Eamonn McCann

Eamonn McCann   (activist)
Born	10 March 1943
Nationality	British, Irish?
Alma mater	St. Columb's College, Queen's University Belfast
Northern Irish journalist, writer and activist. He was one of the organizers of the march against internment without trial which in 1972 gave rise to the events of Bloody Sunday.

Eamonn McCann is a Northern Irish journalist, writer and activist. He was one of the organizers of the march against internment without trial which, on January 30, 1972 gave rise to the events of Bloody Sunday.

Early life and education

McCann was born and has lived most of his life in Derry. Raised Catholic, he attended St. Columb's College and is prominently featured in the documentary film, The Boys of St. Columb's. He later attended Queen's University Belfast, where he was president of the Literary and Scientific Society, the university's debating society.

Activism

At university McCann began to take an active interest in politics and, for a time in the 1960s, served in the Irish Workers Group, a Trotskyist-inspired organization. When a civil rights movement developed in Northern Ireland in the second half of the 1960s, McCann was one of the founders of the Derry Housing Action Committee (a radical group that focused its work on access to housing), who, together with the Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association (NICRA), organized the march from Belfast to Derry which, on 5 October 1968, was attacked by Protestant extremists backed by the Royal Ulster Constabulary and the B-Specials (auxiliary police force composed of only Protestants, later abolished) near the Burntollet Bridge, near Derry. The attack on the march (filmed on television) is considered one of the key moments in the history of the province and many point to it as the beginning of the Troubles. In those years McCann was one of Derry's best-known personalities, participating in all the significant events of the period, such as the "Battle of the Bogside" in August 1969 or the march that triggered the events of Bloody Sunday on January 30, 1972.

Political activity

McCann, a Trotskyist and staunch atheist, is an important member of the Socialist Workers Party and was a candidate in various elections in 2004, 2005 and 2007. In the 1970s he had also been a candidate for the Northern Ireland Labor Party. He is also president of the Derry branch of the National Union of Journalists and vice president of the Derry Trades Council, as well as lending his support and remarkable oratory skills to numerous causes (such as the right to abortion, the rights of immigrants and the right to marry for homosexuals). McCann has been a constant critic of Irish politics in general and Northern Irish politics in particular, based too much on cultural identity and too little on class analysis.

 

Documents by Eamonn McCann

Title	Document type	Publication date	Subject(s)	Description
Document:How Saville got the Higher-ups off the hook	article	18 June 2010	Bloody Sunday	A powerful critique of the Saville report into the 'Bloody Sunday' killings in Derry Northern Ireland by British paratroopers
Document:Saville Inquiry Review	article	16 June 2011	Bloody Sunday (1972) Saville Inquiry

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References

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