, while welcoming the cease-fire, we drew a very
clear distinction between this and the "peace process" -
a process which we saw as being inherently flawed
"The 'peace process' as it is called, will not deliver a
united socialist Ireland, or significant improvements
apart from those associated with 'de-militarisation'.
In addition it represents a hardening of traditional
nationalism, and the goal of getting an alliance of all
the nationalists - Fianna Fail, SDLP, Sinn Fein and the
Catholic Church." (3)
Sound of silence
Over twelve months later, the cease-fire holds firm, the
people of the 6-Counties have enjoyed the 'sound of
silence' of the guns for over a year and a semblance of
normality has returned to the area after 25 years of
war.
But, as the British government continues to drag its
heels even on the simple concessions which normally
follow the ending of conflict such as prisoner release
and round-table inclusive talks, and as the Sinn F?in
leadership appears to have totally capitulated on its
ultimate objective of a 32-County Socialist Republic and
subsumed itself into the Pan-Nationalist Alliance of
SDLP/Dublin and 'Irish-America', many republican
supporters are left floundering and asking themselves
exactly what is going on.
Less than two short years ago Gerry Adams, Martin
McGuinness et al - as far as the media and mainstream
politicians were concerned - were "godfathers of
violence" for whom the English language did not contain
sufficient condemnatory terms. Now they are feted by
Bill Clinton in the White House, wined and dined at
$1,000-a-plate dinners and rub shoulders with captains
of industry. How has this come about? And, more
importantly, how does it square with their professed aim
of a Socialist Republic? How must those who believed in
the republicans' 'left turn' in the 1980s feel now?
In order to answer these questions or even to begin to
understand the logic of the current republican position,
it is necessary to look back at the origins of the
Provisional movement and to study the politics on which
it was founded.
Following the disastrous border campaign of 1956 - 1962,
the IRA was practically non-existent, retaining only a
handful of members and being regarded by most working-
class nationalists as a thing of the past. Meantime,
the nationalist middle-class had given up waiting for a
united Ireland and had instead begun to look for
equality of opportunity within the 6-County State. It
was from this layer that the Northern Ireland Civil
Rights Association (NICRA) was formed in 1967 with a
very moderate (in any state that even pretends to be
democratic) list of demands - one man (sic), one vote;
allocation of housing on a points system; redrawing of
gerrymandered electoral boundaries; repeal of the
Special Powers Act; abolition of the notorious B-
Specials; laws against discrimination in local
government. The issue of the border was not even
raised.
However, because the Northern State had been founded on
discrimination, even these moderate demands could not be
acceded to. Nor could the bigots who controlled the
State allow dissension in the form of public protest.
When the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) attacked the
second Civil Rights march on October 5th 1968 in Derry,
the die was cast.
The Peoples Democracy (PD) organised march from Belfast
to Derry in January 1969 was to be a key turning point.
When the 100 marchers were attacked by about 350
loyalists throwing rocks and stones at Burntollet
Bridge, the RUC stood by and watched.
The naked sectarianism and irreformability of the Orange
State had been dramatically exposed. Just seven months
later the British army were back on the streets when the
RUC found themselves incapable of restoring order
following what became known as the "Siege of Derry".
British Guns
Up to this stage the IRA were non-existent in terms of
military activity. The gun had been re-introduced to
Northern politics, not by a highly organised republican
movement determined to wreak havoc, but by the forces of
the British State. It is interesting to note that the
first death, the first dead soldier, the first dead
policeman, the first dead child and the first bombing
were all at the hands of British or Loyalist forces.
The lesson appeared clear - if even the modest demands
of the Civil Rights Movement were met with such massive
repression by the State, there was no alternative but to
meet force with force. Unfortunately the left at the
time failed to offer a coherent alternative and so 25
painful years of war and bloodshed had begun.
The Provisional movement was formed following a split in
the Republican movement in January 1970. When the Sinn
F?in Ard Fheis (Conference) of that month voted to end
the traditional policy of abstentionism from Stormont,
the Dail and Westminster, the dissidents walked out.
