Following a widescale and carefully orchestrated police operation
aimed at disrupting ‘dissident republican’ activity and two nights of
rioting in Lurgan, it would appear that the north of Ireland’s social
peace has not been in such a fragile state since the signing of the
Good Friday Agreement eleven years ago. These were the sort of scenes
that the British state and the leaders of Sinn Féin and the Unionist
parties all told us were a thing of the past.
It is evident that following the onset of the capitalist crisis,
this is no longer the case. The longevity of the Good Friday Agreement
was based on a relative prosperity which is rapidly turning into its
opposite as the dole queues grow and a generation of youth is pushed
from the school gates onto the scrapheap. The class contradictions are
growing and where there is no clear mass socialist alternative
presented all the old ideas will tend to reassert themselves.
The events in Lurgan followed on from the conviction of three men
for attempting to launch a mortar attack on a police patrol in 2007.
The response of the state in setting up road blocks and other
repressive measures will in the long run only turn yet another
generation of Irish youth from nationalist areas against them.
Sinn Féin impotency
These incidents follow on from attacks by the Continuity and Real
IRA in March which left two soldiers and one police officer killed as
well as disturbances surrounding the orange marches in Belfast this
summer. The response of Sinn Féin to this situation also confirms their
impotency of organisation in providing a serious answer to working
class youth. They have been tasked with bringing an end to disturbances
and maintaining order on ‘their side’ of the sectarian divide. It is
clear that over the last few months this has become a more and more
difficult task.
Johnny McGibbon, a local Sinn Féin councillor simply remarked that,
“The majority of young republicans are not interested in this type of
activity and have stayed away.” Such disruption, however, is clearly an
embarrassment for the organisation in its own backyard. It is true that
most Irish youth aren’t interested in a return to the days of the
‘armed struggle’ or actions such as those seen in Lurgan over the last
few weeks. However, it is also evident that Sinn Féin is eroding its
own social base. South Armagh was historically in effect under the
control of the provisional IRA, and a place where the British army was
only able to move troops via helicopter. These actions demonstrate the
rising discontent with the leaders of the Republican movement.
Class contradictions
As we explained at the time of the signing of the Good Friday
Agreement, none of the underlying problems in the North were resolved.
The Good Friday Agreement represents a blind alley, none of the
fundamental class contradictions or national contradictions in the
North have been solved. Under these conditions and particularly under
conditions of a deep capitalist crisis the “Chuckle Brothers” can’t
solve any of the problems in the six counties. This is the fundamental
reason behind the political crisis affecting all of the parties in the
North, regardless of which side of the divide they are on.
Entrenched divisions
Above all the actions of the last few months have demonstrated the
utter uselessness of the tactics being employed by the Continuity/Real
IRA. It is clear, after 40 plus years that the tactic of individual
terrorism, the replacement of the conscious mass action of the working
class by a small band of armed insurgents, cannot succeed. Not one
blade of grass was liberated in all those years. The actions over the
weekend may have been of a more spontaneous character, reflecting the
frustration and anger of a section of young republicans, which has also
been seen in other areas of the north this summer.
The recent so called ‘dissident’ activity only reflects the actions
of the 70s and 80s on a much smaller scale. Given that the ‘armed
struggle’ only resulted in the set up we now face in the north it is
clear that such actions will only lead another generation of
potentially revolutionary youth down a blind alley. Actions such as the
car jacking of a woman’s lorry or pushing burnt out vans onto railway
lines serve no purpose in furthering the cause of a united Ireland and
only further entrench sectarian divisions.
Connolly and Larkin
Irish Republicanism contains some healthy elements that reject the
Good Friday Agreement and pose the solution of a socialist united
Ireland as lying in a united class struggle of protestant and catholic
workers. In relatively recent history youth and workers in the North
began to lay down the basis for this in the form of the civil rights
struggle and incidents such as Free Derry. These traditions stretch at
least as far back as the Dockers’ Strike in 1907 when under the
leadership of James Connolly and Jim Larkin the protestant and catholic
workers of Belfast stood together against the bosses and won. It is
clear that such a response is needed now more than ever. It is only by
building the forces of Marxism in Ireland that this can become a
reality.
