{"id":16349,"date":"2007-11-18T18:50:19","date_gmt":"2007-11-18T18:50:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/republicancommunist.org\/blog\/?p=16349"},"modified":"2021-03-03T18:42:48","modified_gmt":"2021-03-03T18:42:48","slug":"the-ssp-independence-first-and-the-scottish-independence-referendum","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/republicancommunist.org\/blog\/2007\/11\/18\/the-ssp-independence-first-and-the-scottish-independence-referendum\/","title":{"rendered":"The SSP, \u2018Independence First\u2019 And The Scottish Independence Referendum"},"content":{"rendered":"

A Scottish internationalist and republican approach – Republican Communist Network, Platform in the SSP<\/acronym><\/h3>\n

1. Introduction<\/h4>\n

After February 15th, 2003 \u2013 the ruling class counter-offensive<\/h4>\n

Many socialists, participating in the massive global anti-war protests on February 15th 2003, held high hopes after decades of retreat by the working class and oppressed peoples across the world. Left and popular forces appeared to be making some real progress, contesting the New World Order being imposed on behalf of the global corporations, particularly by US<\/acronym> and British imperialism. The imperial ruling classes had initially been politically unprepared for the scale of the new anti-globalisation and anti-war protests. However, they have been able to draw upon their considerable reserves of strength and, for the time being, roll back this challenge in the imperialist heartlands.<\/p>\n

Creating a space for liberal imperial alternatives, by marginalising the most radical challenges, has been a key element in their fightback. Such a strategy allows the ruling classes to make tactical and even strategic retreats, if they are found to be necessary. As a result, the radical sting has largely been taken out of the mass anti-war movements, as more and more of their participants have been persuaded to fall in behind liberal imperial \u2018alternatives\u2019.<\/p>\n

Many were persuaded that a vote for \u2018liberal\u2019 Kerry was necessary to stop neo-conservative Bush; a vote for social democratic Zapatero was necessary to oust the conservative Aznar; or a vote for Prodi\u2019s social democrat-led coalition was necessary to get rid of Right populist, Berlusconi. In the UK<\/acronym>, some looked to Liberal leader, Charles Kennedy as an alternative to Right social democrat, Tony Blair. Whilst, even in France, where the working class and oppressed have demonstrated most resilience, the Left lost its nerve, after its initial electoral successes at the expense of the Centre social democrats in the presidential elections. They ended up giving their support to conservative Chirac against Far Right, Le Pen. The revolutionary Left handed over political leadership to a section of the ruling class.<\/p>\n

Where the Left has managed to hold out, it has set aside much of its own immediate (minimum) programme, and retreated to forms of populism, designed to appeal either to a currently, largely atomised working class, or to particular oppressed groups, such as Muslims. George Galloway\u2019s electoral victory in Bethnal Green & Bow is an example of this. The Far Right has also appealed to an atomised working class through its own forms of populism, especially racism and Islamophobia. There is even some overlap with the Left, when it comes to claiming support for a lost Old Labour past, with its \u2018real\u2019 jobs and welfare measures, now largely abandoned by New Labour.<\/p>\n

Back in May 2003, the Left\u2019s initial hopes rose to new heights when six SSP<\/acronym> MSP<\/acronym>s took their seats, following the Holyrood election, soon after the mass protests on February 15th, which had brought 100,000 on to the streets of Glasgow. But, here too, there has been retreat. The SSP<\/acronym> split in August 2006. On one hand there is the increasingly Scottish nationalist-accommodating SSP<\/acronym> leadership, on the other Tommy Sheridan\u2019s populist and loosely united breakaway alliance, Solidarity. Furthermore, as the ability of the Left to offer a full and united challenge, in the Holyrood elections on May 3rd 2007, recedes, the temptation to turn to the SNP<\/acronym>, the main \u2018liberal\u2019 alternative to New Labour, grows.<\/p>\n

SSP<\/acronym> leaders have already signed up to the Scottish Independence Convention, alongside the SNP<\/acronym> and the Greens. This \u2018love affair\u2019 is largely unrequited, since the SNP<\/acronym> leaders are far more interested in cultivating Scotland\u2019s business community, and wants as little to do with the SSP<\/acronym> as possible. The Greens too would rather get into bed with one of the mainstream parties.<\/p>\n

