The Revolutionary Workers Groups – Building the Communist Party

The Communist Movement in Ireland, did not get off to a strong start. Despite the recent revolutionary period, marked by the Lockout, the Easter Rising, and the War of Independence, the first Communist Party was not founded until 1921, emerging from a left-ward transformation of the nearly moribund Socialist Party of Ireland. It changed its name, expelled reformists such as William O’Brien, and joined the Communist International. But it was not to last. In 1923, Jim Larkin returned from the United States. Despite his near ten year absence following the unions’ defeat during the 1913 Lockout, Larkin still cast a large shadow over the workers movement of Ireland.

There were initial aspirations that Larkin would join the nascent CPI, but it quickly became apparent that he had neither desire nor intention of subordinating himself to a party that was not under his immediate control, and so Larkin went about establishing the Irish Workers League (IWL). The Executive Committee of the Comintern believed that Larkin would have to play a central role in building the Communist Party in Ireland, notwithstanding the fact that his union, the Workers’ Union of Ireland (WUI), was at that time one of the few anglosphere trade unions affiliated to the Red International of Trade Unions (Profintern).

So the CPI was dissolved, and its members joined the newly formed IWL, which had assumed the role of Comintern affiliate for Ireland. Yet no party Congress or programme was forthcoming, nor would they materialise for another three years. Larkin resisted any attempt to formalise the party, often ignoring directions from the Comintern. While the rest of the international Communist movement was undergoing a coordinated bolshevisation, ie. building the Communist Party along Leninist lines as the highest form of political organisation of the proletariat, the IWL remained a husk of a party whose only purpose was seemingly to serve as an occasional election vehicle for Larkin.

This state of affairs reflected Larkin’s wider syndicalist political strategy. Unlike the Leninist understanding of socialist revolution, his strategy did not appreciate the role of party organising, and instead prioritised and over-emphasised the specific role of the trade union in social revolution. Similarly, democratic centralism found no place in a party that was uniquely centred around the singular personality of Larkin.

Eventually however, there was a mutual falling out between Larkin and the Comintern. From the Comintern perspective, they had grown tired of the mounting requests for funds from Larkin, despite few results. While Larkin had become disillusioned when said funds didn’t materialise, and did not approve when WUI members were not given preferential treatment in the newly established Russian Oil Products company in Dublin. Over time, the obvious ideological divergence of Larkin’s party became increasingly too significant to ignore. While previous attempts to establish a new communist party in spite of the IWL had been rebuffed by the Comintern, when the Preparatory Committee for the Workers Revolutionary Party was formed in the late 20’s, the Comintern’s approach to Ireland shifted.

This organisation, briefly called the Workers Revolutionary Party, and eventually the Revolutionary Workers Groups (RWG), represented a qualitative development in the Communist movement in Ireland. Among its founding members were Jim Larkin Jnr. and Sean Murray, both of whom had studied for some years in the Lenin School in the USSR, the purpose of which was to develop ideologically and organisationally trained cadres for the advancement of national Comintern affiliates. In contrast to its predecessor, the RWG readily adopted a bolshevised organisational structure. In fact, the name change from WR Party to RW Groups, reflected a shift in the party’s base organisations from geographic configurations to workplace cells, which, while in line with Comintern strategy at the time, demonstrated a recognition of the fundamental role of the party in workplace organising. Cells were established in workplaces such as Jacobs, Inchicore Railway Works, Guinness, and the Castlecomer coal mines in Co. Kilkenny.

The RWG, whose membership was predominantly situated in Dublin and Belfast, emerged during a period of intensified capitalist crises, which saw widespread wage cuts and rapidly growing unemployment. In the South, Fianna Fáil came to power for the first time, defeating Cumann na nGaedheal in the 1932 election following a campaign that had the backing of much of the republican and some of the workers movement. However, in a break from previous strategy, the RWG took a critical stance not only towards the outwardly reactionary Cumann na nGaedhal, but also Fianna Fáil and the Labour Party, correctly analysing that each party sought, in their own manner, to maintain the rule of capital in Ireland.

Their strategy reflected that of the Communist Movement at the time, characterised by a militant “class vs. class” approach, which took the form of rank and file organising within workplaces and among the trade unions, in direct opposition to the conciliatory position of the trade union leadership. The RWG understood the necessary and historic role of the working class in achieving their aim of a “Workers and Small Farmers Republic”.

While the significance of the national element within the social revolution was upheld by the RWG, the Party formed a new analysis of the South which reflected the developing character of the new state. Sean Murray wrote in 1930:

“The Irish bourgeoisie are no longer ‘oppressed’ by British imperialism, but are ruling Ireland, North and South, in alliance with British capitalism … They have abandoned the struggle for a Republic … Not a single move can now be made for independence without a struggle to overthrow the Irish capitalist class … [which] means, obviously the establishment of the Dictatorship of the Proletariat … This means the old slogans … of ‘Ireland against England’, ‘Independence’, ‘Republic’, must now be replaced by the slogan of class against class.”

In this, the RWG sought to analyse the development that was ongoing in the 26 county state, that while there remained an unequal economic interdependency between it and Britain, the emergent Irish capitalist class, which now ruled the state, exploited the working class no differently than their British counter-parts, and that they too sought to exert their interests internationally, as demonstrated through the economic war.

