Date: Sat, 8 Nov 1997 10:11:02 +0000
From: Lew <Lew-AT-dialogues.demon.co.uk>
Subject: Re: M-I: Marx on Ireland


In article <+FoPFFAj$DY0Iwmw-AT-heartfield.demon.co.uk>, James Heartfield
<James-AT-heartfield.demon.co.uk> writes

>As I remember it one of their private
>complaints was that bombing English workers was not the best way to win
>their support - a theme that was revivied amongst the left here to avoid
>their responsibility to support the movement for Irish independence. 

Not a private complaint as far as I remember. When the RCP began
producing headlines like "Bring the war to the mainland" it was pointed
out that worker killing worker was not the best way to bring about
independence, never mind class solidarity. This is the kind of "stunt
politics" for which the RCP has become well known.

>At the time those of us who campaigned for unconditional support for
>Irish independence pointed out that Marx's private views of the
>character of the fenian movement were not the same thing as his public
>pronouncement on the significance of the Irish struggle. On that point
>Marx was unequivocal: that independence would be the precondition of a
>more just settlement between these two peoples, and the English workers
>would always be prisoners of anti-Irish chauvinism until they supported
>the fenians demands.

Of course Marx was not consistent on nationalism. In the Communist
Manifesto and elsewhere he pointed out that workers had no country and
that nationalism was an obstruction to class consciousness. Whatever
Marx may have meant by "a more just settlement" between these two
peoples, it is clear that the interpretation put upon it flies in the
face of everything else he wrote about capitalism and the state. Nor is
there any reason or evidence to show that supporting national
independence has or will lessen chauvinism.
-- 
Lew


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