Dublin government collapse growth of the movement itself are integrated.
forces general election
Q. How were the mobilizations in
France seen?
Natalia. I think that was important because the students had not mobiliexample of the French that they had, people
THE FINE GAEL/LABOUR government headed by Garret FitzGerald began to think that it was possible.
collapsed on January 20, forcing a general election on February 17.
For years we thought that a student
The four Labour ministers resigned after they had been outvoted 11 mobilization of this scope was impossible. Everything seemed blocked, to 4 by the Fine Gael ministers on the 1987 budget. This collapse and a lot of people thought that a was signalled months in advance, when both government parties victory was impossible, no matter suffered defections in the Dail [parliament] and could no longer how extensive the mobilization was.
But after what happened in France, people started to reflect, to think that we could do something like that command a majority.
here. The victory of the French stu- JOHN MEEHAN and ANNE CONWAY dents had a big influence on our
It is not surprising that we are seeing a mobilization running across national boundary lines, because the attacks we are facing are the same as everywhere else. You might say that there is a plan for a "reconversion" of education for the EEC in general, in order to make it more competitive, to improve its "performance"
This is why we are seeing struggles nearly everywhere in Europe - in France, in Greece, in the Netherlands, in Italy - in all those countries where they are trying to wipe out the most modest gains in education. For example, they want to introduce a weeding-out process between the various cycles in the universities and create short courses of study for the sake of private industry. They want research to be done to suit the interests of private industry and not social needs.
Q. Do you think we are seeing the birth of a new generation that could change the traditional pattern of politics?
Natalia. Everything suggests that. With the mobilizations against NATO, which included a lot of young people who had never engaged in politics, with the struggle that we are going through now, which has drawn in a considerable part of the youth, I think that we can be optimistic about the combativity of the student movement and the youth in general. A lot of people are going to consider fighting in other areas and are beginning to move more than they have done up till now. 20
Before Christmas the government had several narrow escapes. However, it successfully rushed Extradition Bill, making it easier for southern Irish courts to send wanted Republicans to the British authorities.
Previously, it had been possible to exception": people wanted by the British could show that the charges against them were related to the national liberation struggle in the northern Counties directly controlled by Brit-
This defence has now abolished. (1)
This squalid haste over extrawith a growing campaign against the frame-ups of Irish people in England during the the Birmingham Six, Guildford Four and the Maguire family. Even the right-wing journalist Robert Kee, who has written a book on the Guildford Four frame-up Trial and Error? — has condemned the Dublin government's haste over extradition, while so many innocent people still languish in British jails.
This extradition bill is a result of the Anglo-Irish Agreement. (2) At the time it was formally announced, this deal was described as "an astronomical setback and a bad day for Irish by Charlie leader of the bourgeois party, Fianna which has traditionally exploited nationalist sentiment.
Haughey has declared that neither the Anglo-Irish Agreement nor the Six Counties should be an election issue. Fianna Fail would with the Agreement. That was "totally to misrepresent my position," he has said. (Irish Times, January 19, 1987.)
Haughey expects to be taoiseach [premier] after the February 17 poll, but knows that he is mistrusted on the question of the North and on the economy by big business. Fine Gael is trying to exploit Haughey's recent track record of high-blown promises, followed by crushing disappointment when he gets into office. Its answer to Ireland's economic crisis is Thatcherite attacks on living standards. Its governmental record for the last four years is grim:
Unemployment of 250,000 -at 20 per cent of the insured workforce this is the highest in the EEC, and a record for the State.
Emigration of 70-100,000 in the last year, according to the prelim. inary results of the 1986 census.
A national debt of IR£24,300 million - 148 per cent of GNP.
This has caused a huge fall in FG's per cent in the 1982 general election, but today most polls give them only
Undeterred, Fine Gael put forward an even harsher austerity programme in its 1987 draft budget, which forced the Labour Party to leave government. Proposals included cutbacks in un-
For background International Viewpoint, Nos. 33, 108 and Tid. articles
For analyses of of this deal and its consequences see, 90 and 93
See IV' Nos. 109 and 110 for Fein's November Party was formerly a movement, having now moved the right. combines abstract socialist rhetoric with rightwing positions in practice that it has come over to the pro-imperialist side of the divide in Irish politics
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IRELAND
International Viewpoint 23 February 1987 employment benefit and assistance, charges for previously free hospital services, Slashing of public sector budgets and the privatization of industries currently owned by the state.
