Liam Mac Uaid reviews "The real Irish peace process" (Craig/McAnulty/Flannigan) published by Socialist Democracy.
The Omagh bomb has virtually silenced all those voices critical of the new imperialist settlement in Ireland, particularly those for whom leaving bombs in shopping centres was, until recently, a perfectly justifiable tactic.
However there are still small pockets of dissent and "The real Irish peace process" is its most articulate expression, offering a choice other than blowing people up and embracing Blair, Trimble and Clinton as the heroes of Irish politics.
This book is important for many reasons. It is an account of a 30 year struggle against imperialism which has ended with the major protagonists of that struggle making their peace with imperialism. It is an attempt to understand and explain that history from a Marxist point of view and it concludes by trying to see what possibilities for resistance to imperialism in Ireland are still available.
It is also a group of socialists, formerly known as Peoples Democracy, examining their own history and trying to learn from it.
The first big question the authors seek to answer is why Britain has spent around £25 billion to defend the democratic rights of 900,000 loyalists.
Churlishly disregarding the innate nobility of Britain's rulers they seek clues in economics and politics. Britain is still a big player in the world's financial markets, large chunks of the Irish economy are owned by British or other imperialist powers, and a defeat for Britain in Ireland, such as a forced withdrawal, would be a major threat Britain's own political stability.
The authors maintain that Britain remains in Ireland because it still does have imperial interests there, a view which is no longer even mentioned in polite society in Britain or Ireland.
The evolution of ideas is also discussed in well deserved detail. The talks between John Hume and Gerry Adams resulted in what the authors judge to be a big ideological success for Hume. Those who doubt this need only listen to both men speak.
There is often now no perceptible difference in what they say. This is not surprising.
Without a commitment to armed struggle Republicanism is very reliant on ideas from other sources and, in a period of retreat, these will as often be drawn from the right as from the left.
As well as reviewing history, the authors offer an alternative of their own.
They sumarise it as "the creation of a mass political movement in the whole of the country capable of removing partition and British rule by destroying both reactionary states on the island."
They are confident that it is possible, not just because we saw the embryo of one in the late 1960s and early 70s, but also because the peace process offering dreams of change and the return to Stormont at the same time.
History hasn't finished yet!