The ideas of James Connolly
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Wednesday June 08, 2005 19:37 by Oisin Mac Giollamoir - WSM
James Connolly is probably the single most important figure in the history of the Irish left. He was an organiser in the IWW in the USA but in Ireland is best known for his role in building the syndicalist phase of Irish union movement and for involving the armed defence body of that union, the Irish Citizens' Army in the 1916 nationalist insurrection. This left a legacy claimed at one time or another not only by all the Irish left parties but also by the nationalists of Fianna Fail and Sinn Fein.
A system of society in which the workshops, factories, docks,
railways, shipyards, &c., shall be owned by the nation, but
administered by the Industrial Unions of the respective industries,
organised as above, seems best calculated to secure the highest form
of industrial efficiency, combined with the greatest amount of
individual freedom from state despotism. Such a system would, we
believe, realise for Ireland the most radiant hopes of all her heroes
and martyrs.
The ideas of James Connolly
the single most important figure in the history of the
irish left
James Connolly is probably the single most important figure in the
history of the Irish left. He was an organiser in the IWW in the USA
but in Ireland is best known for his role in building the syndicalist
phase of Irish union movement and for involving the armed defence
body of that union, the Irish Citizens' Army in the 1916 nationalist
insurrection. This left a legacy claimed at one time or another not
only by all the Irish left parties but also by the nationalists of
Fianna Fail and Sinn Fein.
Connolly is one of those historical figures who can seem to have
been both everything and nothing. People claim him for a myriad of
political ideologies, many of which are irreconcilably opposed to one
another. At times it can seem like he was little more than a confused
revolutionary who was never sure what he was for or what he was
against. Connolly held diverse opinions, (many of which I,
unfortunately, will not have the space to go into here). At the same
time his analysis is unique in that it possessed remarkable depth and
clarity. Because of this, quotes can found in his work to enable
almost anyone to claim him as an advocate of almost any political
cause. In this article I will attempt to look at the long neglected
anarchistic aspects of Connolly's thought and ask the question was
Connolly a libertarian?
Connolly was, of course, not an anarchist. He advocated
parliamentary action, at times advocated a form of State Socialism
and considered himself a nationalist. These positions are
contradictory to anarchist thought.
Syndicalist
First and foremost James Connolly was a Socialist. And when asked
to elaborate on his Socialist theory, he would always advocate
Revolutionary Syndicalism. Readers of James Connolly may react by
saying that almost nowhere in Connolly's work can any mention of
Syndicalism be found. This is simply because Connolly preferred to
use the term 'Industrial Unionism' to Syndicalism.
Leninists are very found of claiming that Connolly was only a
syndicalist in his innocent youth and by the time of the Easter
rising (his role in which secured his place in history) he had
abandoned syndicalism. C. Desmond Greaves, the author of the
definitive biography of James Connolly The Life and Times of James
Connolly, wrote that by the beginning of 1916 'no more than a faint
echo of syndicalism remained'1. This is quite strange seeing as that
in Connolly's last major work the pamphlet The Re-Conquest of
Ireland, published on the 14th of December 1915, Connolly fervently
advocates Syndicalism or as he calls it 'Industrial Unionism'.
Connolly writes:
The principle of complete unity upon the Industrial plane must be
unceasingly sought after; the Industrial union embracing all workers
in each industry must replace the multiplicity of unions which now
hamper and restrict our operations, multiply our expenses and divide
our forces in face of the mutual enemy. With the Industrial Union as
our principle of action, branches can be formed to give expression to
the need for effective supervision of the affairs of the workshop,
shipyard, dock or railway; each branch to consist of the men and
women now associated in Labour upon the same technical basis as our
craft unions of today.
Add to this the concept of One Big Union embracing all, and you
have not only the outline of the most effective form of combination
for industrial warfare to-day, but also for Social Administration of
the Co-operative Commonwealth of the future.
