Yorkist-Socialism

Yorkist-Socialism
Yorkist-Socialism was developed among the working class citizens of York and Yorkshire, during and after the revolution of ’01. It is a socialist theory incorporating elements of Trotskyism and Marxism, alongside nationalist Yorkist sentiments based on ‘Tyke pride’ and the supposed destiny of Yorkshire. It’s goal is the self-emancipation of the working classes, beginning in Yorkshire. It is difficult to define exactly, since it is not the work of any one theorist but the product of an entire movement, and therefore many of it’s positions and statements are vague, contradictory and variable. This article describes only those themes which are common to almost all strands of Yorkist-Socialist thought.

Religious Basis of Yorkist-Socialism
The influence of Scandinavian settlers, ‘Vikings’, in the early middle ages left a deep mark in the culture of the North. Although they have been nominally Christian after the Norman conquest, the influence of the Old Gods amongst the people of the North never completely died out, coexisting with Christian ideas in an odd amalgam of superstitions. Indeed, this influence persisted in the North, long after it had been eradicated from Scandinavia itself.

Yorkist-Socialism is partly an integration of Socialist ideas into this belief system. The word ‘ragnarok’ is used interchangeably with ‘revolution’, for example. Belief in ragnarok is central in Socialist versions of the Norse faith, where the last battle is seen as the prelude to a new and better world, and world revolution as the natural expression of ragnarok within midgard (the sphere of existence inhabited by mortal people, matter, energy and reality, which is immediately accessible to humans). The progress of the revolution is the progress of ragnarok; it both shapes it and is shaped by it.

A warrior ethic is also central to Yorkist-Socialism. The ideology is, indeed, a military strategy as well as a political system. In the battle of liberation, the identity of the worker will ‘die’, and they will become warriors of the one cause: Einherjar. Yorkist-Socialism is insistent that a prolonged, military struggle is necessary, not only to throw off the capitalist class, but to transform the workers into a coherent unit capable of constructing a socialist system.

Class Analysis through Conflict
Yorkist-Socialists analyse class in terms of class war, and hold that class only truly attains realisation in open conflict. According to Yorkist-Socialist theorists, class is vague and indistinct so long as the class struggle is smouldering beneath the surface. However, as that struggle escalates into open battle, class becomes absolute. After the battle is won, class becomes non-existent.

Anti-Militarism
Although they are concerned with war and the idea of the worker as a warrior, Yorkist-Socialism is extremely anti-militaristic. The division of the workers into ‘soldiers’ and ‘civilians’ is held to be one of the primary evils of capitalism, according to Yorkist-Socialist ideas. Rather than a caste of soldiers, professional fighters whose job is war, Yorkist-Socialists propose that each and every worker is a warrior, and that going to war is not a job or profession, but a duty, an honour and a destiny that manifests itself in each person when the time is right. The professional armies of other nations are, therefore, a deformed imitation of ‘real’ soldiery. For this reason, Yorkist-Socialist armies have eschewed uniforms, preferring simple marks such as shirts, or arm or head cloths, of distinctive colours (red obviously being prominent).

The Role and Destiny of Yorkshire
The central theme of Yorkist-Socialism is that Yorkshire, and it’s capital the, city of York, are destined to come to the forefront of the international socialist movement. This destiny is a fusion of mystical and mythic forces and historical, material ones, which supposedly make the rise of Yorkshire inevitable.

References are often made, when discussing the history of Yorkshire, to the wars of the roses, and Richard of York, who famously renounced his title and estates, along with his claim to the throne, creating the York commune, and adopting the peasant ‘Norse’ religion, in rejection of Christianity. (This is what Yorkist-Socialists call the ‘peasant socialism’ of the wars.) The Lancastrian king, faced with a virulent radical ideology that seriously threatened his power-base, eventually crushed Richard and sacked York, but only after an extensive campaign. While they are cautious to attach too much significance to these events, occurring as they did in a pre-capitalist society, Yorkist-Socialists do see them as foreshadowing later events. Yorkist symbols, and stylised images of Richard’s face, often appear on banners, t-shirts, badges and in graffiti associated with the ideology of Yorkist-Socialism. There is even some evidence of it being known as ‘Richardism’ in the early days of it’s creation.

Yorkshire, it is claimed, was among the first places in the world to undergo the industrial revolution, which established capitalist modes of production: it will also be among the first to transcend capitalism, and arrive at a classless society. Immediately thereafter it will establish a ‘Unique Kind of State’ which will act as the mechanism by which revolution spreads outwards to the world at large. The Unique Kind of State is vaguely described, but it is insisted that it will be different from all previous workers’ states and all existing capitalist states. It will engage in battles, ideological and martial, with capitalist nations, alongside other communist states. These battles will help to develop it, and will eventually lead to it’s dissolution, and Worldwide Socialism.