So instead, SSP<\/acronym> leaders have turned to \u2018Independence First\u2019, a populist cross-class campaign. This mostly involves the nationalist fragments \u2013 the Free Scotland Party, the Scottish Independence Party and Soil nan Gaidheal – who feel betrayed by the SNP<\/acronym>\u2019s increasing accommodation to the UK<\/acronym> state and big business; or ex-SSP<\/acronym> members, such as those in the SRSM<\/acronym> and former Scottish Socialist Voice columnist, Kevin Williamson, who feel the SSP<\/acronym> is not nationalist enough. \u2018Independence First\u2019, whilst wanting to organise forces independently of the SNP<\/acronym> leadership, and beyond any existing parties\u2019 control, is still dependent on an SNP<\/acronym>-led Scottish Executive to deliver its main demand \u2013 an \u2018independence referendum\u2019. Anticipating big gains for the SNP<\/acronym> they have termed next year\u2019s Holyrood contest, the \u2018independence election\u2019.<\/p>\n

This contribution from the RCN<\/acronym> represents a critique of the Left nationalist approach. The RCN<\/acronym> is a socialist republican platform within the SSP<\/acronym>. We advocate a Scottish Workers\u2019 Republic as part of a World Federation of Socialist Republics. To achieve this, we pursue a Scottish internationalist strategy, promoting \u2018internationalism from below\u2019, alongside English, Irish and Welsh socialists, to break-up the British imperial, monarchist and unionist state. We see the republican struggle for genuine democracy as fundamental to any socialist strategy in these islands.<\/p>\n

The likely reaction of the UK<\/acronym> state to a campaign to win an \u2018independence referendum\u2019 will be outlined. The state\u2019s response to earlier national democratic challenges, and its methods of dealing with these, will be investigated. Then the seriousness of the SNP<\/acronym> leadership\u2019s commitment to its own official \u2018independence referendum\u2019 policy will be questioned. Again, an historical approach will be adopted, highlighting the SNP<\/acronym>\u2019s long-term political trajectory from being a populist party, seeking full political independence and economic control of Scotland, to a Rightwards-moving social democratic party, trimming its aims to a world dominated by US<\/acronym> imperialism and the global corporations. This will be followed by an examination of the weaknesses of the Scottish Left\u2019s understanding of the issue of self-determination. It has been split into Left nationalist and Left unionist camps \u2013 allowing either an aspiring Scottish, or the existing British, ruling class to define its immediate political objectives. Finally, it will demonstrate the RCN<\/acronym>\u2019s republican socialist alternative strategy to achieve genuine self-determination, based on the \u2018internationalism from below\u2019 approach first adopted with the Calton Hill Declaration of October 9th 2004.<\/p>\n

2. The \u2018Independence Referendum\u2019, The British Ruling Class And The UK<\/acronym> State<\/h4>\n

i) The political nature of the UK<\/acronym><\/h4>\n

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is a multi-nation state, incorporating the nations of England, Scotland, Wales and part of Ireland. The UK<\/acronym> is also an imperialist and unionist state, and a constitutional monarchy with extensive extra-parliamentary Crown Powers. These can be used to reinforce the position of the British ruling class. Although British imperialism has been on the decline for almost a century, its ruling class has maintained this unionist state to defend shared imperial interests as best it can.<\/p>\n

There never was a popular democratic struggle to form a \u2018British nation\u2019, unlike say the nineteenth century struggles to unite Germany and Italy. British state unity was achieved top-down, either by English (and after 1707, British) armed force, or by deals confined to the respective constituent countries\u2019 ruling classes.<\/p>\n

