Workers' Party (Ireland)

The Workers' Party () is an Irish republican, Marxist–Leninist communist party active in both the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland.

The party formerly asserted a claim of direct descent from the original Sinn Féin organisation founded in 1905 by Arthur Griffith. It took its current form in 1970 following a division within Sinn Féin, in which the majority faction followed the leadership in a Marxist direction. It was known as Sinn Féin (Gardiner Place) or Official Sinn Féin, to distinguish it from the minority faction of "Sinn Féin (Kevin Street)" or "Provisional Sinn Féin". It changed its name from Sinn Féin to Sinn Féin The Workers' Party in 1977 and then to the Workers' Party in 1982. In that time, Provisional Sinn Féin came to be known simply as Sinn Féin. Both groups were tied to corresponding paramilitary groups, with Official Sinn Féin tied to the Official Irish Republican Army.

By the late 1980s, the party had broken through electorally in the Republic of Ireland and at its peak it elected 7 TDs at the 1989 general election and 21 councillors at the 1991 local elections. However, following the fall of the Berlin Wall and collapse of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s, almost all the party's elected members broke away and formed Democratic Left in 1992. Since 1992 the party has existed as a microparty. A 2021 split in the party left the party's status disputed.

Name

In 1971, it registered to contest Dáil and local elections in the Republic of Ireland under the name Sinn Féin. From the early to mid-1970s, it was known as Official Sinn Féin or ''Sinn Féin (Gardiner Place)'' to distinguish it from the rival offshoot Provisional Sinn Féin, or ''Sinn Féin (Kevin Street)''. Gardiner Place had symbolic power as the headquarters of Sinn Féin for decades before the 1970 split.

At its Ardfheis in January 1977, Official Sinn Féin renamed itself ''Sinn Féin – The Workers' Party''. Its first seats in Dáil Éireann were won under this new name. A motion at the 1979 Ardfheis to remove the ''Sinn Féin'' prefix from the party name was narrowly defeated. This change would come about three years later.

In Northern Ireland, Sinn Féin was organised under the name Republican Clubs to avoid a ban on Sinn Féin candidates (introduced in 1964 under Northern Ireland's Emergency Powers Act). The Officials continued to use this name after 1970, and later used the name Workers' Party Republican Clubs. In 1982, both the northern and southern sections of the party became The Workers' Party.

The Workers' Party is sometimes referred to as the "Sticks" or "Stickies" because in the 1970s it used adhesive stickers for the Easter Lily emblem in its 1916 commemorations, whereas Provisional Sinn Féin used a pin for theirs.

History

Origins

The modern origins of the party date from the early 1960s. After the failure of the then IRA's 1956–1962 border campaign, the republican movement, with a new military and political leadership, undertook a complete reappraisal of its .''The Lost Revolution: The Story of the Official IRA and the Workers' Party'', Brian Hanley and Scott Millar, Through the 1960s, some leading figures in the movement, such as Cathal Goulding, Seán Garland, Billy McMillen, Tomás Mac Giolla, moved steadily to the left, even to Marxism, as a result of their own reading and thinking and contacts with the Irish and international left. This angered more traditional republicans, who wanted to stick to the national question and armed struggle. Also involved in this debate was the Connolly Association. This group's analysis saw the primary obstacle to Irish unity as the continuing division between the Protestant and Catholic working classes. This it attributed to the "divide and rule" policies of capitalism, whose interests were served by the working classes remaining divided. Military activity was seen as counterproductive, because its effect was to further entrench sectarian divisions. The left-wing faction believed the working classes could be united in class struggle to overthrow their common rulers, with a 32-county socialist republic being the inevitable outcome.

However, this Marxist outlook became unpopular with many of the more traditionalist republicans, and the party/army leadership was criticised for failing to defend northern Catholic enclaves from loyalist attacks (these debates took place against the background of the violent beginning of what would be termed the Troubles). A growing minority within the rank-and-file wanted to maintain traditional militarist policies aimed at ending British rule in Northern Ireland. An equally contentious issue involved whether to or not to continue with the policy of abstentionism, that is, the refusal of elected representatives to take their seats in British or Irish legislatures. A majority of the leadership favoured abandoning this policy.

