Eoin Ó Broin’s Sinn Féin and the Politics of Left Republicanism (Pluto Books) looked like a timely book when it came out a few weeks ago.  Events since have only emphasised the relevance of its argument.
The book opens with a trenchant defence of Sinn Féin against allegations that is an authoritarian, quasi-fascist movement. Ó Broin acknowledges [...]

In the second pamphlet on Italy from the archives of the Irish Socialist Network, which I’m republishing here to coincide with the two recent Perry Anderson essays on the Italian centre right and its ‘invertebrate left‘, the story goes back to the rise of the left in Italy towards the end of the Second World [...]

In two superb essays published in the London Review of Books recently, Perry Anderson describes the politics of Italy’s Second Republic in the context of the consolidation of power by Silvio Berlusconi and the recent history of the Italian Left, respectively. These are worth reading by anyone interested in politics and contempory European history in [...]

Recently on South Belfast Diary I leaked the draft Section 8 of Labour’s 21st Century Commission, dealing with Party organisation in Northern Ireland. Since 2002, the Irish Labour Party has allowed membership in the North. We have actively participated in conferences and have had an NEC co-opted member, Mark Langhammer. More to the [...]