The idea of a \u2018British nation\u2019 won wider acceptance, in the past, primarily through the material privileges gained from Empire. This Empire has been in rapid decline since the end of the Second World War, and particularly from the 1960\u2019s. Then the late 1970\u2019s saw the beginning of the dismantling of the post-war, social monarchist, political settlement with its welfare state. This process was mightily accelerated under the Tories and New Labour, particularly after the defeat of the Miners Strike in 1985. Therefore, the constitutional chains binding the constituent nations together have become less effective in cementing the notion of a \u2018British nation\u2019. But, there is no constitutional right to national self-determination in the UK<\/acronym>, so there has been no easy democratic solution to the growing tensions.<\/p>\n

However, declining British imperialism has found a valuable source of \u2018life-support\u2019. US<\/acronym> imperialism has awarded the UK<\/acronym> state the local franchise to manage imperial and corporate interests in the North-East Atlantic. Therefore, the current political strategy of the British ruling class, designed to maintain its power over these islands, has enjoyed the support of both the Clinton and Bush administrations.<\/p>\n

The leaders of the key states in the European Union have been unhappy over UK<\/acronym> politicians\u2019 closeness to the US<\/acronym>. Despite these differences, they still give backing to the UK<\/acronym> government, when it comes to dealing with problems \u2018in its own backyard\u2019. The EU has adopted a policy non-interference in the UK<\/acronym>\u2019s constitutional affairs, since the leaders of countries like France, Spain and Italy do not want to create a precedent for their own state\u2019s national\/regional movements. However, the Spanish government has recently had to experience the indignity of a European Parliament vote advocating a peaceable settlement of the Basque Question. However, the model being sought is based on the UK<\/acronym> state-directed \u2018Peace Process\u2019 in \u2018The Six Counties\u2019. Therefore, the current UK<\/acronym> strategy, for dealing with problematic national movements in Western Europe, has become the accepted model.<\/p>\n

ii) The British ruling class only reforms the Union after overwhelming pressure<\/h4>\n

How is the prospect of an \u2018independence referendum\u2019 likely to be viewed by the British ruling class and the UK<\/acronym> state? The British ruling class has learned many lessons in how to preserve its power and influence, throughout these islands and the wider world, in the face of both working class and national democratic challenges. It has devised a number of strategies for dealing with national democratic opposition. These range from outright repression, through internal cooption, to externally imposed subordination. The UK<\/acronym> is a unionist, not a unitary, state, so the British ruling class has been able to adopt new political arrangements for its constituent nations, whenever national tensions arose, e.g. Direct Rule, Administrative Devolution, Political Devolution\/Home Rule, or indirect political control (e.g. in the former Irish Free State between 1922 and 1937\/48). Federalism has also been toyed with on occasion.<\/p>\n

The preferred option of the majority of the British ruling, at present, is the internal cooption of the main parties fronting the national movements in \u2018The Six Counties\u2019, Scotland and Wales. This means promoting a \u2018Devolution-all-round\u2019 policy. However, Devolution in the UK<\/acronym> has had a chequered history.<\/p>\n

It was the growing strength of the Irish national movement, in the late nineteenth century, which persuaded the liberal wing of the British ruling class, led initially by Gladstone, to support Irish Home Rule – or Devolution, as it is now called. Liberals were split between Home-Rulers, and Imperial Direct Rulers, over the running of Ireland, Scotland and Wales. This reflected wider British ruling class divisions over the issue.<\/p>\n

The Tories, gung-ho supporters of triumphant British imperialism, were able to block Home Rule. Opposing the Third Irish Home Rule Bill of 1912, the Tories were supported by the anti-democratic House of Lords, the British Army High Command, the Ulster Unionists, and the loyalist paramilitaries of the Ulster Volunteer Force. Yet, their stance was so rigid that it led to departure of the \u2018Twenty Six Counties\u2019 from the UK<\/acronym> state in 1921, after the dramatic impact of the 1914-18 First World War, and the 1916-21 International Revolutionary Wave.<\/p>\n

Eventually, the immediate pressure of the Irish democratic challenge was contained through the partitionist, 1921 Anglo-Irish Treaty and by British backing for the anti-Republicans in the 1922-3 Irish Civil War. Home Rule was only implemented in \u2018The Six Counties\u2019, the one area where opposition to it had previously been strongest! The ensuing Stormont Home Rule model was hardly a glowing advertisement for advocates of Scottish and Welsh Home Rule! Home Rule largely fell off the political agenda in Scotland and Wales, although some sentimental support still remained.<\/p>\n