They established a provisional army council of the IRA
and a caretaker Sinn F?in executive.
Their first public statements strongly attacked the
leftward trend in the organisation and were vehemently
anti-communist. In its Easter statement of 1970 the
Provisional IRA army council stated:
"Irish freedom will not be won by involvement with an
international movement of extreme socialism." (4)
But it would be wrong to see the split as simply being
along left-right lines. Many of the Officials (as the
other wing became known) had become reformists and were
in favour of a strategy of working through parliament to
effect change - even being willing to take their seats
in Stormont - the notorious symbol of oppression - if
elected.
Because of the reformist nature of the Officials many of
the younger militants - especially in the North - joined
the Provisionals despite the fact that at the time they
were controlled by right-wing traditional nationalists
who wanted no truck with socialism.
Throughout the early 1970s, the Provos engaged the
British in a hugely intensive war of attrition. Events
such as Bloody Sunday in Derry (when 13 civilians were
killed by the Parachute Regiment during a Civil Rights
March on Sunday 30th January 1972) brought floods of
recruits. When the British sent heavily-armed troops
into IRA no-go areas in Belfast and Derry in July 1972,
there were 95 deaths. In the previous four months there
had been 5,500 shooting incidents and hundreds of car
bombs had devastated the centres of many Northern towns.
(5)
Throughout this time, the IRA remained heavily dependant
on the conservative American Noraid network for funding.
Joe Cahill had on the IRA's behalf promised Noraid that
they would deliver"...a republic without socialist or
communist ideas..." (6). General Army Order No. 8
banned military activity in the 26-Counties and
political work in the South was confined to support for
the Northern IRA.
Following a brief cease-fire in 1972 during which six
Provo leaders - including Gerry Adams and Martin
McGuinness - were flown to London for talks with British
government ministers, the IRA campaign resumed. At this
time too Loyalist paramilitary groups wreaked havoc with
a particularly vicious sectarian campaign of terror
aimed at the Catholic population.
Flawed Strategy
It was the Provisionals' cease-fire of 1974-1975 however
which was to show up for the first time one of the flaws
in a strategy which relied solely on a military campaign
- especially one with a purely nationalist base.
Speaking of this period 10 years later, in 1985, Gerry
Adams was to say
"When the struggle was limited to armed struggle, the
prolongation of the truce meant that there was no
struggle at all. There was nothing but confusion,
frustration and demoralisation, arising directly from
what I call spectator politics" (7)
By the 1978, Sinn Fein Ard Fheis disaffection with the
leadership's handling of the 1975 truce had begun to
assert itself and Adams was elected to the position of
Vice-President. A new leadership began to emerge based
around Adams, Tom Hartley, Joe Austin and Danny
Morrison. There was much talk - especially among the
prisoners - of socialism and of replacing the
reactionary nationalist outlook of the past. A new type
of community politics began to emerge with Republicans
being encouraged to involve themselves in community
groups, trade unions and cultural groups.
It was the beginning of the 'blanket protest' following
the removal of the prisoners' 'special category status'
in March 1976 which was to lead eventually to the hunger
strikes of 1980 and 1981 and the highpoint of support
for the Republican cause throughout the 32-Counties. By
1980, with Margaret Thatcher in power, there were 380
prisoners taking part in the 'no wash' protest and
preparations for a hunger strike were well under way.
When the prison protests began in 1976, Sinn F?in as an
organisation seemed incapable of the sort of political
agitation necessary to highlight the prisoners' plight.
When a conference was held in Coalisland, Co. Tyrone in
January 1978 to discuss the building of a broad anti-
Unionist front which would campaign on the prisons
issue, Sinn F?in criticised the naivety of the
organisers and basically put forward the proposition
that only those who offered uncritical support for the
IRA's campaign were entitled to get involved. However
by October 1979 when a further Conference was held in
the Green Briar Hall in Andersonstown, the Sinn F?in
line had changed dramatically and Gerry Adams proposed
to the conference a list of 5 demands around which a
"Smash H-Block" campaign could be built. These demands
were:
(1) To be exempt from wearing prison clothes.
(2) To be exempt from prison work.
(3) To have freedom of association with fellow political
prisoners.
(4) The right to organise educational and recreational
facilities, to have one weekly visit, to receive and
send out one letter per week and to receive one parcel
per week.
(5) Entitlement to full remission of sentence
These demands were agreed by the Conference and became
the central plank of the National H- Block/Armagh
Committee. While this Committee worked to raise public
awareness and bring pressure on the British government
on the issue, Sinn F?in was involved in secret
negotiations with, among others, Cardinal Tom?s O'Fiach
- the head of the Irish Catholic Church - to try and
persuade him to intervene with the British on the
prisoners' behalf.
Meanwhile pressure from inside the prisons was growing
and Sinn Fein began to come to the realisation that they
had to organise politically - especially in the 26-
Counties - if they were to make progress.
Hunger Strike
In October 1980, the prisoners in the H-Blocks decided
that their only hope of pressing home the issue of
prison status was to go on hunger strike. In a
communication sent in to Bobby Sands, Gerry Adams stated
that the leadership of the republican movement
was"...tactically, strategically, physically and morally
opposed to a hunger strike." (8)
The prisoners however, were determined to press ahead
with their plans. The first hunger strike lasted for 53
days and involved nearly 40 prisoners in the H-Blocks
and Armagh. There were pickets, marches and riots
throughout the 6-Counties. In Dublin, 12,000 people
marched in support of the prisoners in late October and
a further 2,000 picketed a summit meeting between
Thatcher and Taoiseach Charles Haughey on 8th December.
Republican strategists began to realise that political
agitation could be a strong weapon in their arsenal.
On 18th December - with one of the hunger strikers, Se?n
McKenna, fast approaching death - the British government
indicated that if the fast was called off some of their
demands would be met. The prisoners decided to end the
protest but discovered very quickly that the document
presented to them by the British fell far short of
meeting their demands. Almost immediately, preparations
began for another hunger strike.
Again the Sinn F?in leadership attempted to dissuade the
prisoners from their proposed course of action
"...in terms of the political priorities of the moment,
we did not want the hunger strike. We were just
beginning our attempts to remedy the political
underdevelopment of the movement, trying to develop the
organisation, engaging in a gradual build-up of new
forms of struggle and, in particular, we were working
out our strategy in relation to elections. We were well
aware that a hunger strike such as was proposed would
demand exclusive attention, would, in effect, hijack the
struggle, and this conflicted with our sense of the
political priorities of the moment." (9)
Bobby Sands
But the prisoners were determined. They felt they had
no alternative and plans went ahead. On 1st March 1981
Bobby Sands was the first to refuse food. Over the
course of the next seven months, ten republican
prisoners - members of both the IRA and the INLA (Irish
National Liberation Army) - were to die on hunger
strike. The National H-Block/Armagh Committee - set up
on a humanitarian/ pan-nationalist axis - was to
organise protests, pickets, marches, riots and even some
strike action throughout the 32-Counties. It was a
period of mass action but also one of missed
opportunity. It was a period also which was to have
long-term effects on the direction of Sinn Fein's
developing political strategy:
"The hunger strike did away with spectator politics.
When the only form of struggle being waged was armed
struggle, it only needed a small number of people to
engage in it. But, with the hunger strike, people could
play an active role which could be as limited or as
important as billposting, writing letters, or taking
part in numerous forms of protest." (10)
The mass action was indeed impressive. In the week of
Bobby Sands' funeral, for example, over 10,000 marched
in Dublin, 5,000 in Limerick, 4,000 in Cork. There were
big marches in Waterford, Tralee, Killarney, Wexford,
Bray, Meath, Monaghan, Donegal and many other places.