A group consisting of Seán Mac Stiofáin, Dáithí Ó Conaill, Seamus Twomey, and others, established themselves as a "Provisional Army Council" in 1969 in anticipation of a contentious 1970 Sinn Féin Ard Fheis (delegate conference). At the Ard Fheis, the leadership of Sinn Féin failed to attain the required two-thirds majority to change the party's position on abstentionism. The debate was charged with allegations of vote-rigging and expulsions. When the Ard Fheis went on to pass a vote of confidence in the ''official'' Army Council (which had already approved an end to the abstentionist policy), Ruairí Ó Brádaigh led the minority in a walk-out, and went to a prearranged meeting in Parnell Square where they announced the establishment of a "caretaker" executive of Sinn Féin. The dissident council became known as the "Provisional Army Council" and its party and military wing as Sinn Féin and the Provisional IRA, while those remaining became known as Official Sinn Féin and the Official IRA. Official Sinn Féin, under the leadership of Tomás Mac Giolla, remained aligned to Goulding's Official IRA.

A key factor in the split was the desire of those who became the Provisionals to make military action the key object of the organisation, rather than a simple rejection of leftism. The pre-split leadership, they stated, had attempted to replace the programme of Wolfe Tone and James Connolly with "the foreign socialism of Marx and Mao". If this had gone unchecked, their argument went, the "traditional" IRA would have been replaced by the “so-called National Liberation Movement”, including Communist Party members.

In 1977, Official Sinn Féin ratified the party's new name—"Sinn Féin The Workers' Party"—without dissension. According to Richard Sinnott, this "symbolism" was completed in April 1982 when the party became simply the Workers' Party.

Political development

OIRA ceasefire

Although the Official IRA became drawn into the spiralling violence of the early period of conflict in Northern Ireland, it almost immediately reduced its military campaign against the United Kingdom's armed presence in Northern Ireland, declaring a permanent ceasefire in May 1972. Following this, the movement's political development increased rapidly throughout the 1970s.

On the national question, the Officials saw the struggle against religious sectarianism and bigotry as their primary task. The party's strategy stemmed from the "stages theory": firstly, working-class unity within Northern Ireland had to be achieved, followed by the establishment of a united Ireland, and finally a socialist society would be created in Ireland.

IRSP/INLA split and feud

In 1974, the Official Republican Movement split over the ceasefire and the direction of the organisation. This led to the formation of the Irish Republican Socialist Party (IRSP) with Seamus Costello (whom the Official IRA had expelled) as its chairperson. Also formed on the same day was IRSP's paramilitary wing, the Irish National Liberation Army (INLA). A number of tit-for-tat killings occurred in a subsequent feud until a truce was agreed in 1977.

In 1977, the party published and accepted as policy a document called the ''Irish Industrial Revolution''. Written by Eoghan Harris and Eamon Smullen, it outlined the party's economic stance and declared that the ongoing violence in Northern Ireland was "distracting working class attention from the class struggle to a mythical national question". The policy document used Marxist terminology: it identified US imperialism as the now-dominant political and economic force in the southern state and attacked the failure of the national bourgeoisie to develop Ireland as a modern economic power.

Official Sinn Féin gravitated towards Marxism-Leninism and became fiercely critical of the physical force Irish republicanism still espoused by Provisional Sinn Féin. Its new approach to the Northern conflict was typified by the slogan it would adopt: "Peace, Democracy, Class Politics". It aimed to replace sectarian politics with a class struggle which would unite Catholic and Protestant workers. The slogan's echo of Vladimir Lenin's "Peace, Bread, Land" was indicative of the party's new source of inspiration. Official Sinn Féin also built up fraternal relations with the USSR and with socialist, workers' and communist parties around the world.

Throughout the 1980s, the party came to staunchly oppose republican political violence, controversially to the point of recommending cooperating with British security forces. They were one of the few organisations on the left of Irish politics to oppose the INLA/Provisional IRA 1981 Irish hunger strike.

The Workers' Party (especially the faction around Harris) strongly criticised traditional Irish republicanism, causing some of its critics such as Vincent Browne and Paddy Prendeville to accuse it of having an attitude to Northern Ireland that was close to Ulster unionism.