In the late 1960\u2019s, when national democratic opposition arose once again, first in Wales, followed by Scotland, a Royal Commission was established under Lord Crowther, replaced after his death by Lord Kilbrandon. The final report indicated that the liberal wing of the ruling class had returned to Devolution as a model to maintain control of their state, in the face of the new challenges.<\/p>\n

The initial massive protests in \u2018The Six Counties\u2019, however, were conducted under a Civil Rights, not a National Rights, banner. It was the violence of the local \u2018Six Counties\u2019, and the wider UK<\/acronym>, state responses to this campaign, which redirected the struggle onto an Irish national democratic road, led by Republicans. The shooting of 13 unarmed demonstrators in Derry, on \u2018Bloody Sunday\u2019, January 30th, 1972, was a key event in this change. An unintended side-effect of the conflict was the closure of the province\u2019s own devolved parliament, the notorious, sectarian Stormont, in March 1972. This placed \u2018The Six Counties\u2019 under UK<\/acronym> Direct Rule for the first time since Irish partition, just like Scotland and Wales.<\/p>\n

From then on, liberal British unionists pushed a devolutionary strategy, not just for Scotland and Wales, but for Northern Ireland too. Indeed, the latter became their number one political priority. Quite obviously, the liberals\u2019 ideal Stormont had to appear different from its recently deceased predecessor. British unionist\/Irish nationalist \u2018power sharing\u2019 was the liberals\u2019 aim. The Sunningdale Agreement was set up in December 1973. Unfortunately, liberal unionism, in the form of a few \u2018moderate\u2019 Ulster Unionists and the Alliance Party, turned out to be a rather weak creature. For a long time, though, the UK<\/acronym> state had more success with the moderate nationalists of the SDLP<\/acronym>. However, neither of the large Ulster unionist (Protestant) parties, nor their loyalist-voting base, were prepared to accept \u2018power-sharing\u2019 with Irish (Catholic) nationalists.<\/p>\n

Therefore, the hard-liners amongst the Ulster Unionist Party, and its even more reactionary competitors, such as the DUP<\/acronym> and semi-fascist Vanguard Party, were able to mount a reactionary counter-offensive. This delivered the knock-out blow, which overthrew Sunningdale\u2019s reformed Stormont proposals, in May 1973. The loyalist paramilitaries, in the UVF<\/acronym> and UDA<\/acronym>, and the RUC<\/acronym> and UDR<\/acronym>, all played their part too. And, behind the scenes, they received backing from significant sections of the UK<\/acronym> state security services.<\/p>\n

When it came to Scottish, and even more so to Welsh, Devolution the Labour Party itself was split. This allowed the two Labour government-initiated Devolution campaigns, and the 1979 referenda, to be undermined from within. Those sections of the UK<\/acronym> state beyond direct parliamentary accountability also resorted to a number of unsavoury tactics. The \u2018non-political\u2019 Queen was wheeled out to attack those wanting to reform the UK<\/acronym> state, military exercises were directed at a putative, nationalist, armed challenge in Scotland, and agent provocateur activity was promoted on the ultra-nationalist fringe. In Wales, the largely English-speaking South was played off against the more Welsh-speaking North.<\/p>\n

Nevertheless, the overwhelmingly constitutionalist nature of the national challenges in Scotland and Wales, ensured that the UK<\/acronym> state did not need to resort to the full armoury of Crown Powers wielded against the Irish Republicans. The SDLP<\/acronym>, SNP<\/acronym> and Plaid Cymru, all buckled under the pressure. The Scottish and Welsh Devolution proposals were defeated in the 1979 referenda. A minority Labour government had been maintained in office with the help of the Ulster Unionists and an Irish nationalist! The contradictions in pursuing a liberal devolutionary policy, in the face of growing ruling class opposition and declining electoral support, were too much. Labour was soon toppled and replaced by Thatcher\u2019s Tories, now committed to Direct Rule-all round.<\/p>\n

