At the moment, it is unusual for a DAIC meeting to have more than ten people present, and more than 15 is practically a conference. The numbers involved in activity have fallen dramatically, as have the number of activities organised. This talk is about whether this is just something peculiar to these two campaigns, or inevitable when activists organise around a single issue, as opposed to a broad revolutionary programme, and what our response to this should be.

The problem of declining involvement is part and parcel of the way these campaigns are run, the way they have to be run. It is practically impossible for small groups, such as DAIC and TUF were, even at their peak, to make something an issue for the general public, or that sector of the public at which the campaign is aimed. Because the campaign can only really operate when the issue is in the news, most often for reasons beyond our control, the activity of the campaign proceeds in long lulls, followed by bursts of frantic activity. Without any sustained activity, there seems to be no reason for the campaign to exist, and people just drift away.

This is more obvious in the case of TUF, organised as it was to fight the 'social partnership' programmes. With that as its basis, the activity had to be cyclic, but without any larger numbers getting involved the campaign could only take on such a specific issue. DAIC started small, expanded rapidly with the 'X' case, with small bursts of growth around the abortion referenda and various court cases, but after each small growth it rapidly went back to the same dozen or so people, and started the long slow decline once more.

This is the pattern that we see with most single issue campaigns. Unless they can very quickly reach a critical mass at which stage they become newsworthy in themselves, and not just because the issue they fight is newsworthy, they will start to die back as their activities have less and less of an impact. Of course, the campaigns are still worth fighting, as long as we avoid the Scylla and Charybdis of, on the one hand expecting campaigns to last forever when they have lost all impact, and on the other, hopping from campaign to campaign in an effort to keep up with whatever the current issue is.

Revolutionary Organisations

So, if you always judge the length of a campaign correctly, and work on an issue for as long as it is feasible, but no more, what point is there in joining a revolutionary organisation? Well, the simple answer to that is, because you're a revolutionary! If the changes you want to make in society go beyond the relatively small (though still important issues) like that of abortion information, then your activism shouldn't be limited to those issues.

There is also a danger that, if you work only on issues that come up, you will tend to concentrate on one issue to the extent that the others are sidelined, and the most important thing is winning that particular campaign - losing sight of the wider reasons why that campaign is important, or you will gradually drift out of activity altogether, because of the lack of continuity.

The alternative is to join a revolutionary organisation, where you continue to work on issues as they arise, but you also work on the long-term project of socialism. Of course, this means investing some time in activities that may not be as immediately effective as fighting the PCW, in the sense that you often don't have so concrete an accomplishment to look back on. But that's just because its a longer struggle, and there are still smaller campaigns to be worked on, with their own victories.

Within the campaign, the organisation provides continuity, activists who have learned of the campaigns that have been fought in the past, what mistakes were made, what things succeeded, and who are experienced in the day-to-day work of drawing up leaflets, fly-posting, collections, licking envelopes, whatever. For members, the organisation, is a support network, where you know that people can fill in for you when you're just too tired to stand on O'Connell Street giving out leaflets for the millionth time. And for the organisation, involvement in campaigns means that we get to test our politics, wher it matters, in the concrete experience of struggle.

The important thing is, if you want a society where people are free and equal, have a decent standard of living and don't have to worry about what happens if they lose their job, if one of the kids gets sick, or they can't afford to go to college, or whatever it may be - you're not going to get there by campaigning for this bit of freedom, that bit of equality, and a little more security all round though they still have to be campaigned for. You need a fundamental change in society, and that has to be campaigned for in itself. Perhaps, though, people feel that it is no longer possible to organise on a class basis, around class struggle, and single issues are all that can be fought.