Irish Examiner journalist picks up award for Workers’ Party book

A HISTORY of the Workers’ Party written by Irish Examiner journalist Scott Millar and historian Brian Hanley has won the prestigious Brian Farrell prize for the best political science book published last year.

The award was presented to the authors by the Political Studies Association of Ireland (PSAI) at the weekend. After accepting the award for the book, The Lost Revolution: The Story of the Official IRA and the Workers’ Party, from PSAI president Professor Gary Murphy, Dr Hanley said he was honoured to be recognised by his academic peers for the work, which took over five years to research and write.

Dr Hanley said. “The importance and impact on modern Ireland of the Workers’ Party and its predecessor organisations has long been underplayed, both due to the bitter split within the party when it was at its political high-point in 1992 and a tendency to downplay the importance of left-wing movements in a largely conservative society.”

The Lost Revolution traces the story of what became know as the official republican movement from the first involvement of its leading figures such as Cathal Goulding, Tomás Mac Giolla and Sean Garland in violent nationalism in the 1950s through the split with the Provisionals to becoming one of western Europe’s most successful hard-left parties in the late 1980s.

During this period the political party, which grew out of what had become known as the Official IRA following the 1969 republican split, changed its name from Sinn Féin to Sinn Féin the Workers’ Party to eventually jut the Workers’ Party in 1982.

Among the significant figures who cut their teeth within the official republican movement and whose careers are traced in the book are Labour Party leader Eamon Gilmore, commentator Eoghan Harris and former trade union leader Des Geraghty.

The award, named after veteran RTÉ political broadcaster Brian Farrell, was given as part of the PSAI’s 2010 annual conference, which took place in Dublin at the weekend. The theme of this year’s conference was Communicating Politics and seminars included discussions on dissident republicanism and “Electoral Politics in Ireland and Eurovision”.