Ned Stapleton Cumann inside RTÉ

Part of the party's plan to gain influence in the Republic of Ireland was the formation and maintenance of a secret branch (''cumann''), the Ned Stapleton Cumann, inside Ireland's national broadcaster RTÉ. Centred around the leadership of Eoghan Harris, the members were all employees of RTÉ and many of them were journalists. Members included Charlie Bird, John Caden and Marian Finucane. The branch started in the early 1970s and continued to operate in secrecy until the Worker's Party broke apart in the early 1990s as the Soviet Union collapsed (1991) and likewise the Workers' Party saw a major split with the formation of the Democratic Left (1992). Remaining undetected was fundamental to the existence of the Cumann, as officially RTÉ reporters were not allowed to have party-political affiliations, in order to appear objective as journalists. The Cumann was influential within RTÉ, and used its position to shape the output of RTÉ programming; they pushed for narratives which reflected the official Sinn Féin/Workers' Party outlook, particularly in relation to the Provisional IRA.

One programme impacted by the Cumann, ''Today Tonight'', aired 4 nights a week and focused on investigative journalism. Although not directly involved with the show, the Cumann members ensured that SFWP members regularly appeared on the programme without having to acknowledge their membership. The Cumann was also able to influence one of RTÉ's flagship shows ''The Late Late Show'', and placed SFWP activists into the show's studio audience, a studio audience who often took part in discussions on the show.

During 1981 Irish hunger strike, the Cumann was deeply annoyed by the positive coverage that the hunger strikers (such as Bobby Sands) began to receive, as they were aligned with the Provisionals. In response, they produced pieces which focused on the victims of violence by the Provisional IRA in Northern Ireland.

1992 split between Workers' Party and Democratic Left

In early 1992, following a failed attempt to change the organisation's constitution, six of the party's seven TDs, its MEP, numerous councillors and a significant minority of its membership broke off to form Democratic Left, a party which later merged with the Labour Party in 1999.

The reasons for the split were twofold. Firstly, a faction led by Proinsias De Rossa wanted to move the party towards an acceptance of free-market economics. Following the collapse of communism in eastern Europe, they felt that the Workers' Party's Marxist stance was now an obstacle to winning support at the polls. Secondly, media accusations had once again surfaced regarding the continued existence of the Official IRA which, it was alleged, remained armed and involved in fund-raising robberies, money laundering and other forms of criminality.

De Rossa and his supporters sought to distance themselves from alleged paramilitary activity at a special Árd Fheis held at Dún Laoghaire on 15 February 1992. A motion proposed by De Rossa and General Secretary Des Geraghty sought to stand down the existing membership, elect an 11-member provisional executive council and make several other significant changes in party structures was defeated. The motion to "reconstitute" the party achieved the support of 61% of delegates. However, this was short of the two-thirds majority needed to change the Workers' Party constitution. The Workers' Party later claimed that there was vote rigging by the supporters of the De Rossa motion. As a result of the conference's failure to adopt the motion, De Rossa and his supporters split from the organisation and established a new party which was temporarily known as "New Agenda" before the permanent name of "Democratic Left" was adopted. In the South the rump of the party was left with seven councillors and one TD.

In the North, before the 1992 split, the party had four councillors – Tom French stayed with the party, Gerry Cullen (Dungannon) and Seamus Lynch (Belfast) joined New Agenda/Democratic Left, and David Kettyles ran in subsequent elections in Fermanagh as an Independent or Progressive Socialist.

While the majority of public representatives left with De Rossa, many members remained in the Workers' Party. Sean Garland condemned those who broke away as "careerists" and social democrats who had taken flight after the collapse of the Soviet Union and labelled them "liquidators". Marian Donnelly replaced De Rossa as president from 1992 to 1994. Tom French became president in 1994, and served for four years until Sean Garland was elected president in 1998. Garland retired as president in May 2008, and was replaced by Mick Finnegan who served until September 2014, being replaced by Michael Donnelly

A further minor split occurred when a number of members left and established a group called Republican Left; many of these went on to join the Irish Socialist Network. Another split occurred in 1998, after a number of former OIRA members in Newry and Belfast, who had been expelled, formed a group called the Official Republican Movement, which announced in 2010 that it had decommissioned its weapons.

21st century

The Workers' Party has struggled since the early 1990s to rejuvenate its fortunes in both Irish jurisdictions. The Workers' Party maintains a youth wing, Workers' Party Youth, and a Women's Committee. It also had offices in Dublin, Belfast, Cork and Waterford. Apart from its political work at home in Ireland, it has sent party delegations to international gatherings of communist and socialist parties.

The party supported an independent anti-sectarian candidate, John Gilliland, in the 2004 European elections in Northern Ireland.

Waterford City

HOME


Content is Copyleft
Website design, code, and AI is Copyrighted (c) 2014-2017 by Stephen Payne


Consider donating to Wikimedia



As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases