D.R. O'Connor Lysaght: The Republic of Ireland. [illegible] Press, 21/-.
[illegible] book satisfies a long-[illegible] a historical background to the events in Ireland. Read together with the Making of Northern Ireland and the basis of its undoing, or Liam de Paor's Divided Ulster (Penguin, 5/-), it should allow most revolutionaries to [illegible] twisted thread of Irish politics.
[illegible] the main emphasis is placed on the events of the twentieth century, with [illegible] book [illegible] period after 1938; i.e. after the de facto collapse of De Valera’s economic war with Britain. This period tends to be a blank to most British socialists, who often appear to be under the delusion that nothing of note occurred between the time of the collapse of the radical bourgeois attempt to solve the national question and the beginning of the present struggle in Northern Ireland. Lysaght on the other hand clearly shows that it was a period of great, if missed, opportunity. The failure of the left to capitalise on the 1943 electoral successes of Clann na Talmhan (1) and the Irish Labour Party is discussed in a very illuminating way. The main criticism one might make of this section of the book is that it would have been useful to have seen this failure related to the inability of revolutionaries to capitalise on the leftward shifts which occurred before the election of Fianna Fail.
Where we might have some more important disagreement with Lysaght is on his views on the bourgeois revolution in Ireland. Lysaght holds that the settlement of 1921 marked the consummation of the bourgeois revolution. Thus he [illegible] fulfilled the Irish bourgeois revolution.” (2)
Assessment of this statement depends upon first defining the tasks of the bourgeois revolution. [illegible] abolition of pre-capitalist property forms. In this sense, of course, the bourgeois revolution has been consummated [illegible] 1922. (See [illegible] views on the sources and motive forces of the Irish struggle). However, the mere abolition of the pre-[illegible] content. The content of the bourgeois revolution is the taking of state power by the bourgeoisie and the shaping of the country’s social and economic structure in the interests of that class. This revolution is not consummated until [the] process has been [illegible] economy. This is necessary because such domination prevents the re-moulding of the country’s social structure in the interests of the native bourgeoisie, thereby placing constraints on this class forcing it into policies and measures not in accord with its class interest. This prevents the development of the social structure along “classic” capitalist lines. In this sense the bourgeois revolution in Ireland has not been consummated. More importantly, it cannot be consummated, for in an epoch of imperialism the bourgeoisie is no longer capable of solving the tasks of the bourgeois revolution. (This is clearly revealed in the failure of De Valera’s policies of the 1930s). In turn this affects the consciousness of the peasantry.
In a country in which the bourgeois revolution has been accomplished the peasantry is a reactionary class concerned with safeguarding its rights of private property. Therefore if it were the case that the bourgeois revolution had been consummated, the peasantry would be an entirely reactionary class. However, the failure to consummate the bourgeois revolution and establish the basis for the development of an independent capitalism and the social structure that would result from this leaves the peasantry in a different situation. It is capable of potentially revolutionary upsurges and moods corresponding to the period before the bourgeois revolution and not after it. This is shown in, for example, the peasant agitation about the land annuity payments before 1932. This development was of great significance as the left wing of the IRA, in the person of Peadar O'Donnell, approached the Labour Party with proposals of a campaign against these payments. As the land annuity payments were the main economic oppression which led the peasants to support the policy of Fianna Fail, if there had been a revolutionary force in the working class capable of taking up O'Donnell's approach, a working class/peasant bloc might have been created which would have prevented Fianna Fail achieving the hegemony it had over the peasantry from 1932 onwards. Following from the great rural depopulation of the period since the Second World War, it may be that the role of the peasantry may have changed in line with its decreasing social weight. Certainly Lysaght holds this position, feeling that the peasantry can now only play a reactionary role. Thus he states that “...in a revolutionary situation they must be neutralised. That is all that can be expected from them immediately.”
It is, however, by no means certain that this estimate is correct. The long history of struggle against British imperialism is certainly likely to affect the consciousness of this class as the struggle in the North intensifies and this may open the door for more revolutionary politics to gain a foothold. The acid test here would probably be if Sinn Fein were to put into practice its formal decision to run candidates with the intention of their taking up their seats. The support they would gain would be an indicator of the consciousness and revolutionary potentiality of the small farmers.
On this question Lysaght also appears at times to have a rather mechanical conception of the relationship between social position and consciousness. He says for example that “Their best hope lies in their increasing proletarianisation: in the fact, revealed by the Irish Times Agricultural Correspondent (30-5-68) that increasing numbers of small farmers are taking part-time jobs, For the rest, in a revolutionary situation they must be neutralised.” However, in general Lysaght is perfectly correct in attacking the romantic view that simply because it has a “peasantry”, the case of Ireland is somehow assimilable to that of Vietnam, or Cuba, or China. On the contrary, [illegible] points out, the precise peculiarity of Ireland is that although it is economically a neo-colony, in terms of social structure it is closer to an advanced capitalist state than it is to a classic imperialist-dominated state. (Although for reasons already gone into, it cannot [illegible] resulting from this combination have only been avoided by dint of massive emigration.) With this social structure, these romantic analogies can only prove disastrous, as multi-class parties of the Stalinist type would have worse consequences for the struggle in Ireland than they have had in China or Vietnam.
The tactics flowing from Trotsky's formula of “The dictatorship of the proletariat leading the small farmers” [illegible]. However, any disagreements of the type discussed above, although not unimportant, are secondary compared to the mass of empirical and theoretical work contained in this book. Any British revolutionary interested in the Irish struggle will find this book indispensable reading. (And any revolutionary not interested in the 900-year long struggle of the Irish for independence doesn't merit [illegible].)
A. Jones
Footnotes
(1) Clann na Talmhan—a peasant-based “left” party which was significant in the 1940s. In 1943 it scored a notable electoral victory, gaining more seats than the Labour Party. After the 1943 election it and the Labour Party were a major force against the traditional bourgeois parties.
(2) P. 413.