In previous articles we have explained the origins of the economic crisis gripping Irish society and the social explosion that is building up. It would be very easy to separate this off from the events in the North. But this is to miss the heart of the matter.
As we have shown, Irish capitalism is quite incapadle or deverobino independen tly. Its future is absolutely tied to foreign investment. As a direct consequence, any project for rescuing Irish business must also involve cooperation with the British in solving their problems in the North The dominant party in the coalition government. rine ael, understands this very well.
Moreover, Fine Gael appreciates that the same conditions which provoked the troubles in the North underlie the social crisis in the South. They know that if this underiving economic connection ever reaches a political level, and the soutern working class reacnes une same high level of militant struggle and self-organisation inat the nortern minority nas achieved trom time to time inen there will be precious little hope for Fine Gael or its backers.
Internment ts tas inat exolains the turious -almost paranoid - campaign of the coalition government against the Hepublican movement. Full scale internment still exists in the South. The Irish police, the Garda Siochana, has been falling over backwards to give other European gonce Torces a lesson on the srevenuon ot terronism. InA suspects can deaned on the worn ora golice otticer and a Bill has just gone through the Dail (parliament) allowing for the deportation of Republican prisoners to Britain.
How is the left organising against these policies? The Communist Party or irelano is tirmy convinces nat cIvil rignts and economic independence are a precondition for successful workers' struggles. But as this outlook contradicts the whole of Irish economic history - since economic independence is impossible within the framework of capitalism - the CP is increasingly STUCK TOr a ne inus they take up me bin or MionTs approach to the northern question and South. At the same time they call for an extension of relands isning limits. and for withdrawal from the EEC. In short they end up as a weak echo of the bourgeois nationalist Fianna Fail.
Mutual The recent CP| conference saw the con summation of their long standing romance with omnicial sinn rein. Mutual conoratulations were exchanged, but very little else was achieved.
A link between an organisation that has an appreciable base in the Irish trade union movement and one that has taken part in the northern struggle could have had real possibilities - of becoming a maior reform st innuence drine ver tease - were i not tor two nines. ne tirst is a taure on the part of the Officials and the CP to break with the trade union bureaucracy. Thus when bureaucrats of the Irish Trans port & General Workers Union tried to call off unofficial action at Dobson Fibres in vaterrora, the aovice civen to tre workers by Official Sinn Fein was to do just that.
the second block the Utticials and the CP put between themselves and a mass base is their sectarianism. This has taken some ugly forms. When the Irish Republican Socialist Partv split from the Officials, what can only be called a vendetta was opened up by ine Utticial leadership.
trum. however, debates are starting to emerge which may give Irish workers the prospect of a clear political strategy for their struggle. The revolutionary left is extremely small, but its chances to put forward its ideas are increasing For instance, at Dobson Fibres part of ine leadersnio or the struccle was madt up of an alliance between members of the Young Socialists and of Provisional Sinn Fein.
resulted in increased industrial action in the South on the part of the Provisionals. But they have not yet drawn une meoretical lessons oi this experience. Above all, they do not craso me tu scope ane ceon or Ene crisis. They have not understood, for instance, the break with the old intu ence of the Church that the women's movement potentiany rporesents. nor the extent to which the issues raised by the women's movement (equal pay in particular) challenge the economic position of the southern ruling class and thereby their collaboration with the British. Elsewhere in the Irish political spec In general, the truce in the North has involvement in come from.