In Belfast over 100,000 people attended the funeral.
There were work stoppages - some organised, some
spontaneous - all over the country, including Dublin
Corporation maintenance depots, Alcan's construction
site in Limerick (2,500 workers), Arigna mines in Co.
Leitrim, building sites in Dublin, factories and shops
in Limerick, Cork, Cobh, Tralee, Wexford, Bray, Sligo,
Donegal, Leitrim, Monaghan. Trades Councils in places
such as Waterford, Dungarvan, Meath, Dundalk and
Drogheda called successful stoppages. (11) There were
daily pickets and protests in almost every town in
Ireland.
While this was in many ways people power at its best,
the necessity to maintain friendly relations with the
'broad nationalist family' which included Southern
political parties, the Catholic Church and the GAA meant
that it had to be controlled. Thus the 100,000 people
who attended Sands' funeral were told to go home and
wait for the Republican movement to take its revenge.
Thus also the failure to make workplace and community
struggle the spearhead of the campaign. Ultimately the
period was to prove the acid test of Sinn F?in's
'socialism' - a test they were to fail miserably.
The real lesson that Sinn F?in took from the H-Block
Campaign happened almost by chance. The sudden death of
Frank Maguire, independent MP for Fermanagh/South Tyrone
raised the possibility of a prisoner candidate standing
in the bye-election. Bobby Sands was duly nominated and
elected with 30,492 votes. Sands' election literature
sought to "borrow" the votes of the electorate. Voters
were told that by lending their votes they could help
save Sands' life. In the following election they could
go back to supporting their usual candidates.
Apparently it would have been expecting too much to hope
that people would vote for an IRA man because they
supported what the Republican Movement stood for.
When Charles Haughey called a general election in the
26-Counties for 11th June, Republican prisoners stood as
candidates in 9 constituencies. Paddy Agnew (Louth) and
Kieran Doherty (Cavan/Monaghan) were elected. Kevin
Lynch missed a seat in Waterford by just 300 votes. The
electoral successes were to have two effects. Firstly,
the Dublin and London governments moved to marginalise
the Republican Movement through a process of extended
collaboration that lead to the Anglo-Irish Agreement of
1985 and the extradition legislation of 1987. For Sinn
F?in, the message they took from the period was that"Our
tentative moves towards adopting an electoral strategy
were rapidly concluded with the electoral success of
that year. The centrality of mass popular struggle
eventually found its place alongside the armed
struggle." (12)
Buoyed by the prisoners' electoral successes many
Republicans began to believe that not only should an
electoral strategy become more central to the overall
struggle but that it was only a matter of putting up
candidates and winning seats. Thus the "armalite and
ballot box" tactic was developed and indeed it appeared
to meet with considerable success in the 6-County area.
In the 1982 elections to the newly-established "Northern
Assembly" Sinn F?in candidates got 64,191 first
preference votes and Adams (West Belfast), Jim McAlister
(Armagh), Martin McGuinness (Derry), Danny Morrison
(Mid-Ulster) and Owen Carron (Fermanagh/South Tyrone)
were all elected. In elections to Westminster in June
1983 the Sinn Fein vote increased to 13.4% and Gerry
Adams was elected MP for West Belfast.
'Left Turn'?
The first cracks began to appear in the traditional
policy of abstentionism at the 1983 Ard Fheis when a
decision was taken to contest the upcoming elections to
the European Parliament and to take seats if elected.
But it was the decision of this Ard Fheis to replace the
movement's commitment to "Christian principles" to
"Irish Republican Socialist principles" which was to
lead many to believe, over the subsequent decade, that
Sinn F?in had taken a 'left turn'. Ruairi O'Br?daigh
resigned as President and Adams was elected to the
position.
When the Euro elections were held, the Sinn F?in vote in
the 6-Counties was down slightly to 13.3%. In the South
- where in the 1982 general election the SF vote in the
key constituencies of Louth and Cavan/Monaghan had
halved since the hunger strike election - their total
vote was only 2%. In the 1985 Northern local elections,
the Sinn F?in vote slipped further, to under 12% but
they had 59 Councillors elected.