A system of society in which the workshops, factories, docks,
railways, shipyards, &c., shall be owned by the nation, but
administered by the Industrial Unions of the respective industries,
organised as above, seems best calculated to secure the highest form
of industrial efficiency, combined with the greatest amount of
individual freedom from state despotism. Such a system would, we
believe, realise for Ireland the most radiant hopes of all her heroes
and martyrs.
This is syndicalism pure and simple, and no amount of historical
acrobatics can change the fact that Connolly was a life long
Socialist and a life long Syndicalist 2.
Nationalist
As I mentioned earlier Connolly called himself a nationalist. This
has enabled generations of Irish nationalists from every side of the
political spectrum to lay claim to Connolly's legacy.
Because nationalism is the dominant ideology of capitalism and has
profoundly affected every one of us who lives under capitalism,
thinking about it objectively is quite a challenge.
Nationalism is the ideological justification of the nation-state.
It imagines that capitalists and the working class share a common
political interest; it imagines that the oppressed and their
oppressors, the exploited and their exploiters share a common
political interest just because they share the same nationality! It
advocates the strengthening/creation of a nation-state to protect
this common interest. It seems strange that Connolly, as a socialist,
would identify himself with this ideology.
I believe Connolly's mistake was that he never made the
distinction between national liberation and nationalism. Libertarian
socialists are, in all circumstances, opposed to oppression.
Libertarian socialists, therefore, defend all liberation movements,
whatever their form. As such, libertarian socialists should (although
they often don't) defend national liberation movements. Where people
are being oppressed due to their nationality, all socialists and all
progressive people in the world should defend their right to fight
this oppression. But does not mean we seem them as a solution.
Although racial liberation movements are rarely racist and sexual
liberation movements are rarely sexist, unfortunately, most national
liberation movements are nationalist, and as they campaign against
oppression of one kind they advocate that of another, namely the
oppression of the nation-state. Libertarian socialists must be at all
times conscious of this complexity, Connolly unfortunately wasn't.
Connolly was a nationalist of sorts, but he never believed a
national revolution could act as a substitute for a social
revolution. He harshly ridiculed those that did in his pamphlet
Socialism Made Easy when he wrote:
After Ireland is free, says the patriot who won't touch Socialism,
we will protect all classes, and if you won't pay your rent you will
be evicted same as now. But the evicting party, under command of the
sheriff, will wear green uniforms and the Harp without the Crown, and
the warrant turning you out on the roadside will be stamped with the
arms of the Irish Republic.
Now, isn't that worth fighting for?
And when you cannot find employment, and, giving up the struggle
of life in despair, enter the Poorhouse, the band of the nearest
regiment of the Irish army will escort you to the Poorhouse door to
the tune of St. Patrick's Day.
Oh, it will be nice to live in those days...
Now, my friend, I also am Irish, but I'm a bit more logical. The
capitalist, I say, is a parasite on industry...
The working class is the victim of this parasite - this human
leech, and it is the duty and interest of the working class to use
every means in its power to oust this parasite class from the
position which enables it to thus prey upon the vitals of Labour.
Therefore, I say, let us organise as a class to meet our masters
and destroy their mastership; organise to drive them from their hold
upon public life through their political power; organise to wrench
from their robber clutch the land and workshops on and in which they
enslave us; organise to cleanse our social life from the stain of
social cannibalism, from the preying of man upon his fellow man.
Clearly Connolly did not believe in ignoring class division in the
name of nationalism, nor did he think he needed to, due to his unique
theory of what a nation is. He wrote a mere sixteen days before the
Easter rising:
We are out for Ireland for the Irish. But who are the Irish? Not
the rack-renting, slum-owning landlord; not the sweating,
profit-grinding capitalist; not the sleek and oily lawyer; not the
prostitute pressman - the hired liars of the enemy. Not these are the
Irish upon whom the future depends. Not these, but the Irish working
class, the only secure foundation upon which a free nation can be
reared.