Their unrelenting drive to embed themselves within the Irish working class led to the RWG assuming leading roles in several important industrial disputes. One such example was the Belfast Outdoor Relief strike of 1932, which united, albeit temporarily, catholic and protestant relief workers under the unified demands for higher pay and better conditions, as unemployment, poverty and hunger rampaged the city in the wake of the ongoing capitalist crisis. Unemployment in Belfast had reached nearly 40%, and the only form of social-welfare available other than entering a poor-house, was ‘outdoor relief’ – working on public employment schemes such as digging up and paving roads. However, the wages from this work were meagre and only means-tested, married men were eligible for the relief.

In June 1932, the RWG established the Outdoor Relief Workers Committee, and set out their demands for better wages and conditions, the end to payments in kind, and the extension of relief to single-men. They campaigned for several months, until finally in 1932, the Belfast relief workers went on strike. The strike action saw demonstrations and mass meetings, with 20,000 marching through the city centre on the first evening of the strike. As it continued, the workers experienced significant state repression, with the RUC attempting to prevent gatherings through physical altercations, murdering two workers during the course of the dispute and injuring many others.

Under increasing pressure from their membership, the Trades Council backed the relief workers and threatened a general strike. This forced the government to the table, conceding to many of the demands. Pay was to be increased, but relief would not be extended to single men. While this was hailed as a victory and the deal was accepted by the workers, it represented the peak of RWG influence among the Belfast working class, as the Trades Council would go on to create their own Outdoor Relief Worker organisation, while single-men would form another, disparaged with having been left in the cold with the deal. Nevertheless, this dispute demonstrated the power of class politics in overcoming sectarianism within the working class, and established a base of Party members among the Protestant working class.

It was not just in the North that the RWG experienced state repression. In 1931, embroiled in a wave of anti-communism, Cumann na nGaedheal passed the Public Safety Act, to little opposition from Fianna Fáil or the Labour Party. This act imbued the state with emergency powers and allowed for the proscribing of 12 communist and republican organisations, including the RWG. While few members faced arrests and the publication of the ‘Irish Workers Voice’ was largely unimpacted, the act created an increasingly difficult environment for political work. While the bill was being proposed to the Dáil, the government also met with several bishops of the Catholic church, coordinating the release of consistent anti-communist encyclicals, which were read from pulpits across the country.

The consequences of this were substantial. Workers were inhibited from joining the RWG out of fear of excommunication from the church and ostracisation from their communities. The trade unions adopted a fiercer anti-communist orientation. Organised violence against communists also increased, with RWG member, Jimmy Gralton, from Leitrim, being deported by the state in 1933 for his political work after a campaign of violence against him by local reactionaries, the first instance of political deportation in the 26 county state. In the same year, the RWG head office in Dublin was attacked and burned by a violent mob after a particularly vitriolic sermon at St. Mary’s Pro-Cathedral.

The Catholic Church likewise had no qualms with intervening in industrial disputes on the side of the capitalist class. In the Castlecomer coal mines, the RWG managed to build a strong base of members among the coal miners, or colliers as they were called. As the ITGWU, which had previously organised workers in the mines, had become inactive and held no interest in advancing the workers interests, the RWG oversaw the organisation of a new union called the Irish Mines, Quarries and Allied Workers Union (IMQAWU), with the RWG’s Nicholas Boran as its secretary.

The RWG and the Union were highly successful in organising the mine workers, despite continued intimidation and house-raids from the Gardaí. They managed to elect Boran as checkweighman for the mine, a highly influential position which determined payments for the colliers, and also won a significant pay rise after leading the workers on strike, despite the union not having enough funds to cover strike pay, and receiving little solidarity support from other unions. However, on the invitation of the mine-owners after the conclusion of the strike, the local Catholic bishop visited the workers, and threatened that should they not return to membership of the ITGWU, they would face formal excommunication. With this direct threat and intimidation, many workers left the Union, which was eventually forced to merge with the ITGWU.

While the RWG was instrumental in the organising of some of the most influential industrial disputes in Ireland after the War of Independence, it ultimately failed to embed itself within the working class in the long-term. There are a multitude of reasons why this happened; intense state repression, outmaneuvering by opportunist forces, widespread anti-communism. However, there were also strategic and tactical mistakes; the RWG failed to secure a united front from below among the working class and small farmers, which would have been essential in order to capitalise on the momentum achieved during industrial disputes and achieve further cooperation within the trade unions and workers movement. The Party, which would in 1933 become the Communist Party of Ireland, also suffered from inconsistent analysis of the Irish situation, caused in part by shifting Comintern strategy.

Yet it would be a mistake to disregard this period in the history of the communist movement in Ireland. Despite its failures, the RWG was possibly the most ambitious form the Communist Party has ever taken in Ireland. In contrast to previous efforts by communists to organise the Irish working class, it did not subordinate its work to the trade union struggle, and understood the vital role of the Party. The position of prestige and leadership the RWG held within the working class, and the extent of its organisational work, was never again replicated by the Irish Communist Movement. Nevertheless, in this period of renewed antagonisms against the working class, there is still much that can be learned from the experience of the RWG for the communists of today.