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PRAISE FOR THE POLITICS OF ILLUSION
‘Of immense value’
Michael D. Higgins, The Irish Times
’Subtle and authoritative’
Fintan O’Toole, New York Review of Books
‘Good, even-handed history’
The Guardian
‘The definitive history of the IRA’
The World This Weekend, BBC Radio 4
‘Thought-provoking’
Times Higher Education Supplement
’A welcome addition to the historiography of the subject’
Irish Historical Studies
‘An extremely timely book that will be an eye-opener for those who believe they understand Ireland and its problems’
Library Journal
Henry Patterson is Emeritus Professor of Politics at the University of Ulster and the author of numerous books and articles on modern Irish history, including Ireland Since 1939: The Persistence of Conflict, Ireland’s Violent Frontier: The Border and Anglo-Irish Relations During the Troubles and Class Conflict and Sectarianism. With Paul Bew he is co-author of Sean Lemass and the Making of Modern Ireland and The British State and the Ulster Crisis, and with Paul Bew and Peter Gibbon of Northern Ireland 1921-2001: Political Forces and Social Classes.
The Politics of Illusion
A Political History of Sinn Féin and the IRA
Henry Patterson
Serif
London
This expanded and updated e-book edition first published 2015
by
Serif
47 Strahan Road
London E3 5DA
Originally published, in a slightly different form, as The Politics of Illusion: Republicanism and Socialism in Modern Ireland by Hutchinson Radius in 1989 and, revised and updated, as The Politics of Illusion: A Political History of the IRA by Serif in 1997
Copyright © Henry Patterson, 1989, 1997, 2015
The moral rights of the author have been asserted.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, transmitted or stored in a retrieval system, in any form or by any means, without permission in writing from the publishers.
ISBN 978 1 909150 19 5
e-book produced by Will Dady
Cover design by Pentagram
Contents
Acknowledgements
Introduction
1 The Origins of Social Republicanism
2 Republicanism in Inter-war Ireland
3 In de Valera’s Shadow
4 A Limited Reassessment: The IRA After 1962
5 The Officials: Regression and Development, 1970-1977
6 The Provisionals and the Rediscovery of Social Republicanism
7 The Tactical Use of Armed Struggle, 1990-1996
8 Ending the Union or Renegotiating It?
9 The Peace Process: The Struggle to Defeat Unionism Continues
Chronology
For Sam, Alex and Annie
Acknowledgements
This book could not have been written without the assistance of those who agreed to be interviewed – Gerry Adams, Jack Brady, Anthony Coughlan, Francie Donnelly, Jimmy Drumm, Sean Garland, Cathal Goulding, Eoghan Harris, Seamus Harrison, Roy Johnston, Seamus Lynch, Tomás MacGiolla, Paddy Joe McClean, Dessie O’Hagan, Eamonn Smullen, Kevin Smyth and Jim Sullivan. I also received assistance from Mary McMahon. Eric Byrne and Ellen Hazelkorn gave me valuable criticism of what I had written on Official Republicanism in Dublin in the mid-1970s. Richard Dunphy gave me access to his major work on the history of Fianna Fáil up to 1948. Anthony McIntyre gave a critical perspective on the ‘peace process’. Rogelio Alonso allowed me to see the transcript of his interview with Bernadette McAliskey. The book as a whole benefited from many conversations with Paul Bew, particularly on the nature of Sinn Féin’s ‘modernisation’ since the mid-1970s. Carmel Roulston’s work on the recent history of the Communist Party of Ireland was of great value, as were her detailed criticisms of the first draft of the book, which much improved it. Neil Belton was a source of support to the development of my work on Ireland and provided an intelligent and detailed editorial control to the first edition. Stephen Hayward and Will Dady at Serif were invaluable in their support and enthusiasm for this new and expanded e-book edition.
None of the people I have mentioned has any responsibility for the positions and interpretations of the author.
I would like to acknowledge the assistance of the staffs of the National Library of Ireland; the State Paper Office, Dublin Castle; the Linenhall Library, Belfast; the Library, University of Ulster at Jordanstown and the British Library at Colindale My research benefited from grants and study leave given by the Research Sub-Committee of the Faculty of Humanities of the University of Ulster and from the assistance of Jennifer Irwin and Joan Philipson
Henry Patterson
Belfast 2015
Introduction
Since the original version of this book was published in 1989, the collapse of the Soviet Union has radically transformed the international context in which Irish republicanism exists. Although the 1916 Rising predated the Bolshevik Revolution, it occurred in a period of rising working-class militancy in Ireland and Britain, and for most of its history the republican movement that developed out of the Rising had a complex and fraught relationship with working-class organisations and struggles. What distinguished The Politics of Illusion from histories of republicanism existing at the time was its focus on this relationship as key to understanding the movement’s ability periodically to resuscitate itself from the dead-end of a sterile, elitist militarism.
Until the Treaty split and Civil War, the revolutionary nationalist movement of Sinn Féin and the IRA, which had emerged in the aftermath of the Easter Rising of 1916, had strongly insisted on the trans-class and generally ‘non-sectional’ nature