The cause of labour is the cause of Ireland, the cause of Ireland
is the cause of labour. They cannot be dissevered. Ireland seeks
freedom. Labour seeks that an Ireland free should be the sole
mistress of her own destiny, supreme owner of all material things
within and upon her soil. Labour seeks to make the free Irish nation
the guardian of the interests of the people of Ireland, and to secure
that end would vest in that free Irish nation all property rights as
against the claims of the individual, with the end in view that the
individual may be enriched by the nation, and not by the spoiling of
his fellows.
As can be seen, Connolly believed that the true Irish nation is
the Irish people; he once said, "Ireland without her people is
nothing to me."4 He believed the Irish nation did not include
capitalists. It is clear that for Connolly the Irish nation and the
Irish working class (in the broadest sense of the term) were
synonymous. However, by this logic George W. Bush is not an American
and the Queen of England is not English. But that is not the only
inconsistency in Connolly's nationalism.
First of all, when Connolly says 'Ireland for the Irish', what
does he mean?
Does he mean Ireland for those that live in Ireland? Surely not,
many people who live in Ireland aren't Irish. There are many people
living in Ireland that would identify themselves as American or
British or Canadian or Chilean or Chinese etc. So, unless Connolly
thought that these people are Irish but they just don't know it, this
is not the correct interpretation of his slogan.
Does he mean Ireland for those that identify themselves as Irish?
I'm confident he doesn't. I'm sure Connolly would find the idea of
workers not being given equal rights because of their national
identity detestable. It seems to me that Connolly hasn't fully
thought out what he is saying.
Some might say that this is an unfair criticism. They might argue
that it is only in recent times that a lot people living in Ireland
aren't Irish, a phenomenon Connolly had no experience of. And they'd
have a point but not a very strong one.
Connolly was a migrant. He grew up an Irish man in Scotland and
spent 8 years in America, living in Ireland for only 12 years.
Connolly should have appreciated that the nation-state cannot be the
form of workers self-emancipation.
However, when a nation is being politically oppressed that nation
is politicised and a national liberation movement emerges. Ireland at
the turn of the twentieth century was a nation is the grip of a
national liberation movement.
On the one hand Connolly believed that in the Ireland of his day
you had British imperialist capitalism and on the other hand you had
the Irish fighting against imperialism and for a new way of living.
Connolly believed that that new way of living must be socialist, and
he believed that all the forces fighting capitalism and imperialism
in Ireland should unite and struggle together.
In Labour in Irish History, his greatest work, he writes that the
working class are 'the inheritors of the Irish ideals of the past -
the repository of the hopes of the future'5. Socialism being the hope
of the future.
Unity
Connolly was a great advocate of left unity. He believed that to
create Socialism all the people struggling for a new social system
should work together and offer one another support and solidarity.
Even if such a union diluted the political message of Revolutionary
Syndicalists like himself, he believed that
'the development of the fighting spirit is of more importance than
the creation of the theoretically perfect organisation; that, indeed,
the most theoretically perfect organisation may, because of its very
perfection and vastness, be of the greatest possible danger to the
revolutionary movement if it tends, or is used, to repress and curb
the fighting spirit of comradeship in the rank and file.' 6
Connolly believed that the struggle for socialism, for the
co-operative commonwealth, for a workers' republic, for the
re-conquest of Ireland; for the new social system, should be
conducted on every front. He saw the revolutionary potential in all
autonomous working class organisation. He gave his full support to
the co-operative movement and argued that it was part of the same
struggle as syndicalism. He even went as far as supporting the Irish
language movement. Despite rather cynically observing that 'you can't
teach a starving man Gaelic' 7, Connolly appreciated the fact that
the Irish language movement was a movement 'of defiant self-reliance
and confident trust in a people's own power of self-emancipation' 8.
