‘Old Spart’ Theses on Ireland is pro-imperialist

As a result of the ICL’s reorientation, we renounced our long-held position on Ireland in favour of a united Irish workers’ republic. Patrick Sliney wrote a letter (see Weekly Worker, 28 May) upholding our old approach which was outlined in Theses on Ireland (Spartacist No 24, Autumn 1977). This document was thoroughly debunked by Comrade Perrault in the article “Theses on Ireland: A Centrist Capitulation to British Imperialism”, which we also published in Workers Hammer (No 256, 5 September 2025). But for all his angry words, Sliney doesn’t address our fundamental arguments. The Theses on Ireland is a centrist document that claims to offer a proletarian perspective for Ireland. But at bottom it amounts to a Labourite programme on the national question in Ireland that maintains the integrity of the United Kingdom.

For Sliney, any move towards Irish unity must be rejected in the name of working-class unity. Forging unity among the working class, Protestant and Catholic, is crucial to the struggle for an Irish workers’ republic. Our difference with Sliney is over how to achieve it. For him, the Catholic Irish must renounce their desire for a united Ireland. As he sees it, their burning desire to drive the British imperialists out of the north is a barrier to working-class struggle against capitalist exploitation. This flies in the face of history. It means that communists must set themselves against the centuries-old sentiment for Irish freedom that has animated countless revolts, including insurrections, against British domination. That sentiment lives on, from the 1921 partition which dissected the country, through 30 years of the “Troubles” and to the support for a border poll today. The deep desire to end the British occupation of the Six Counties is a powerful force for revolutionary struggle to this day.

Far from demanding that the oppressed Irish set aside the historic cause that has animated their struggle against British subjugation for centuries, the task for communists is to wrest it from the nationalist leadership, which has capitulated to the imperialists at every point, and to integrate it into the class struggle against imperialist domination of all Ireland—which today includes the US, the EU and the British rulers, and against their Irish capitalist lackeys. 

The key to class unity is to win Protestant workers away from Orangeism, the reactionary ideology that chains them to the United Kingdom and their capitalist exploiters. Our position is not based on “love thy brethren” moralism, but on the class interests of Protestant workers. Theses on Ireland make no argument to win Protestant workers to an anti-imperialist perspective. On the contrary, it buys into the pro-imperialist “two nations” theory; paints the ideology of Orangeism as progressive, and neglects to call for the abolition of the monarchy!

In a flagrant denial of the reactionary character of Orange ideology, the Theses state: “The communalism/nationalism of the Protestants has a defensive character and is not the chauvinism of a great power”. What an utter whitewash! James Connolly would turn in his grave. He insisted that the Orange Order was founded so that “the Irish people might be kept asunder and robbed whilst so sundered and divided”, and that “the Orange aristocracy went down to the lowest depths and out of the lowest pits of hell brought up the abominations of sectarian feuds to stir the passions of the ignorant mob” (Labour and the proposed partition of Ireland, 1914).

The Theses on Ireland buy into the theory that Unionism is a national movement. This is flatly wrong. The ideology and purpose of Unionism is the very opposite of a national movement. It was invented in the 19^th century to prevent Irish independence from the Empire. Today, it is weaponised to justify British rule in the Six Counties, as well as to prevent Scottish independence. Unionism is a political outlook, not nationhood. Scottish Unionists are part of the Scottish nation. Ulster Unionists are part of the Irish nation. Protestants in the north, like those in the south, are a religious minority within the Irish nation. The idea that both Catholics and Protestants are one Irish nation is not a “neo-Spartacist” invention. It was understood by revolutionaries from Wolfe Tone, who named his movement the United Irishmen, to Connolly. Writing about the conquest of Ireland, he noted that the Catholic natives were “subjected and despoiled by open force”, whereas the Protestant settlers were “despoiled by fraud”. Nevertheless, regarding the Protestants, he wrote”, “the rank and file of the armies of the conquerors” and their descendants “are now an integral part of the Irish nation” (The Reconquest of Ireland, 1915).

