Comment on Left activism…a paradox by Paddy Healy

It is important to understand the reasons for the failure of the ULA and its substitute the CAHWT. To conclude that it was due to wrong estimations, lack of bright ideas, lack of patience, lack of persistence etc would, in my view, be a mistake.
There are a number of strands to understanding these failures.
Trotskyist groups have traditionally seen themselves as being a left opposition to larger political forces such as social democracy, the communist parties and, in some countries, left nationalist movements. Following the restoration of capitalism in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe the communist parties in the west collapsed into a shadow of their former selves. With the onset of the international recession in 2008, social democratic parties in power in western countries lost considerable support. This didn’t happen in Ireland until after the Labour Party entered government in 2011. Now the Trotskyist groups faced a much different task- how to organise and lead whole layers of workers who had already rejected the social democratic and communist parties. This required the groups to take responsibility not only for politically reorganising tens of thousands, for leading them in campaigns but also for dealing with the outcomes. There was no longer a traditional political leadership to blame! The groups failed to adjust to the new situation and continued to compete with each other for individual recruits to their own groups AS A PRIORITY.
It is my view that in Ireland any successful political reorganisation of workers must include a republican (United Ireland) component. Irish people instinctively understand that Irish unity, independence and sovereignty is in their vital interest. It is part of their revolutionary heritage. A regroupment that does not include this can never be genuinely popular. Without such a component, socialism can appear external and reformist. No word on this matter was included in the ULA founding document because differences on this issue between the founding bodies were so great.