In the South the electoral breakthrough never came. As
one Sinn F?in activist put it:
"...we were not going to get votes in Ballymun because
the Brits were battering down doors in Ballymurphy"
(13)
The need to 'become relevant' to 26-County voters meant
that Sinn F?in activists were encouraged to become
involved in community and trade union activities. Much
good work was done by SF activists on the drugs issue in
Dublin, for example, over the next couple of years.
However, there was a glaring dichotomy. The strategy
being formulated by the leadership - that of developing
a 'Pan-Nationalist Alliance', an "...Irish Ireland
movement to offset, especially in the 26-Counties, the
neo-colonial and anti-national mentality that exists
there" (14), meant that direct conflict with the 26-
County government had to be avoided. Instead of
realising that the failure to make 'an electoral
breakthrough' in the 26-Counties was directly
attributable to the failure to offer a radical socialist
alternative, the leadership decided instead that the
problem was abstentionism. At the 1986 Ard-Fheis the
decision was taken to enter Leinster House if elected
and many of the "old guard" left to form Republican Sinn
F?in.
Anarchists would of course argue that the decision to
use the tactic of participation in elections in the
first place would inevitably lead to reformism. The
decision to drop abstentionism was just one more step in
that process. True socialism cannot be achieved through
the parliamentary process. Participation in elections
has the dual effect of maintaining illusions in the
State apparatus and of taking away all possibility of
self-activity among the working-class and replacing it
with a reliance on voting for 'good representatives'
every couple of years.
While Sinn F?in continued - and still continues - to
call itself a socialist party, the central policy became
one of creating the much talked about "Pan Nationalist
Alliance". Much of the leadership's thinking on this
issue was included in a document entitled "A Strategy
For Peace" given by Sinn F?in to the SDLP during a
series of meetings between the two parties in 1988.
These meetings had come about as a result of an
extensive series of contacts between Sinn F?in,
representatives of the Catholic Church and indirect
contact with Taoiseach Charles Haughey. In the
document, Sinn F?in called for a date for British
withdrawal, saying that, "Within the new situation
created by these measures [withdrawal], it is then a
matter of business-like negotiations between the
representatives of all the Irish parties, and this
includes those who represent today's loyalist voter, to
set the constitutional, economic, social and political
arrangements for a new Irish state.... the British
government needs to be met with a firm united and
unambiguous demand from all Irish Nationalist parties
for an end to the Unionist veto and a declaration of a
date for withdrawal...."
One of the aims of the SF/SDLP talks was, according to
the document,"That Sinn F?in and the SDLP join forces to
impress on the Dublin government the need to launch an
international and diplomatic offensive to secure
national self-determination."
It must be remembered that this proposal was made at a
time of unprecedented co-operation between the Dublin
and London governments in an attempt to marginalise and
smash the Republican Movement. The Anglo-Irish
Agreement of 1985, which Gerry Adams himself describes
as "...a coming together of the various British
strategies on an all-Ireland basis, with the Dublin
government acting as the new guarantor of partition"
(15) was already two years in place. Haughey was in the
process of extraditing republicans and tightening up
security co-operation with the British forces. And
workers and the unemployed in the 26-Counties were
facing a severe economic onslaught under the terms of
the government-union-employer deal, the "Programme for
National Recovery " (PNR).
Socialism?
So what of the 'left turn'? Adams still described
himself as a socialist so he must have seen some role
for socialists in the "Irish Ireland movement". And
indeed he did:
"The true socialist will be an active supporter of the
republican character of the national independence
movement. She or he will realise that, unless this
character is maintained and unless the most radical
forces are in the leadership of the independence
struggle, then inevitably it must fail or compromise.