So, it appeared that Home Rule\/Devolution option was a \u2018bridge-too-far\u2019 for the British ruling class, except in the reactionary form, found in \u2018The Six Counties\u2019 from 1922 to 1972. However, a number of political developments were to change this state of affairs and place Devolution firmly on the ruling class agenda.<\/p>\n

iii) The British ruling class abandons hard-line Unionist, Westminster Direct Rule and adopts a \u2018New Unionist\u2019, \u2018Devolution-all-round\u2019 strategy<\/h4>\n

The post-1979, Thatcher-led, Tory government was a strong promoter of UK<\/acronym> plc<\/acronym>, along with its overseas British imperial investments. However, \u2018successful\u2019 ventures, like the Falkland War, could not disguise the final loss of much more significant imperial territories, such as Rhodesia\/Zimbabwe and Hong Kong. Yet, this wider imperial decline only made Thatcher more determined to tighten the bonds that held her core state together \u2013 the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. \u2018The Six Counties\u2019 became the keenly contested front line in her battle. The running of \u2018The Six Counties\u2019 had already effectively been handed over to the British Army and security forces, under the Direct Rule regime introduced by the Tory government, and eventually accepted by the next two Labour governments. Thatcher developed particularly close links to the unaccountable sections of the British state.<\/p>\n

Later, the Tories invented their own inverted form of devolution, through their control of the Scottish Office. Thatcher piloted reactionary legislation in Scotland, most notoriously the hated poll tax in 1988. This proved to be a major miscalculation and provoked a new national democratic opposition in Scotland. The Anti-Poll Tax Campaign, along with the later opposition to the Criminal Justice Bill, Scottish water privatisation proposals, and school closures in Glasgow, provided the eventual base for the formation of the Scottish Socialist Alliance, the predecessor to the Scottish Socialist Party.<\/p>\n

The Tories were more imaginative in Wales, appreciating the divide-and-rule potential of playing Welsh-speakers against English-speakers. They provided selective state support for certain Welsh language cultural initiatives. Nevertheless, even here, assaults on both the mainly English-speaking, South Wales coal-miners, and the mainly Welsh-speaking, North Wales slate quarriers, helped to make more Welsh workers reconsider their previous opposition to Welsh devolution.<\/p>\n

However, the major opposition to Thatcher\u2019s Unionism came from the Republican resistance in \u2018The Six Counties\u2019. Here Thatcher continued the hard line criminalisation policy, initiated by Labour\u2019s Northern Irish Secretary, Roy Mason. She closely allied herself with the reactionary Ulster Unionists. She decided to break the Republican resistance by facing down the IRA<\/acronym> Hunger Strikers in 1981. Wildly underestimating these \u2018criminals\u2019 ability to galvanise the Irish nationalist population, she gloated over the deaths of the hunger strikers, only to witness Bobby Sands elected as Westminster MP<\/acronym> and give a major fillip to the Republican opposition.<\/p>\n

Faced with this wider opposition, Thatcher was forced to abandon her uncritical support for the hard-line Ulster Unionists. Instead she had to seek support both from the SDLP<\/acronym>, whom she had virtually ignored, and from the Irish government, whose own \u2018New Ireland Forum\u2019 recommendations, dealing with \u2018The North\u2019, she had recently denigrated. The Anglo-Irish Agreement of 1985, detested by all Ulster Unionists, because of the role given to the Irish government, was the first step in the UK<\/acronym> ruling class rethink over strategy to maintain the Union.<\/p>\n

The hard-line unionism of Westminster Direct Rule began to slowly give way to liberal \u2018New Unionism\u2019. However, the biggest step taken was the Downing Street Declaration of 1992 when overtures were made to the Republican Movement, with the offer of direct involvement in a reformed, power-sharing Stormont. Devolution was back on the political agenda. However, the Tories were still too tied to the Ulster Unionists for their voting support at Westminster. Ulster Unionists were able to prevent any rapid implementation of this \u2018power-sharing\u2019 strategy. They began their continuing campaign of obstructionism towards liberal Devolution, still harking back to the old reactionary Stormont.<\/p>\n

