Delves into the internal politics and personalities that brought life to the Irish Socialist Republican Party. The political significance of the organisation led by James Connolly is viewed in both the international and national sphere. The legacy of theISRP has had an impact on the left wing and republican movements in Ireland for many decades.

This book analyzes the underlying reasons behind the formation of the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA), its development, where this current in Irish republicanism is at present and its prospects for the future. Tommy McKearney, a former IRA member who was part of the 1980 hunger strike, challenges the misconception that the Provisional IRA was only, or even wholly, about ending partition and uniting Ireland. He argues that while these objectives were always the core and headline demands of the organization, opposition to the old Northern Ireland state was a major dynamic for the IRA’s armed campaign. As he explores the makeup and strategy of the IRA he is not uncritical, examining alternative options available to the movement at different periods, arguing that its inability to develop a clear socialist program has limited its effectiveness and reach. This authoritative and engaging history provides a fascinating insight into the workings and dynamics of a modern resistance movement.

This is the first comprehensive study of the IRA's attempts to create a "social republicanism," a marriage between militant nationalism and the politics of the left.

This new biography explores the neglected life and political career of Sean Murray, who went from an unremarkable, rural, northern Catholic upbringing to General Secretary of the Communist Party of Ireland, and was one of the most prominent left-wing thinkers of his era. An Irish War of Independence volunteer, anti-Treaty republican, and graduate of the International Lenin School in Moscow, Murray rooted himself in the key Irish labor, republican, and international struggles of his time. Using previously untapped sources, the book uncovers the details of Murray's IRA activities during the Irish revolutionary period, his significant contribution to the 1932 outdoor relief strike and the short-lived Republican Congress initiative, and his crucial role in organizing the Irish contingent of the International Brigades in the Spanish Civil War. Shining a spotlight on Murray's close personal and political relationships with Peadar O'Donnell, Frank Ryan, Jim Larkin Jr., Hanna Sheehy Skeffington, and many others, the book reveals how cross-pollination between the Irish socialist and left republican movements was maintained by virtue of these relationships. This is a story of how, in the face of adversity (the coercive measures of the Unionist state and "red scare" tactics of Catholic Ireland) Sean Murray left a significant imprint on Irish leftist politics through his work as an activist and organizer, a prolific writer, a propagandist, and a theorist. [Subject: Biography, Irish Studies, Political History]

This is a wide-ranging analysis of the internal dynamics of Irish republicanism between the outbreak of ‘the Troubles’ in 1969 and the Good Friday Agreement of 1998. Engaging a vast array of hitherto unused primary sources alongside original and re-used oral history interviews, ‘The Age-Old Struggle’ draws upon the words and writings of more than 250 Irish republicans. This book scrutinises the movement's historical and contemporary complexity, the variety of influences within Irish republicanism, and divergent republican responses at pivotal moments in the conflict. Yet it also assesses the centripetal forces which connected republican organisations through decades of struggle. Across five thematic chapters, ‘The Age-Old Struggle’ offers new insights into republicanism’s multi-layered interactions with the global ’68, tactical and strategic change, revolutionary socialism, feminism, and religion. Drawing on political periodicals, ephemera, and interviews with activists throughout the ranks of several republican groups, the book roots its analysis in republicanism’s temporal and spatial complexity. It contends that the cultural significance of place, interactions with class and revolutionary politics, and shifting intra-movement networks are essential to understanding the movement’s dynamics since 1969.

"'This book is a fresh and exciting look at Irish radicalism in the early twentieth century, which puts the labour movement at the centre of socialist agitation and adds immensely to our understanding of the era', Brian Hanley, Institute of Irish Studies, University of Liverpool, co-author of The lost revolution: the story of the Official IRA and the Workers' Party (2009). 'Grant's book takes a fresh and stimulating approach to the politics of the labour movement and republicanism in early twentieth-century Ireland. A useful, provocative and engaging study, it should be read by all those with an interest in the history of social radicalism on this island', Fintan Lane, author of The origins of modern Irish socialism, 1818-1896 (2007). This book examines Irish socialist republicanism in the early part of the 20th century. Previous studies of the subject have pointed to the left wing of the IRA as the prime instigator of the movement. Here, socialist republicanism is examined in detail from the perspective of the Labour movement alongside the IRA and other republican groups for the first time. The result is an enlightening account of the many connections and alliances that existed between republicans, socialists, communists and others. The reader is provided with a narrative that explains the many twists and turns in both mainstream and radical Irish politics in the period."--Publisher's website.