Revolutionary Marxist Group was a Trotskyist organisation in Ireland during the 1970s. [1]
Revolutionary Marxist Group was a Trotskyist organisation in Ireland during the 1970s. [1]
Its origins lay in the 1971 split of United Secretariat of the Fourth International (USFI) supporters from the League for a Workers Republic. Many of the initial group had formerly been in the Young Socialists, along with some others who attended discussion meetings (such as Charlie Bird and Butch Roche) but who tended to drop off later when the RMG name was adopted and democratic centralism set in.
In 1972, they joined with a loose grouping in Belfast to form the Revolutionary Marxist Group, mainly under the influence of D.R. O'Connor Lysaght (known as Rayner Lysaght) [2] and Anne Speed, Brendan Kelly, Betty Purcell. In 1974, the organisation affiliated to the USFI. [3] The RMG campaigned against internment in Northern Ireland and took part in several public protests against it. [4]
The theoretical journal of the group was Marxist Review. [5] The group focused on supporting a united Ireland and on gaining influence in the student movement. [3] The RMG rejected the Éire Nua plan put forward by Ruairí Ó Brádaigh and Dáithí Ó Conaill, arguing EN was "too tied to the bourgeoisie". [6] Marxist Review also criticised the ideas advocated by the conservative Irish writer Desmond Fennell, arguing that "Fennellism" is essentially idealistic and ultra-clerical". [7] They also accused Fennell of being anti-feminist and anti-trade union. [7]
The RMG was strongly pro-feminist, [8] and RMG members took part in the "Irishwomen United" group in 1976, along with members of People's Democracy and the Irish Republican Socialist Party. "Irishwomen United" was a left-wing, anti-clerical, radical feminist group that called for the legalisation of contraception and abortion, equal pay for Irish women, and secular community-controlled schools. [9]
In 1976, the group changed its name to the Movement for a Socialist Republic. Between 1977 and 1978 the MSR began fusion talks with People's Democracy. In November 1978 the two groups fused, adopting the name People's Democracy. In 1981 People's Democracy was recognised as the Irish Section of the Fourth International.
Dublin; Revolutionary Marxist Group.
Revolutionary Marxist Group.
Dublin; Revolutionary Marxist Group.
Dublin; Plough Book Service for Revolutionary Marxist Group.
Dublin, Plough Books (Movement for a Socialist Republic), [1976].
Jan Kavan. Dublin : Movement for a Socialist Republic [1975?].
Dublin : Movement for a Socialist Republic, [1976].
Norman Gamboa. [Dublin?] : Movement for a Socialist Republic, 1976.
Belfast : Peoples Democracy with the Movement for a Socialist Republic, 1977.
Dublin, Women's Commission, Movement for a Socialist Republic, 1977.
Trotskyism is the political ideology and branch of Marxism developed by Russian revolutionary Leon Trotsky. Trotsky self-identified as an orthodox Marxist and Bolshevik–Leninist. He supported founding a vanguard party of the proletariat, proletarian internationalism and a dictatorship of the proletariat based on working class self-emancipation and mass democracy. Trotskyists are critical of Stalinism as they oppose Joseph Stalin's theory of socialism in one country in favor of Trotsky's theory of permanent revolution. Trotskyists also criticize the bureaucracy that developed in the Soviet Union under Stalin.
The Irish Citizen Army, or ICA, was a small paramilitary group of trained trade union volunteers from the Irish Transport and General Workers' Union (ITGWU) established in Dublin for the defence of workers' demonstrations from the Dublin Metropolitan Police. It was formed by James Larkin, James Connolly and Jack White on 23 November 1913. Other prominent members included Seán O'Casey, Constance Markievicz, Francis Sheehy-Skeffington, P. T. Daly and Kit Poole. In 1916, it took part in the Easter Rising, an armed insurrection aimed at ending British rule in Ireland.
The International Left Opposition (Trotskyist) of Canada, the Workers Party of Canada, Socialist Policy Group, Socialist Workers League, Revolutionary Workers Party, The Club, the Socialist Education League and Socialist Information Centre, and the League for Socialist Action were successive Trotskyist organisations in Canada.
Ruairí Ó Brádaigh was an Irish republican political and military leader. He was Chief of Staff of the Irish Republican Army (IRA) from 1958 to 1959 and again from 1960 to 1962, president of Sinn Féin from 1970 to 1983, and president of Republican Sinn Féin from 1987 to 2009.
