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Ted Grant The one weakness of the outstanding Scottish Marxist John Maclean

Marxist Theory · 2026-05-13

Core Argument

The central thesis is that John Maclean, despite his heroic stature as a revolutionary Marxist, succumbed to a fatal error: Scottish nationalism. Ted Grant argues that Maclean's turn towards advocating a separate Scottish Workers' Republic and a Scottish Communist Party was not a principled application of Marxism to the national question, but an expression of political impatience and frustration with the ebb of the revolutionary wave after 1920. The article claims that this nationalist deviation was a utopian shortcut that contradicted the fundamental Marxist position that socialism cannot be achieved in Scotland separately from the rest of Britain, given the indissoluble economic integration of the British Isles. Grant further argues that Maclean's errors have been revived by later left-nationalist currents, particularly the Scottish Socialist Party, which have used his legacy to justify a capitulation to nationalism wrapped in socialist rhetoric.

Theoretical Grounding

The analysis is grounded in the classical Marxist position on the national question as developed by Marx, Engels, Lenin, and Trotsky. The key theoretical claim is that the unity of the working class must be organised on the basis of the actual economic and territorial integration of capital, not on the basis of national sentiment or administrative boundaries. Grant draws on Lenin and Trotsky's explicit rejection of Maclean's Scottish Workers' Republic proposal as "fundamentally false," situating this within the broader Marxist critique of national separatism as a diversion from class struggle. The article also deploys the Marxist distinction between sensitivity to national aspirations — which is legitimate — and capitulation to nationalism as a political programme — which is not. The theoretical tradition invoked is that of revolutionary internationalism: the working class has no country, and its interests are objectively unified across national borders within a single capitalist economy. The critique of "left reformism" is also present: the article argues that nationalist politics, even when dressed in socialist language, leads to seeking solutions within the confines of capitalism rather than through the revolutionary overthrow of the entire system.

Conjunctural Relevance

The article was published in November 2003, at a moment when the Scottish Socialist Party (SSP) was a significant political force. The SSP had been founded in 1998 and by 2003 had six MSPs in the Scottish Parliament, making it the most prominent left-nationalist formation in Britain. Tommy Sheridan, the SSP's most visible figure, had built the party on a platform combining radical anti-capitalism with Scottish independence. Alan McCombes, named in the article, was a key SSP strategist and later co-author of Sheridan's autobiography. The article is therefore a direct intervention into a live political debate within the British Marxist left: whether the path to socialism in Scotland runs through independence or through British-wide working-class unity. Grant's argument is that the SSP's emphasis on "Scotland's wealth" and "Scottish workers" represents a slide into left reformism, precisely because it accepts the framework of a separate Scottish capitalism rather than demanding the overthrow of capitalism as a whole. The 1926 General Strike is invoked as historical proof that the British working class can move as a single force, and that Maclean's pessimism about England was empirically wrong.

Where the Argument Continues

This article is part of a sustained polemic by Ted Grant and the tradition that became the Revolutionary Communist International against left-nationalist currents within the British and Scottish left. The argument continues in other In Defence of Marxism articles from the same period, particularly those critiquing the SSP and the broader Scottish independence movement. The theoretical framework is developed further in Grant's writings on the national question and the united front, as well as in the tradition's ongoing analysis of the British state and the Labour Party. The article also connects to the broader Marxist debate on the national question in small nations, which runs from Lenin's The Right of Nations to Self-Determination through Trotsky's writings on the Ukraine and the Balkans. The specific critique of Maclean is revisited in later IDOM pieces that examine the relationship between revolutionary impatience and nationalist deviation.

Connections

  • Lenin, The Right of Nations to Self-Determination — the classical Marxist text on the national question, which distinguishes between the right to secession as a democratic demand and the political wisdom of actually pursuing secession in a given conjuncture.
  • Trotsky, The History of the Russian Revolution — particularly the sections on the national question and the relationship between the Russian and Ukrainian working classes.
  • Ted Grant, The Unbroken Thread — a collection of Grant's writings that includes his sustained critique of left nationalism and reformism.
  • Alan McCombes and Tommy Sheridan, Imagine: A Socialist Vision for the 21st Century — the SSP's own statement of its political project, which the article treats as a direct contemporary echo of Maclean's errors.
  • In Defence of Marxism articles on the Scottish independence referendum (2014) — the argument developed here was extended and updated during the referendum campaign, when the RCI argued against both the SNP's nationalism and the Labour Party's unionism, calling instead for a united working-class struggle against austerity.

Key Quotes

  1. "His fundamental error was to succumb to the pressures of Scottish nationalism. Maclean refused to join the newly created Communist Party, advocating instead a Scottish Communist Party."

  2. "Thus he lost sight of the long held position of Marxists that there cannot be a separate struggle for socialism or a workers government in Scotland separate and apart from that in the rest of Britain. This was a Utopian idea that John Maclean put forward in the early 1920s - an idea which was derided by Lenin and Trotsky as fundamentally false."

  3. "It was out of this impatience and frustration that Maclean began to look towards the short-cut of a socialist revolution in Scotland as an example to the rest of Britain. This was a fundamentally false perspective."

  4. "Our task is not to emulate Maclean's mistakes, but to learn from them and inoculate the youth against impatience and short-cuts that could lead the movement into the swamp of nationalism."

  5. "The main criticism we would make of the leaders of the Scottish Socialist Party leaders is that they have succumbed to the pressures of Scottish nationalism and with it to left reformism. They are seeking solutions to the problems of the Scottish workers within the confines of capitalism."

  6. "This is not for sentimental reasons, but because the economies of Scotland, Wales and England are indissolubly linked. A separation of these countries would bring about a disaster for all of them, but the heaviest price would, as always, be paid by the working class."