Fine Gael know that they will lose this election - it may even cost Garret FitzGerald the leadership of his party. But they also know that any capitalist government in place after February 17 will, sooner or later, have to carry out an identical austerity programme. Fianna Fail, as the likely winner, riding high in the opinion polls, is trying to stay silent on its intentions. It does not want to make promises it cannot deliver - and which fact, Fianna Fail suffered a significant split in 1985. Since 1970,
Haughey was sacked from the Fianna Fail cabinet and unsuccessfully charged with conspiring to send arms to the Republicans in the Six Counties, the party has been riven with faction fights.
Not surprisingly, Haughey is standard-bearer for a populist wing, long on talk about nationalism, jobs, and Irish Catholic traditions. It has only been in the third category - bigoted
Catholic sectarianism - where Fianna Fail has backed up its talks with effective action.
The split from Fianna Fail is called the Progressive Democrats, and is headed by an ex-FF minister, Des O'Malley. Its politics are very similar to Fine Gael - openly pro-austerity, mildly liberal on issues such as divorce and women's rights, and very Republican. The opinion polls show it taking about 15 per cent of the vote, and it is most useful to the big capitalists. While it has the same politics as Fine Gael, it can exploit its "new" image and push the political pendulum to the right.
On the left, the most promising the Anglo-Irish Agreement and the opposed with mass mobilizations.
It was the depth of the crisis in the South that gave the impetus for the decision by the last Sinn Fein Ard Fheis [congress] to drop abstention. The challenge now facing the anti-imperialist movement is to provide for those forces struggling against the crisis and looking
Such an alternative will, of necessity, involve the anti-imperialist movement alliances with other oppressed groups links with the working particular. It will also require opening up of a debate on the nature of the imperialist offensive and the strategy needed to combat it. Attacks on women a major issue
In recent years women have suffered the harshest attacks, the most recent being the closure, under a High Court order, of pregnancy counselling agencies that give women information on abortion. The constitutional
"right-tolifers" in 1983.
There has been a quick response to this blow from the women's movement, and the sweeping nature of the necessity for all anti-imperialists and Republicans to build support for the defence of the clinics, and make this a major issue in the election campaign.
On February 17, we can expect a certain amount of protest voting (a notable protest vote having emerged as a prominent feature in more recent elections) and a sizeable abstention, especially in the most deprived working class areas.
Sinn Fein can expect to win some of this protest vote, but in the absence of any fightback that would enable the working class to distinguish who their real allies were, the "left vote" will be divided among all sorts of "alternatives" such as independents and the pro-imperialist Workers section of the Fourth International, is calling for a first preference vote for Sinn Fein in these elections. called not because of a working class challenge but because of the inability of the coalition to carry out the programme of austerity and the political offensive needed by the bourgeoisie.
The bourgeoisie's problem remains the lack of a clear alternative government, a Fine Gael/Progressive Democrat coalition not being on the cards this time round, although it is the favoured choice of the ruling class.
Fianna Fail, who are likely to form the next government, will be obliged to carry out attacks similar of the coalition on both working class imperialist struggle in the Six Counties. Their populist and nationalist rhetoric will fade very quickly once the elec-
The offensive against the working class and the oppressed will intensify. The central element of Fianna Fail's strategy will be to support and strengthen the attacks by the Church and the "Morality Mafia" on women's and use this as a cutting edge for wider attacks on democratic rights.
confronting challenging the bourgeois nationalists of Fianna Fail, the anti-imperialist movement can widen its base of support and hasten the crisis of the bourgeois recent development is Sinn Fein's recent decision to abandon abstention and, if elected, take their seats in the
Gerry Adams on the election trail in 1982 (DR) 26 County Dail. (3) Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams does not expect a breakthrough in this election - he sees the party's real test coming in a following one. While this is a prudent approach, it is also true that Sinn Fein does not have unlimited time to build
POLLING up its intervention in electoral politics.
In the upcoming election, Sinn Fein are standing in the context of an absence of any mass mobilization since the 1981 hunger-strike campaign. STATION In June 1981, two H-Block prisoner candidates were elected to Leinster House [the Irish parliament]. Fianna Fail was severely damaged by the electoral intervention of the H-Block/ Armagh Campaign, which resulted in a hung Dail in 1981.
In this election, a major swing towards Sinn Fein is unlikely, as both
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