This classical view of the matter contrasts with the
ultra-left view, which counterpoises republicanism and
socialism and which breaks up the unity of the national
independence movement by putting forward 'socialist'
demands that have no possibility of being achieved until
real independence is won. " (16) [my emphasis].
In essence, it's the classic stages theory - national
independence first, then we can think about socialism.
A significant section of the 'nationalist' ruling class
- so the theory goes - can be drawn into the fight for a
united Ireland, if we don't frighten them off by
screaming too loudly about poverty, unemployment or the
ills of capitalism!
This 'tread very carefully' philosophy was seen clearly
during the Anti-Extradition Campaign of the late 1980s.
Appeal after appeal was made to the 'grassroots' of
Fianna Fail (FF) and attempts were made, to quote from a
motion from the National Committee to one of its first
conferences,"...to play on the inherent contradictions
within the party [FF] between the old Dev'ites and the
newer monetarists.."
At another Conference, a National Committee document
stated"A primary means of pressurising Fianna Fail is
through their own party structures."
Because this remained a key focus of the campaign, event
after event was scaled down or cancelled entirely for
fear of alienating the couple of backbench TDs who it
was hoped would issue a statement against extradition.
Thus when the January 1988 Conference of the Irish Anti-
Extradition Committee (IAEC) took a decision to stage a
large demonstration outside the Fianna Fail Ard Fheis,
this decision was countermanded by Sinn F?in and only a
small picket took place.
Indeed this situation reached farcical heights following
the extradition of Robert Russell in August, 1988. At
the first National Committee meeting of the IAEC
following Russell's extradition, Norah Comiskey, Richard
Greene and Jim Doyle (all FF members) with the support
of SF were still talking about organising meetings of FF
members against extradition and even seriously discussed
holding a press conference to call for the removal of
Haughey as leader of FF and his replacement by a "true
republican".
The lessons of that period should have been clear. The
complete failure of the anti-extradition campaign to
make an impact should have taught Sinn F?in that any
alliance with bosses - even if in this case the alliance
was more illusory than real - is one dominated
politically by bosses. Instead, however, the drive to
create the "Pan-Nationalist Alliance" was intensified.
By the early 1990s the "Irish Peace Process" (as Sinn
Fein was labelling it) was well under way and Sinn F?in
and the British government were in regular secret
contact. Northern Secretary Peter Brooke had publicly
acknowledged that he found it "...difficult to envisage
a military defeat of the IRA." (17) On the other side
of the coin, Republicans had realised that a military
victory for the IRA was not a possibility.
The British were saying that they had no selfish
interest in staying in the 6-Counties, and Brooke was
involved in a series of 'talks about talks' with
Unionist parties and the SDLP. At Sinn Fein's Wolfe
Tone commemoration in June 1991, Adams stated
"While Dublin and the SDLP refuse to stand up to the
British government it will continue to think it can do
exactly what it wants in Ireland......Dublin should seek
a change in Britain's current policy of maintaining the
union to one of ending it and handing over sovereignty
to an all-Ireland government, democratically elected and
accountable to the Irish nation. Dublin should use the
opportunity of these talks [Brooke talks] to persuade
the unionists that their future lies in this context and
to persuade the British to accept that they have a
responsibility to influence the unionist position. To
secure a national and international consensus on this
the Dublin government needs a strategy for unity and
independence. Such a strategy would involve winning
international support for the demand for Irish
independence and would require the full use of Irish
diplomatic skills and resources." (18)
Nobody ever explained how a government which was
presiding over massive unemployment and poverty, which
had - over the previous 5 years - imposed severe
restrictions on the living standards of workers and the
unemployed through "National Programmes"
(government/employer/union deals) and which was quite
efficiently fulfilling its role as a junior partner in
the western capitalist system was likely to persuade the
unionists that life in a 32-County State was going to be
any better for them. The realpolitik of the Pan-
Nationalist Alliance meant that the need to smash both
states on the island and replace them with a Socialist
Republic was quietly shelved. Instead it was more
important to play footsie with Dublin and 'Irish-
America'. Such a policy was never likely to win
working-class Unionists over from the Orange bigots.
