Padraig Mac Saoirse is something of a legend in leftist circles, having been involved in almost all the major and minor parties of the Irish left in an active political life of almost 60 years. In that time he has matured from the rash young firebrand of the Trinity Trotskyist movement to the more sober and mature figurehead of numerous parties from the Young Socialists to the International Anarchist Movement. His restlessness was a sign of both increasing commitment to the socialist cause and increasing disillusionment with the various parties he was involved with. Eschewing all forms of personal promotion, he has been a major influence in every movement he was part of.
While he has been criticized as the purist ne plus ultra, he has recently surprised his colleagues and friends by forming a new party, the Recreational Socialist party of Ireland. This party is designed to re-create socialism, to realign it with its original intentions. Fearful of creating a personality cult, Mac Saoirse avoids all photography and does not do interviews. He has agreed though to allow the publication of a dialogue between the two of us, which he has had ample opportunity to comment on. Mac Saoirse is referred to as Mac. I am referred to as Int.
Mac :Socialism has become corrupt , and has become prone to incorrect interpretation. One of the biggest obstacles is the confusion of Marxism with democratic notions, and the mixing of socialism with political parties. It cannot be done as the whole notion of political parties per se creates the illusion of choice when in fact there is none. It doesn’t matter whether it’s Obama or Mc Cain, Fine gael or Fianna Fail, the Socialist workers party or the PD’s ; for the proletariat there is no change. For the capitalist overlords there is no change. Middlle class self-righteous moralists may take some succour in political parties, but that is a form of escapism. Political parties are a product of the capitalist chimera of choice and no self-respecting socialist should have anything to do with them”.
This is what has happened with Chomráid Chavez in Venezuela. He has fallen under the spell of popular approval, forgetting that the revolution when it comes will not be based on bourgeois ideas such as “approval” or “democracy” but on the overthrow of those ideas and those hierarchies of ideology. And the ultimate Armageddon of the confrontation of the capitalists and the proletariat.
Int : But can you have a party without some form of approval ?? I mean, even by its own members ?
Mac :Now we get to the nub of it. Listen to me. You cannot. Yet you must. I repeat. You cannot. Yet you must. What is unique about the Recreational Socialist Party of Ireland is that one of our first acts is to denounce our own existence. We will be the first to put ourselves up against the wall when the revolution comes. This is the only way in which the purity of the revolution can be maintained. Our role at best is catalytical.
Int : But surely that is suicidal ?
Mac : “That is the choice. Either to be first up against the wall, or to be crushed by the proletariat. The former is the more noble.”
Int : So there can be no organisation ?
Mac : The only organisation that matters will spontaneously evolve from the proletariat.
Int :Isn’t this anarchy ?
Mac : No, it isn’t anything that can be recognised because our terms and structures of recognition are based on capitalistic ideology. What occurs will occur outside this ideology.
Int : So what is the role of the revolutionary?
The role of the revolutionary is to wait, to patiently wait, and be prepared to act at all times. This readiness must be coupled with the commitment to never act as all action is determined and provoked by capitalist ideology. The proletariat are the only ones who can be freed of this taint. I cannot and you cannot. We are born bourgeois and remain so to our dying days.
The history of revolution thus far is the history of failure in all cases. We see a creeping revanchement in China, Russia and even beloved Cuba. The international and clandestine forces of capitalism remain strong so the revolutionary must be patient, and ready to pay the ultimate sacrifice at a moment’s notice.
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