Socialism, nationalism and Ireland
Before and during the Second International there were many different approaches to the questions of socialism and nationalism. In Ireland James Connolly banked on nationalists taking a positive attitude towards the cause of labour. In his next article Marc Mulholland will look at Ireland’s conservative revolution
The liberal republicanism coming out of the French Revolution had generally aimed for a radical reconfiguration of Europe’s boundaries. The old dynastic states, jerry-built constructions assembled by conquest and inheritance, should be replaced by ‘nation states’, which would meld together pan-class ‘communities of fate’, built upon common language, ethnicity and historical experience.