World Socialist Party (Ireland) | |
|---|---|
| Leader | None |
| Founded | 1949 |
| Dissolved | 1990s |
| Headquarters | Donegall Street,Belfast, Northern Ireland |
| Newspaper | Socialist View |
| Ideology | Impossibilism Classical Marxism Socialism |
| International affiliation | World Socialist Movement |
| Colours | Red |
TheWorld Socialist Party (Ireland),[1] founded as theSocialist Party of Ireland in 1949 before changing its name a decade later,[2] was aMarxist political party in theimpossibilist tradition. It was a companion party of theWorld Socialist Movement (WSM) and was closely connected to theSocialist Party of Great Britain (SPGB).[3] The party's offices were inBelfast and it was most active inNorthern Ireland, although it was also active in theRepublic of Ireland. The party participated in elections in Northern Ireland, but without success.[4]Socialist View was the party's newspaper. The party disbanded in the 1990s.[5]
As with all parties in the WSM, the object of the World Socialist Party of Ireland was "[t]he establishment of a system of society based upon the common ownership and democratic control of the means and instruments for producing and distributing wealth by and in the interests of the whole community.[6]
The party was staunchlyanti-Leninist. Along with its companion parties in the WSM, it believed thatsocialism could only be established when the majority of the population decided that socialism was in their best interests, not through arevolutionary vanguard.[6] The party held that parliament could and should be used in the course of establishing a socialist society.
The party stressed the limited nature of anyreform within thecapitalist system, saying of theIrish Labour Party that it "serves capitalism just as faithfully as the other political parties, and as you cannot serve capitalism and the majority of the people at the same time, the Labour Party is as much to be condemned from the workers' viewpoint as the others. It does not and cannot act in the interests of the Irish working class".[7]
The party articulated its views on Northern Ireland andthe Troubles in two documents,Ireland: Past, Present and Future (1983) andTheAnglo-Irish Accord and Its Irrelevance for the Working Class (1986). Like other Marxist parties, it believed that the origins of the conflict lay individe and rule tactics of the ruling class, of privileging Protestant workers over Catholic ones.[8] Unlike many other parties of the left, it also believed thatnationalism andidentity politics were no solution. Indeed, it was argued that this focus stood in the way of achieving socialism and therefore bothrepublican andloyalist paramilitaries were considered to be "fighting the bosses' battles".[9] The British government was denounced for participating in political terrorism while claiming to oppose it.[10] TheCatholic civil rights campaign was also seen as amounting to nothing more than an insistence that the miseries of capitalism be distributed equally among the working class without regard to religion while something better could be created.[10] The party did claim to oppose partition but only the partition "between the rich and the poor, between the capitalist class and the working class".[11]
The party viewed theIrish War of Independence in much the same light as it viewed the later conflict in Northern Ireland, saying that as far as the working class was concerned, it only amounted to a change in masters.[12]
| International | |
|---|---|
| National | |
