The Politics of James Connolly

Writing from a revolutionary Marxist perspective, Kieran Allen situates Connolly within the framework of the socialist 2nd international and aims to show how its theoretical inadequacies account for many of Connolly's own ambiguities and failings. While applauding Connolly's unflinching commitment to anti-imperialist struggle and social revolution, Allen argues that he never understood the importance of class in the Irish republican movement, thus failing to build an independent revolutionary party of the Irish working class. The book traces the consequences of this failure, and aims to show how it remains a failing in the Irish Left today.