Top Issue 1-2024

18 November 2004 Edition

Resize: A A A Print

The heart of the matter?

BOOK REVIEW

New Sinn Féin

By Agnes Maillot

Published by Routledge

€23.30/£15.99

"New Labour with guns" was how comedian Jeremy Hardy caricatured Sinn Féin as he compered the West Belfast Festival comedy night in 2003. Yes, we did laugh but perhaps with the realisation that there were many in Irish political and public life who would want to make a real life analogy between the two parties' recent histories as a method of negating Sinn Féin's growing success and political strength.

It would be easy then, to write off Sinn Féin's rising political and electoral successes as having been won at the cost of undermining and eroding the core beliefs of socialist republicanism.

However, a read of Agnes Maillot's new text on the party would quickly undermine the comparison, despite her book's title, New Sinn Féin — Irish Republicanism in the 21st century.

Maillot has written a unique book and it is a forensic examination of the party's development and strategies. Republicans will find it hard to read not because of any profound disagreement with her contents or analysis, though there are clearly some. Rather, it is difficult, but still compelling, to sit through someone else's analysis of what it is we are about.

It's a bit like coming home to find a camera crew ready to screen a reality TV programme of your life. But how could they even begin to have any real insight into what we were living through, what we were thinking?

HUGE TASK

I wonder when Maillot set out to write this book had she any notion of the gargantuan task that awaited her. She has picked a rather large canvas to develop her themes on in that essentially this book tries to answer three questions.

They are firstly, where has Sinn Féin come from, being Ireland's oldest political party, but also the newest in terms of breaking into, or better still breaking up, the cosy cartels of Irish politics?

Then there is the question of where the current franchise holders are taking the party and finally, but most importantly, what is the real political character of Sinn Féin?

The book then, is part a history interwoven with a seemingly endless series of tests from Maillot as to Sinn Féin's political agenda. It seems that this is driven by three factors.

One is that Maillot herself wants to be convinced as to the party's core political ideology. She writes that Sinn Féin has "succeeded in presenting itself to its electorate as the voice of radicalism while fitting into the mainstream" and later that though "it aims to become the only authentic socialist party of the island", the party's tactics are "also populist in nature".

The second is that this is an incredibly fair analysis of the party, given that it comes against a background of a dearth of similar work and a wide range of those who would deny Sinn Féin's commitment to a united, just and equal Ireland.

LEFT WING OR NATIONALIST?

Indeed, Maillot does note and reference the opinions in this vein of Fintan O'Toole and Ruairí Quinn on one side. Quinn describes Sinn Féin as "an extreme nationalist party. They are not a socialist party and a vote for men like Ferris is a vote for Le Pen".

Then there are the opposing views of those like Mary Harney, who talks about Sinn Féin's "extremely left wing policies that have been abandoned by others".

The third factor driving Maillot's investigation is that there is no template, Irish or international, with which to measure or compare what Sinn Féin really is and how the party is developing.

This is the crux of her text. Maillot takes the reader through the origins of modern Sinn Féin, with a particularly detailed analysis of the party's development from the 1960s to the present day. Maillot probes consistently for what she perceives are the flaws in the party's egalitarian and republican policies.

For example, Maillot queries the party on its policies on racism and immigration and finds them wanting at times. She writes that Sinn Féin's policy on racism, though a "comprehensive document", also "reads like an anti-racist pledge".

There is, though, reference to the party's unparalleled engagement with the Travelling Community, Alex Maskey's commitments to all ethnic communities during his time as Mayor of Belfast and the assertion by Martin Ferris in an interview with the author that racism had be combated by "being brave, not facing down, even if we lose votes".

LITMUS TEST

Still though, Maillot concludes that "the manner in which Sinn Féin constructs and pursues a policy that is truly radical could be the litmus test of its ideological commitment to the defence of the most vulnerable".

Also under scrutiny is the party's record on gender, with a detailed piece on the debates within the party on abortion and Sinn Féin's commitment to gender equality. There is also an analysis, albeit a limited one, on the economic policies of the party and how they fit in with our socialist republican ethos.

Perhaps the main strength of this book is also a small weakness. Maillot is, for an academic, in uncharted territory here. There are no other published studies of the party to my knowledge that have the depth of careful thought and analysis that this book has.

It is because of this that the book has to explain in a lot of detail about Sinn Féin. The problem, though, is that running to 200 plus pages, the book spends a lot of its narrative telling the reader who Sinn Féin really are, leaving Maillot with not enough space maybe to really get to grips with how it all hangs together for the members, activists and organisers who make up the party today.

There are sections, though, where she gets the heart of the matter. For example, she sees the fear of institutionalisation, as the party engages with the politics of Leinster House and with a Northern Assembly, and she understands that Sinn Féin sees the current political challenges as only another chapter in a longer term struggle.

HARD QUESTIONS

It is these nuggets that make the book such a refreshing read. It is also unique in that Maillot conducted extensive interviews with party activists across all sections of the party and it is the first time that such a well researched analysis has ever been published.

It would have been easy to write a negative piece about Sinn Féin, as many others have done. It is all the more difficult to write such a challenging analysis. For those coming to Sinn Féin, it is an excellent introduction and it will take a lot to surpass it.

For republicans reading this it is a test, partially because of our tendency at times to take umbrage easily but most importantly because along the way Maillot asks some interesting questions about what Sinn Féin is and what we want it to be in coming years. Read this book.

BY ROBBIE SMYTH


An Phoblacht
44 Parnell Sq.
Dublin 1
Ireland