The Communist Party of Ireland is an all-Ireland Marxist–Leninist party, founded in 1933. The party is a member of the International Meeting of Communist and Workers' Parties.
Mansoor Hekmat was an Iranian Marxist theorist, revolutionary and leader of the Worker-communist movement. He opposed the Shah and, after the 1979 Revolution, he first founded the movement of Revolutionary Marxism and in 1983 he co-founded the Communist Party of Iran which was opposed to the Islamic Republic of Iran. In 1991 he separated from this party and founded the Worker-communist Party of Iran (WPI), which he led until his death in 2002. He was the husband of fellow politician Azar Majedi.
Socialist Democracy is the successor to People's Democracy, a left-wing current which emerged in Belfast in 1968 during the civil rights movement in Northern Ireland. During the 1970s it evolved towards Trotskyist positions and, by merging with the Dublin-based Movement for a Socialist Republic, became a section of the Fourth International. After the hunger strike campaign Peoples Democracy shrank in size with some leading members joining Sinn Féin when it began to take more explicit left-wing positions.
James Anthony Lane is an Irish republican and socialist. He was born on Devonshire Street North in Cork's north inner city. His father Michael, a former quartermaster sergeant in the Free State army, worked in Ford's motor plant – the family originated in Conna in east County Cork where they had a medium-sized farm. Jim Lane's mother, Mary Ann, was in Cumann na Cailini and Cumann na mBan, the girl's and women's sections respectively of the Republican Movement, from childhood until 1935.
The Irish Workers' Group (IWG) was a Marxist political party in Ireland. It originated as the Irish Workers Union, which later called itself the Irish Communist Group, and contained a variety of people who all considered themselves to be Marxists. Some were from an Irish Republican background, and some, including Gerry Lawless, also became involved in Saor Éire.
Cumann na mBan, abbreviated C na mB, is an Irish republican women's paramilitary organisation formed in Dublin on 2 April 1914, merging with and dissolving Inghinidhe na hÉireann, and in 1916, it became an auxiliary of the Irish Volunteers. Although it was otherwise an independent organisation, its executive was subordinate to that of the Volunteers.
Éire Nua, or "New Ireland", was a proposal supported by the Provisional IRA and Sinn Féin during the 1970s and early 1980s for a federal United Ireland. The proposal was particularly associated with the Dublin-based leadership group centred on Ruairí Ó Brádaigh and Dáithí Ó Conaill, who were the authors of the policy.
The Irish Socialist Network (ISN) is a democratic socialist organisation formed in 2001. It is a campaigning organisation which works actively to fight for the rights of Irish workers and to help build a socialist Ireland. It is based in Belfast and Dublin. Politically, the ISN locates itself within the Marxist tradition, but it rejects both Leninism and Trotskyism, partly because of its opposition to democratic centralist organisational structures and to the concept of the vanguard party, which it deems elitist. Most of the founding members were former members of the Workers' Party, some being involved in the Official Republican Movement split in the late 1990s.
The Irish Worker League was an Irish communist party, established in September 1923 by Jim Larkin, following his return to Ireland. Larkin re-established the newspaper The Irish Worker. The Irish Worker League (IWL) superseded the first Communist Party of Ireland and became Ireland's affiliate with the Communist International.
The Spartacist League is a Trotskyist political grouping. They are the United States section of the International Communist League, formerly the International Spartacist Tendency. This Spartacist League named themselves after the original Spartacus League of Weimar Republic in Germany, but the current League has no formal descent from it. The League self-identifies as a "revolutionary communist" organization.
The International Committee of the Fourth International (ICFI) is the name of two Trotskyist internationals; one with sections named Socialist Equality Party which publishes the World Socialist Web Site, and another linked to the Workers Revolutionary Party in the UK.
The International Marxist Group (IMG) was a Trotskyist group in Britain between 1968 and 1982. It was the British Section of the Fourth International. It had around 1,000 members and supporters in the late 1970s. In 1980, it had 682 members; by 1982, when it changed its name to the Socialist League, membership had fallen to 534.
The Irish Marxist Society was a Eurocommunist organisation active in Ireland in the 1970s.
Revolutionary Workers' Groups (RWG) were left wing groups in Ireland officially founded in 1930 with the objective of creating a Revolutionary Workers' Party. Formed initially as the Preparatory Committee for the Formation of a Workers’ Revolutionary Party, it changed its name in November 1930. It was helped establish by Bob Stewart and Tom Bell from the Communist Party of Great Britain and Comintern. In 1933 they disbanded and established the Communist Party of Ireland.