Of course Connolly's main concern was with the most rapidly
growing section of the Irish population, the industrial working
class. He argued that the industrial working class (wage-earners)
should unite in Industrial Unions. He said:
"The enrolment of the workers in unions patterned closely after
the structure of modern industries, and following the organic lines
of industrial development, is par excellence the swiftest, safest,
and most peaceful form of constructive work the Socialist can engage
in. It prepares within the framework of capitalist society the
working forms of the Socialist Republic, and thus, while increasing
the resisting power of the worker against present encroachments of
the capitalist class, it familiarizes him with the idea that the
union he is helping to build up is destined to supplant that class in
the control of the industry in which he is employed. The power of
this idea to transform the dry detail work of trade union
organisation into the constructive work of revolutionary
Socialism...It invests the sordid details of the daily incidents of
the class struggle with a new and beautiful meaning." 9
He argued strongly against craft unionism, that is when workers
are divided into unions by craft despite working in the same
industry, and struggling against the same bosses. He points out that
if only one section of the workers in a workplace go on strike the
strike will be ineffectual, and argues that all workers in a
workplace need to be in the same union. He also points out how craft
unionism creates and encourages craft snobbery. Examples of craft
snobbery would be when, office workers sneer down at office cleaners,
or middle managers doing the same to those below them, or manual
workers dismiss the grievances of intellectual workers. Connolly
argues that all crafts should be united, and workers should be
organised industry by industry in One Big Union.
As well as believing in a united social struggle Connolly believed
in the need for a united Socialist force with in that struggle. He
almost always treated the socialist movement as if it was a
homogenous whole, which it of course is not. After a century of
'socialists' such as Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, Trotsky and Lenin on the
one hand and the likes of Blair and Schroeder on the other, we know
better than to feign unity where there is none.
Parliament
Connolly never lived to see the poverty of 'social-democracy' nor
did he live to see the barbarity of Leninism. He never saw how
quickly people abandon their principles once placed in a position of
power. In part because of this, although a Syndicalist, he was never
an Anarcho-Syndicalist.
In 1908 there was a split in the IWW (the 'Industrial Workers of
the World', a mainly American organisation to which Connolly devoted
much time and energy). The split was essentially between the Marxist
Daniel De Leon and his followers and the Anarcho-Syndicalists. It is
well worth noting that Connolly sided with the Anarcho-Syndicalists
and against the Marxist Daniel De Leon.
De Leon was a major influence on Connolly, he considered himself a
De Leonist for many years. However, while in America, Connolly was
repulsed by the sectarianism and dogmatism of De Leon. De Leon argued
that to achieve socialism the working class should elect a socialist
party backed by a strong Industrial Union into parliament so as to
create a socialist government, he believed that by doing this the
working class could control the State and usher in Socialism. He
believed that the working class should elect his 'Socialist Labor
Party', a party that he believed was the only true socialist
organisation in America. He believed that socialism could be achieved
through the ballot box, provided the ballot was backed by a strong
industrial union. He wrote: "The might of the revolutionary ballot
consists in the thorough industrial organisation of the productive
workers organised in such a way that when that ballot is cast the
capitalist class may know that behind it is the might to enforce it."
10
To Connolly this seemed bizarre, why create industrial unions
capable of enforcing a revolution and capable of being the
organisational loci of a socialist society and then not use them? Why
create a revolutionary movement capable of revolution and then expect
it to wait for 'the revolutionary ballot'? Connolly thought this was
ridiculous. He believed that:
"The fight for the conquest of the political state is not the
battle, it is only the echo of the battle. The real battle is the
battle being fought out every day for the power to control industry,
and the gauge of the progress of that battle is not to be found in
the number of votes making a cross beneath the symbol of a political
party, but in the number of these workers who enrol themselves in an
industrial organisation with the definite purpose of making
themselves masters of the industrial equipment of society in general.
