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Ireland: The national question is a social question

Marxist Theory · 2013-08-09

Core Argument

The central thesis is that the national question in Ireland cannot be separated from the social question — they are "inextricably woven together." The article argues that the democratic tasks of Irish unification, ending partition, and healing the sectarian breach are not merely nationalist distractions from class struggle but are preconditions for building a united working-class movement. Conversely, these national tasks can only be completed through socialist revolution. The article directly challenges those on the left — including Sinn Féin and various socialist sects — who have abandoned the fight for democratic rights in Ireland, dismissing anti-internment and anti-repression struggles as "dissident" or "sectarian." This abandonment, the article contends, is a betrayal of the working class, because a proletariat divided along sectarian lines cannot seize power.

Theoretical Grounding

The analysis is explicitly rooted in the 1944 Fourth International Theses on Ireland, which the article quotes at length. This places the argument within the Trotskyist tradition's approach to the national question — specifically, the understanding that in countries where the national democratic revolution remains unfinished, socialists cannot skip over those tasks in pursuit of an abstract "socialism today." The theses argue that the national question is "not necessarily a brake upon the class struggle but, under favourable circumstances, can act as a dynamo upon it."

The article also draws on the Marxist distinction between reactionary nationalism (loyalism/Orangeism, which is pro-imperialist and sectarian) and progressive anti-imperialist nationalism (republicanism, which fights for democratic rights). This is not a moral equivalence: loyalism and republicanism are "not two sides of the same coin." The article insists that socialists must make this distinction and act on it, rather than retreating into a false even-handedness that paralyses action.

The theoretical tradition here is the Marxist approach to combined and uneven development — the idea that in Ireland, the national and social revolutions are fused, not sequential. This is a position that distinguishes the Trotskyist tradition from both reformist nationalism (which believes national liberation can be achieved within capitalism) and ultra-leftism (which dismisses national struggles as irrelevant to the class struggle).

Conjunctural Relevance

The article is written in the immediate aftermath of loyalist riots in Belfast on 9 August 2013, when the UVF and Orange Order blocked an anti-internment march. The article situates this event within the broader context of post-Good Friday Agreement repression: secret courts, secret documents, and the continued jailing of republicans without due process. Specific cases cited include Marian Price, Stephen Murney, and Martin Corey.

The article identifies a political conjuncture in which:

  • Sinn Féin has abandoned the fight for democratic rights, having become an institutionalised party within the Northern Ireland state framework.
  • Small socialist sects have retreated into sectarianism of their own, dismissing anti-internment struggles as "dissident" or "atavistic."
  • Austerity is pushing politics to the right across Britain and Ireland, with UKIP advancing while the left fails to build a mass alternative.
  • The British state consistently sides with unionism, as demonstrated by Theresa Villiers' call for Sinn Féin to cancel a march in Castlederg while making no such demand of loyalist parades.

The article argues that this conjuncture contains both dangers and opportunities. The danger is that sectarian hatred, stoked by events and political organisations, deepens working-class division. The opportunity lies in the discipline and unity shown by the anti-internment march, which the article holds up as a model for future action.

Where the Argument Continues

This article is a short piece from The Red Plough (Vol. 4-6, August 2013), the theoretical journal of the Irish section of the RCI tradition. It is a conjunctural intervention — applying the 1944 Theses to a specific moment — rather than a full theoretical elaboration. The argument continues in:

  • The 1944 Fourth International Theses on Ireland themselves, which provide the full theoretical framework.
  • Other Red Plough articles from the same period, which would have developed the analysis of austerity, sectarianism, and the left's failures in Ireland.
  • Broader IDOM articles on the national question as a theoretical problem, particularly in relation to other national liberation struggles (e.g., Scotland, Catalonia, Palestine).
  • Against the Stream episodes dealing with Ireland, which would update the analysis to subsequent developments — the collapse of the power-sharing executive, Brexit's impact on the Northern Ireland Protocol, and the growth of support for Irish unification.

The article leaves open the question of how the "small forces of Marxism in Ireland" can advance the correct strategic approach to build a mass labour movement. This is the practical political task that the article gestures towards but does not elaborate.

Connections

  • Leon Trotsky, The Permanent Revolution — The theoretical basis for understanding the fusion of democratic and socialist tasks in countries where the bourgeois revolution is incomplete.
  • Vladimir Lenin, The Right of Nations to Self-Determination — The classical Marxist formulation of the national question, which the Trotskyist tradition builds on.
  • James Connolly — The Irish Marxist revolutionary who argued that the national and social struggles in Ireland were inseparable. The article's position is directly in this tradition.
  • The 1944 Fourth International Theses on Ireland — The immediate theoretical source for the article's argument.
  • IDOM articles on Scotland and Catalonia — Comparable analyses of national questions within advanced capitalist states, where the national democratic revolution remains unfinished.

Key Quotes

  1. "The national question IS a social question and, moreover, one of the largest magnitude."

  2. "The fundamental tasks of nationalism awaiting the solution of the approaching revolution are: (1) the healing of the sectarian breach; (2) the winning of national independence from British imperialism; and (3) the ending of partition. These form an inseparable trinity."

  3. "Conversely, the socialist movement can turn its back on the problems of nationalism only at the price of prostration before capitalism; for a proletariat divided within itself cannot seize power."

  4. "The unsolved national question – which is not at all a religious sectarian issue from the standpoint of the nationalist workers – is not necessarily a brake upon the class struggle but, under favourable circumstances, can act as a dynamo upon it, causing violent accelerations of tempo."

  5. "Loyalism and republicanism are not two sides of the same coin-sectarianism. One is reactionary, pro-imperialist with a strong racist and anti-catholic bias running through it... The other is anti-imperialist, favours democratic reform, opposes repression not only in the meeting halls but on the streets."

  6. "Any approach from socialists which ignores the continued repression or pays lip service to fighting that repression by passing pious resolutions in union meetings, knowing that nothing will happen, is to betray the working class."