Sliney’s anti-nationalism goes so far as to oppose a referendum on Irish unity. This is quite a statement in a context where sentiment for unity is high in both the north and the south. Sinn Féin dangles the carrot of a border poll before the Irish people as a consolation prize for having conceded control of the Six Counties to British imperialism in the Good Friday Agreement, in a repeat of Michael Collins’s betrayal in accepting the Treaty and partition. The border is despised by the majority of Irish people, especially among the working class—indeed by pretty much everyone except hardcore “Free Staters” and the far right. And, as our demand for a border poll points out, Sinn Féin is doing absolutely nothing to fight for a referendum, because to do so would mean challenging the imperialist overlords in London and Washington who dominate the whole of Ireland. As our call for a referendum states:

“A militant fight for a border poll will also hold Sinn Féin’s feet to the fire. They cannot campaign for a united Ireland because they must be seen as respectable and fit for government. To this end the party has made its peace with the British establishment, including by bending the knee to King Charles III, Colonel-in-Chief of the Parachute Regiment. Sinn Féin has also cosied up to the US and EU by dropping its pledges to withdraw from EU military arrangements and NATO’s Partnership for Peace. Placing our hopes for a united Ireland in these people is a recipe for defeat.”

—“Enough waiting: Fight for a border poll!”, 10 June 2025

Sliney opposes any move towards a united Ireland, at least until after the revolution. He says he’s for winning Protestant workers “to a communist formation in which they can smash partition and unite Ireland under working class leadership”. But even under working-class rule, the Theses support a separate state for Protestants, to safeguard their supposed national rights. As Sliney writes: “We would hope that [uniting Ireland] could be done within a socialist federation of these islands. This leaves it open where the Protestants fall - we don’t seek to force them into a united Ireland: we are not nationalist irredentists.” A socialist federation sounds good, unless, of course, it’s being used to give “socialist” colouration to what is in fact a Unionist veto on Irish unity.

Sliney vehemently denies any similarity between the Theses on Ireland and the Militant/CWI tradition, but offers no argument other than that “to tar the old SL with the Militant position is beneath contempt”. Indeed, for Sliney’s (and my own) generation, who believed that Theses on Ireland offered a proletarian perspective of opposition to British imperialism, the comparison is a bitter pill. But we must face reality. There’s a reason why the Theses were studied by CWI comrades. Both organisations claimed to offer a “socialist” programme to unite the working class, Catholic and Protestant, on the basis of economic interests, while dismissing the national struggle. This is classic Labourism.

Sliney’s letter confirms his view that, by itself, the economic struggle of the working class can overcome the sectarian divide. He cites the example of the 2024 strike of 150,000 workers, which “brought the north to a halt”, and concludes: “Tie that into the massive disgruntlement in the south you have the basis for class unity and potentially setting a flame which could ignite a spark for our class in Britain.” The one-day strike in the north was an impressive display of Catholic and Protestant working-class unity. But economic struggle on its own, while ignoring the national oppression of the Catholics, cannot unite the working class.

The classic example is the 1919 Belfast strike, led by the Catholic socialist Charles McKay and composed mainly of Protestant workers. The Independent Labour Party had support among both Catholic workers and class-conscious Protestants, but it failed to support Irish independence. This was a fatal weakness. Winning Protestant workers to Irish freedom would have undercut Unionism’s hold on them and helped break Catholics away from nationalism. But while many of its Catholic members and some Protestants supported Irish independence, the ILP refused to adopt a position in favour of Home Rule at this crucial historic moment, for fear of alienating Protestants. This failure was a concession to Orange reaction, which was used to crush this powerful show of proletarian power. The strike ended in bitter defeat and was followed by violent pogroms against Catholic workers and Protestant socialists. The Theses on Ireland indeed stand in the Labourite tradition of the ILP in the past, and the CWI today. CWI members occupy leading positions in the trade union bureaucracy in the north. Far from overcoming sectarian division, the CWI’s refusal to oppose British rule alienates Catholic workers and cannot break Protestant workers’ allegiance to Britain. 

Labourism means unity with British imperialism; it divides the working class and weakens its struggle. The unification of Ireland will require a massive upsurge of the working class, north and south, united in an anti-sectarian struggle against all imperialist powers—British, US and European—and their lackeys, the Irish ruling class. Today, faced with the growth of the far right, it is all the more urgent to rebuild the national and class struggles; to offer Protestant workers an escape from deindustrialisation and ruin under British rule; to undercut illusions in Sinn Féin; and to break the grip of the Irish Labourite union bureaucrats. These misleaders are obstacles to the revolutionary struggle for a united Irish workers’ republic.