This is where New Labour stepped in. They took a leaf from Spain\u2019s post-Franco constitutional reforms. These involved \u2018Asymmetrical Devolution\u2019 for Euskadi, Catalunya, Galicia, Andalucia and other areas. The extent of devolved powers depended on the relative strengths of the national and regional movements within the Spanish state. New Labour extended the Tories\u2019 devolutionary proposals for \u2018The Six Counties\u2019 to Scotland, Wales, and potentially to the English regions too.<\/p>\n

This \u2018New Unionist\u2019 project of \u2018Devolution-all-round\u2019 now enjoys the support of the majority of the British ruling class. The old Right opposition, now lacking significant ruling class backing, was \u2018outgunned\u2019 or out-manoeuvred in the 1997-8 Devolution referenda which brought a Parliament to Holyrood, an Assembly to Cardiff Bay, and a promise to reopen Stormont in Northern Ireland under the Good Friday Agreement.<\/p>\n

iv) The \u2018New Unionist\u2019 project dovetails with US<\/acronym>\/UK<\/acronym> imperial plans for the New World Order in the North East Atlantic<\/h4>\n

The Irish government was the \u2018mute\u2019 partner in this \u2018New Unionist\u2019 project. It was awarded a presence in the largely phantom North\/South Ministerial Council, and on the tokenistic Council of the Isles. However, it was not only the Irish government that provided backing to this project. President Clinton visited Belfast to show the US<\/acronym> state\u2019s full support for the Good Friday Agreement. Bush has continued with this support. 9\/11 has enabled the US<\/acronym> administration to exert additional pressure on Irish Republicans to end all \u2018terrorist\u2019 activity. The UK<\/acronym> government can also depend on the backing of the major EU powers.<\/p>\n

The \u2018New Unionist\u2019 strategy to co-opt and to tame any national democratic opposition dovetailed perfectly with the British ruling class strategy being developed to maintain an imperial presence in the world. Taking on the role of US<\/acronym> imperialism\u2019s staunchest European ally, the British ruling class has been awarded the North-East Atlantic franchise for the maintenance of the \u2018New World Order\u2019. The UK<\/acronym> state, with its devolved administrations, and with the help of a subordinate Irish state partner, has created an agreed political framework for these islands. This allows the global corporations to pursue an aggressive neo-liberal policy of privatisation and deregulation, the better to maximise corporate profits. And, through the Irish and British \u2018social partnerships\u2019, trade union leaders can be depended upon to throw their weight behind the various \u2018New Unionist\u2019 institutions too.<\/p>\n

The supporters of the old hard line Right have not gone away, particularly in \u2018The Six Counties\u2019. Here, they have continued to slow down the \u2018New Unionist\u2019 project, but as yet, they have not persuaded any significant section of the British ruling class to completely abandon it, or to give them the unqualified support Thatcher initially gave to the Ulster Unionists from 1979-85. Yet, Paisley\u2019s hard-line DUP<\/acronym> has managed to water-down the nationalist-accommodating elements of the Good Friday Agreement and protect privileges for the local middle class, in return for his acceptance of British government measures designed to advance neo-liberal economic objectives in \u2018The Six Counties\u2019. This is the essence of the new \u2018deal\u2019 made at St. Andrews in October 2006.<\/p>\n

Nevertheless, the British ruling class\u2019s overall \u2018New Unionist\u2019 strategy for these islands still has more powerful backers, domestically and abroad, than any previous ruling class strategy to maintain the UK<\/acronym>. This is the political context in which any campaign to win an \u2018independence referendum\u2019 and the subsequent vote must be considered.<\/p>\n

v) The response of the UK<\/acronym> state to a campaign to win political independence for Scotland<\/h4>\n

SNP<\/acronym> leader, Alex Salmond, has declared that if there were to be an SNP<\/acronym>-led Scottish Executive, after the May 2007 Holyrood elections, it would enact legislation within 100 days to permit an \u2018independence referendum\u2019 to be held. However, the referendum itself would not be organised until considerably later[1]<\/sup><\/a>Alex Salmond, letter to The Herald<\/cite>, 30.8.06<\/a><\/span><\/span>