Persuaders for Unity!
Not alone did Sinn F?in now call on the Dublin
government to take up the banner of "Irish
Independence", but the call also went out to the British
government to"...join the ranks of the persuaders in
seeking to obtain the consent of all sections to the
constitutional, political and financial arrangements
needed to establish a united Ireland." (19)
With the publication of the Sinn F?in document "Towards
a Lasting Peace in Ireland" in 1992, the strategy was
fully in place. The central thrust of the document was
that Britain must "join the persuaders" and Dublin must
"...persuade the British that partition has
failed,...persuade the unionists of the benefits of
Irish reunification, and....persuade the international
community that it should support a real peace process in
Ireland." (20)
The first steps were now being taken to establish the
'Irish American' arm of the axis. "Americans for a New
Irish Agenda" was set up by, among others, a former U.S.
Congressman, Bruce Morrison. Adams and Hume went public
on the results of their discussions in April 1993. In
June - amidst great controversy - Mary Robinson, the 26-
County President, visited Belfast and shook hands with
Gerry Adams. It was to be the first of many famous
handshakes and the first public acknowledgement of Adams
the peace-maker.
The Warrington bombing of March 1993 in which two
children were killed brought intense criticism of the
armed campaign from both inside and outside the
Republican Movement. The massive car bomb which was
exploded in the City of London in April, causing
millions of pounds worth of damage, reminded the British
government that the IRA was still a force to be reckoned
with.
Realising that the initiative could not be left in the
hands of Sinn F?in, Dublin and London had meanwhile been
involved in drawing up their own set of proposals. The
Downing Street Declaration - launched in December - was
a classic fudge. In the House of Commons Prime Minister
John Major said that the Declaration did not contain
"...any suggestion that the British government should
join the ranks of the persuaders of the value or
legitimacy of a united Ireland...". Meantime in the
D?il Taoiseach Albert Reynolds was saying that "...for
the first time ever, the right to self-determination of
the people of Ireland is acknowledged...".
Despite the fact that Downing St. contained nothing that
had not been in the Anglo-Irish Agreement, Sinn F?in
felt that its strategy was in place and that it was in a
stronger position than in 1985. Therefore, despite
nearly eight months of procrastination, it was only
going to be a matter of time until the IRA cease-fire
was declared. The rapidity with which the Sinn Fein
leadership was accepted into the arms of
'respectability' caught many by surprise. For Adams,
McGuinness et al it was, however, simply the culmination
of a strategy built up over many years.
Sinn F?in now declares as its priority:
"...to move the peace process forward...to build on the
gains which have been made and to move speedily forward
into all-party talks led by both the British and Irish
governments...to bring about an inclusive and negotiated
end to British jurisdiction in Ireland. We seek to
replace it with an agreed Irish jurisdiction."(21)
If socialism had to wait throughout the seventies and
eighties, the realpolitik of the nineties means that the
word should not even be mentioned for fear of upsetting
John Bruton, John Hume or Bill Clinton. Republicans
might well be justified in asking if this is what Bobby
Sands died for.
Multinationals
Meanwhile, Sinn F?in has no difficulty in attending Bill
Clinton's "Investing in Ireland" Conference (Washington
24/5/95), attended by the chief executives of some of
the biggest multinationals in the world all looking to
see if Ireland can provide them with tax breaks and low
wages to extract even more profits. Their Northern
Chairperson Gear?id O'Hara calls on the anti-union
multinational Seagate not to cease their exploitation of
Irish workers but to offer training schemes to
"...afford the youth of Derry the chance to become the
direction and decision-makers of industry in their own
country..." (22). In the course of a debate in the
U.S., the same Mr. O'Hara can declare that Sinn F?in
"...have no problem with capitalism." (23)
The only surprising thing is that anybody should be
surprised. This is simply the logical consequence of
the type of 'nation-state' politics pursued by Sinn F?in
over the years. If "labour must wait" then labour will
always be left behind. This is not a uniquely Irish
phenomenon. It has happened and is happening throughout
the world, the most notable recent examples being the
ANC in South Africa and the PLO in Palestine. Because
the driving political force has been nationalist rather
than socialist in nature, compromise with and the
eventual acceptance of capitalism is inevitable even for
those who continue to call themselves socialists.