That battle will have its political echo, that industrial
organisation will have its political expression. If we accept the
definition of working-class political action as that which brings the
workers as a class into direct conflict with the possessing class AS
A CLASS, and keeps them there, then we must realize that NOTHING CAN
DO THAT SO READILY AS ACTION AT THE BALLOT-BOX. Such action strips
the working-class movement of all traces of such sectionalism as may,
and indeed must, cling to strikes and lock-outs, and emphasizes the
class character of the Labour Movement. IT IS THEREFORE ABSOLUTELY
INDISPENSABLE FOR THE EFFICIENT TRAINING OF THE WORKING CLASS ALONG
CORRECT LINES THAT ACTION AT THE BALLOT-BOX SHOULD ACCOMPANY ACTION
IN THE WORKSHOP." 11
As you can see Connolly was no anarchist but instead advocated a
kind of reversed De Leonism. De Leon argued that the party must usher
in Socialism, and the role of the Industrial Union was to support the
party. Whereas Connolly argued that the Industrial Union must usher
in socialism, and the role of the party was to support the union.
This is an important distinction.
De Leon was arguing for a revolution that involves seizing control
of the State, a revolution lead by politicians. Connolly was arguing
for a revolution that gives immediate power to new form of social
organisation, a revolution lead by the workers themselves. De Leon
was arguing for a political revolution that could lead to a social
revolution. Connolly was arguing for a social revolution straight
out.
Connolly dismissed the idea that socialism could be ushered in by
seizing State control. He didn't think that the political
institutions of today could be used to achieve socialism. He wrote:
"The political institutions of today are simply the coercive
forces of capitalist society they have grown up out of, and are based
upon, territorial divisions of power in the hands of the ruling class
in past ages, and were carried over into capitalist society to suit
the needs of the capitalist class when that class overthrew the
dominion of its predecessors.
The delegation of the function of government into the hands of
representatives elected from certain districts, States or
territories, represents no real natural division suited to the
requirements of modern society, but is a survival from a time when
territorial influences were more potent in the world than industrial
influences, and for that reason is totally unsuited to the needs of
the new social order, which must be based upon industry...
Social democracy, as its name implies, is the application to
industry, or to the social life of the nation, of the fundamental
principles of democracy. Such application will necessarily have to
begin in the workshop, and proceed logically and consecutively upward
through all the grades of industrial organisation until it reaches
the culminating point of national executive power and direction. In
other words, social democracy must proceed from the bottom upward,
whereas capitalist political society is organised from above
downward..."
"Under Socialism, States, territories, or provinces will exist
only as geographical expressions, and have no existence as sources of
governmental power, though they may be seats of administrative
bodies..."
"As we have shown, the political State of capitalism has no place
under Socialism; therefore, measures which aim to place industries in
the hands of, or under the control of, such a political State are in
no sense steps towards that ideal; they are but useful measures to
restrict the greed of capitalism and to familiarize the workers with
the conception of common ownership." 12
As can be seen Connolly was no 'Social Democrat',13 he was an avid
socialist, dedicated to the achievement of socialism. Nor, as can be
seen from the above quotations, was he a state socialist. However,
this must be said with reservation. Connolly did write:
"Socialists are bound as Socialists only to the acceptance of one
great principle - the ownership and control of the wealth producing
power by the state." 14
This is clearly a state socialist claim. It is, however, directly
contradicted by another thing he wrote:
"State ownership and control is not necessarily Socialism - if it
were, then the Army, the Navy, the Police, the Judges, the Gaolers,
the Informers, and the Hangmen, all would all be Socialist
functionaries, as they are State officials - but the ownership by the
State of all the land and materials for labour, combined with the
co-operative control by the workers of such land and materials, would
be Socialism." 15
To explore Connolly's understanding of the State fully would
extend beyond the remit of this article as it would require an in
depth consideration of the differences between the Marxist and
Anarchist understanding of the State. It should suffice to say that
both anarchists and Marxists agree with Connolly's claim above that
the State is 'simply the coercive forces of capitalist society...' 16
It would, of course, be ridiculous for me to claim that Connolly
was an anti-statist, he wasn't. I merely want to point out that
Connolly's idea of the Workers' Republic was not the same as the
'Socialist Republics' that existed in any of the world's Leninist
countries. Nor was it the same as the 'Irish Republic' of today.
