MEMBER VIEWPOINT
Rage Against the Machine
by Alex Salta
Member viewpoints represent the point of view of the author and are not official statements. To submit your own viewpoint, see the submission requirements here.
Participation in the electoral process is a requirement for any serious socialist project. Everyone in DSA agrees that democratic socialists must be active in this arena - the question is how, and for what purpose.
One perspective is that, formally or informally, members of the branch should work to elect as many DSA members to the Queens County Democratic Committee as possible in order to influence the direction of the party. I respectfully disagree with the comrades who advance this view. The most likely outcome of such an approach is that the party will change them more than they will change the party.
The county committee is the most local level of the New York Democratic Party machinery. Its tasks include nominating local judges and special election candidates, and helping devise the party’s generally-ignored official platform. It is comprised of a 28 member executive committee plus roughly 3,000 at-large members. The vast majority of the 3,000 at-large seats are vacant due to a lack of grassroots participation. As a result, the power of the committee is concentrated in the hands of a few party functionaries and county boss Joe Crowley.
It’s extremely unlikely that entering the county committee will allow socialists to turn the party into a vehicle for our political project. The Democratic Party, from the national to the county level, does not live up to its name. Unlike parties in other countries such as the Labour Party or Podemos, it is not a membership organization. Indeed, the very concept of “membership” in the party is extremely vague, and the content of official party platforms is basically irrelevant - recall that Hillary Clinton ran on the “most progressive platform” in the party’s history. The party is essentially a fundraising apparatus for a loose confederation of special interests, most of whom are hostile to our kind of politics and will fight any attempt to displace them tooth and nail.
County committee members will be expected to be cheerleaders for the party as a whole at all levels, not just those relatively progressive Democrats we’d prefer to support. Socialists in official Democratic Party positions will be identified with whatever the party does. Therefore, it’s highly likely that over time, any socialists who win election to the committee will be absorbed into the prevailing norms and structures of the party. Pressure will be extremely high to place its concerns and interests above those of the socialist movement. Instead of building a political alternative to the status quo, they will become its upholders and defenders.
This does not necessarily mean that DSA should not attempt to run or back candidates running on the Democratic Party ballot line. The use of Democratic ballot lines can be an effective tactic depending on the circumstances, as Bernie Sanders demonstrated in his remarkable run for president. But these efforts should be distinguished from attempts to take over the institutional apparatus of the party, which will divert our time and energy away from building the movements and political alternatives we need to change society.
The historic strike in West Virginia, a conservative state politically dominated by the Republican Party, made it very clear where the power of the working class and popular movements lies. It is in the workplace and in the streets, and is exercised whenever masses of people band together to fight for common interests and goals. And yes, it can be found on the campaign trail and in the halls of government when we elect people who fight tirelessly for our needs and use their office as a platform to spread our ideas. It is not, and it never will be, in the back room of a Democratic clubhouse.
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