Editing Dublin lock-out (section)

===James Larkin and formation of ITGWU===
[[James Larkin]], the main protagonist on the side of the workers in the dispute, was a [[stevedore|docker]] in [[Liverpool]] and a union organiser. In 1907, he was sent to [[Belfast]] as a local organiser of the British-based [[National Union of Dock Labourers]] (NUDL). In Belfast, Larkin organised a [[Belfast Dock Strike, 1907|strike of dock and transport workers]]. It was also in Belfast that Larkin began to use the tactic of the [[sympathetic strike]] in which workers who were not directly involved in an industrial dispute with employers would go on strike in support of other workers, who were striking. The Belfast strike was moderately successful and boosted Larkin's standing among Irish workers. However, his tactics were highly controversial and so Larkin was transferred to Dublin.

Unskilled workers in Dublin were very much at the mercy of their employers. Employers who suspected workers of trying to organise themselves could [[blacklisting|blacklist]] them to destroy them any chance of future employment. Larkin set about organising the unskilled workers of Dublin, which was a cause of concern for the NUDL, which was reluctant to engage in a full-scale industrial dispute with the powerful Dublin employers. It suspended Larkin from the NUDL in 1908. Larkin then left the NUDL and set up an Irish union, the [[Irish Transport and General Workers' Union]] (ITGWU).

The ITGWU was the first Irish trade union to cater for both skilled and unskilled workers. In its first few months, it quickly gained popularity and soon spread to other Irish cities. The ITGWU was used as a vehicle for Larkin's [[syndicalist]] views. He believed in bringing about a [[socialist revolution]] by the establishment of trade unions and calling [[general strike]]s.

The ITGWU initially lost several strikes between 1908 and 1910 but after 1913 won strikes involving carters and railway workers like the [[1913 Sligo Dock strike|1913 Sligo dock strike]]. Between 1911 and 1913, membership of the ITGWU rose from 4,000 to 10,000, to the alarm of employers.

Larkin had learned from the methods of the 1910 [[Tonypandy riots]] and the [[1911 Liverpool general transport strike]].