Connolly advocated a 'co-operative commonwealth'. A society in
which all productive property is owned in common and managed by
democratic co-operatives, which in turn are organised along
co-operative lines, industry-by-industry, region-by-region. Connolly
demanded a real 'Social Democracy' as opposed to the sham 'Political
Democracy' we have today. He wanted all of society to be run and
organised democratically for the benefit of all of society.
Legacy
Readers may be quick to note that Connolly's mistakes are the same
as those that have plagued the Irish left ever since his death, and
they would be right. His incoherent opinions concerning the national
question were parroted ceaselessly until the seventies when they
began to be questioned by a number of socialist groups. And his
acceptance of the flawed Marxist theory of the state is only
beginning to be questioned. These mistakes have resulted in
disastrous policies often advocated by the revolutionary left;
policies that have varied from advocating Stalinism (Communist Party)
to advocating/participating in terrorism (IRSP) . His mistakes have
also provided a shield for the impotent 'labour must wait' policies
of the reformist left in Ireland.
It is often queried why Connolly fought in 1916 when he knew that
they were 'going out to be slaughtered'17 and when he knew that a
national revolution could not easily be turned into a social
revolution? There is a widespread anecdote that he told the
socialists fighting in 1916 to hold onto their guns because after the
rising they may well have to fight against those they had just fought
beside. The simple answer is he thought that a national revolution
needed to be a social revolution in order to succeed. Ireland
couldn't be free until the working class of Ireland was free. And
because of that, he felt that a national revolution could lead to a
social revolution. Quite clearly the social revolution never happened
but it very nearly did.
It is worth remembering that both the influence of Connolly and
the part that Labour played in the Irish National Revolution ensured
that the Democratic Programme of the Irish Republic, agreed at the
first sitting of the first D·il (Irish Parliament) on January
21st 1919, read:
We declare in the words of the Irish Republican Proclamation the
right of the people of Ireland to the ownership of Ireland...we
declare that the nation's sovereignty extends ..[to] all its
resources, all the wealth and all the wealth-producing processes
within the Nation, ... declare it is the duty of the Nation that
every citizen shall have opportunity to spend his or her strength and
faculties in the service of the people. In return for willing
service, we, in the name of the Republic, declare the right of every
citizen to an adequate share of the Nation's labour...
It shall also devolve upon the National Government to seek ... a
standard of Social and Industrial Legislation with a view to a
general and lasting improvement in the conditions under which the
working classes live and labour...
We declare and we desire our country to be ruled in accordance
with the principles of Liberty, Equality, and Justice for all...
If this seems radical the draft democratic programme was more so.
It included the passage:
It shall be the purpose of the Government to encourage the
organisation of the people/citizens into Trade Unions and
Co-operative Societies with a view to the control and administration
of the industries by the workers engaged in those industries.18
These passages from one of the founding documents of the Irish
Republic give an indication of the revolutionary intentions of many
republican activists during the Irish National Revolution, a
revolution that involved widespread working class militancy with
Soviets being declared in Cork and Limerick and workers frequently
seizing their workplaces. All this when 5 years previously the seeds
of a socialist movement scarcely existed in Ireland!
This shows how close Ireland came to the Social Revolution that
Connolly dreamed of and gave his life for. This revolution can't be
achieved by means of a lobby, or a parliament or a coup d'etat. This
revolution will only be achieved when the ordinary people of the
world, us, the working class, get up off our knees and take back what
is rightfully ours; namely, everything.
by Oisin Mac Giollamoir