This is not because - as some might claim - the SF
leadership have "sold out" on their socialism. The
entire direction of the 'Peace Process' shows instead
the bankruptcy of nationalist politics and the fact that
nationalist alliances have nothing of consequence to
offer the working-class. 'Socialism' is useful to the
Republicans at times as a slogan to show why they are
different, to mark them out from other members of the
"nationalist family". However the most important aim is
to develop and maintain unity among that nationalist
family. In order to do this the socialist slogans must
be left on the backburner, to be resurrected now and
again, usually at election time, when they are useful.
With time, the slogans become less and less useful and
will eventually be disposed of entirely. Nationalists
see their rightful role as being that of governing
"their" States and will do deals with almost anybody to
be allowed to fulfil that role.
The question which remains is to ask what future there
is for Sinn F?in. In the absence of the military
campaign (which is extremely unlikely to re-commence
under the present leadership for a variety of reasons),
is there any real space for Sinn F?in's politics? One
thing is clear - Sinn F?in may describe itself as
"socialist", it may have as its objective a 32-County
Socialist Republic but it does not have the policies or
the ability to deliver on that objective. Already one
Sinn F?in activist has been quoted in a national Sunday
newspaper as saying that Sinn F?in could well be part of
the next government in the 26-Counties (if of course
they manage to get anyone elected!). As a nationalist
party, Sinn F?in has actually achieved one of its main
objectives of the last decade - the Pan-Nationalist
Alliance is firmly in place, even if the British
government is hardly shaking in its shoes at the sight
of it. With the demand for immediate unconditional
British withdrawal having been replaced by a plea for
"inclusive all-party talks", Sinn F?in look set to
become yet another moderate 'party of the centre'.
Without an armed campaign to support, their politics
differ little from those of the other mainstream Irish
political parties. Genuine socialists who are members
of Sinn F?in should be asking themselves why.
REFERENCES
(1) WORKERS SOLIDARITY MOVEMENT (WSM) statement 7/9/1994
(2) WSM Position Paper: The National Question (adopted
January 1991)
(3) WSM statement 7/9/1994
(4) AN PHOBLACHT Vol. 1, No. 3: quoted in FARRELL,
MICHAEL: Northern Ireland; The Orange State. Page 270
(5) source: BOWYER BELL, J.: IRA Tactics and Targets.
Page 18
(6) CLARKE, LIAM: Broadening the Battlefield; The H-
Blocks and the Rise of Sinn Fein. Page 13
(7) Bobby Sands Memorial Lecture, 5/5/1985; quoted in
CLARKE, LIAM op. cit. Page 29
(8) quoted in ibid. Page 121
(9) ADAMS, GERRY: Free Ireland; Towards a Lasting Peace.
Page 79
(10) ibid. Page 86
(11) AN PHOBLACHT/REPUBLICAN NEWS (AP/RN) Sat. 9/5/1981
(12) GIBNEY, JIM speaking on 10th anniversary of hunger
strikes, quoted in AP/RN 22/11/90
(13) CLARKE, LIAM op. cit. Page 226
(14) ADAMS, GERRY op.cit. Page 135
(15) ibid. Page 108
(16) ibid. Page 133
(17) quoted in ibid. Page 199
(18) AP/RN 27/6/91
(19) ADAMS, GERRY op.cit. Page 203
(20) ibid. Page 209
(21) ADAMS, GERRY speaking to United Nations
Correspondents Association 5/5/95
(22) DERRY JOURNAL 24/5/95
(23) IRISH TIMES 10/5/95