The chaos of this second Trump administration is an onslaught meant to overwhelm us and make us feel powerless. But we are not powerless when we’re organized, and we’re still fighting for someone we don’t know.

After Labor Day, it’s time to take the fascists back to school!

Join us on this call to learn more about how DSA members across the country are fighting to defend and expand the rights of trans and migrant communities, standing up against Musk’s billionaire coup and standing with workers, elect socialist champions to office all over the country, and more! Find out what action you can take today to fight alongside us against fascism and authoritarianism and for a world where we all have dignity and liberation.

We know that it is only through our organized power that we can truly fight back against fascism. When we organize, we can win the whole world.

The post Fight Fascism, Build Socialism DSA Mass Call appeared first on Democratic Socialists of America (DSA).

Enjoy your August National Political Committee (NPC) newsletter! Our NPC is an elected 27-person body (including two YDSA members who share a vote) which functions as the board of directors of DSA. This month, you can welcome the new NPC, watch Rep. Rashida Tlaib’s electrifying speech, check out the Convention results, and get involved in DSA work!

And to make sure you get our newsletters in your inbox, sign up here! Each one features action alerts, upcoming events, political education, and more.

First off, we’d like to send a warm hello and gratitude to you for trusting us to be your national co-chairs for the next two years. This is a critical time for DSA, as we face down increasing fascism at home, militarism abroad, and the ticking clock of climate catastrophe. But we also continue to ride a wave of sustained membership growth, an increase in new DSA chapters and organizing committees, electoral wins, labor movement solidarity, and a general mood of excitement about the possibility of a democratic socialist future, one in which no one profits from the exploitation of another person. We are committed to working together alongside you all to level up DSA’s capacity, strength, and clarity of purpose as we build our fighting organization into the mass party that the moment demands.

We’d also like to congratulate our new fellow National Political Committee members, who were elected at our 2025 Convention earlier this month to a newly expanded NPC. They are:

• Christian A. (Long Island DSA)
• Eleanor B. (NYC-DSA)
• Hayley B.B. (Portland DSA)
• Jeremy C. (NYC-DSA)
• Cliff C. (Orlando DSA)
• Sidney C.W. (NYC-DSA)
• Kareem E. (NYC-DSA)
• Cerena E. (Houston DSA)
• Abdullah F. (DSA-LA)
• Frances G. (DSA-LA)
• Ahmed H. (NYC-DSA)
• David J. (NYC-DSA)
• John L. (New Orleans DSA)
• Francesca M. (Connecticut DSA)
• Luisa M. (Portland DSA)
• Sarah M. (Portland DSA)
• Clayton R. (DSA-LA)
• Katie S. (Ithaca DSA)
• Ella T. (Seattle DSA)
• Andrew T. (Denver DSA)
• Cara T. (Metro Detroit DSA)
• Amy W. (Seattle DSA)
• Hazel W. (DSA SF)

Congratulations to all and we look forward to working with you!

The NPC elections were certainly not the only exciting thing that happened at Convention. Over 1300 delegate members (and hundreds of alternates) also committed to expanding our socialist electoral program, building out our Palestinian solidarity and internationalist organizing work, deepening our participation in the labor movement and toward an arms embargo against Israel, fighting fascist attacks on immigrants and standing up against state repression from ICE, preparing for May Day 2028, building worker power against Amazon, uniting labor and the left to run a socialist for president in 2028, and so much more! 

We were honored by a fiery keynote speech by Rep. Rashida Tlaib, who grounded us in our place in American history and exhorted us to “take this country back for our working families and defeat these pathetic, cowardly, hateful fascists. We’re going to win because we don’t have any other options, and yes, we are going to free Palestine. They don’t have any other choice. Our movement isn’t going anywhere, and we’re just getting started.” This was one of our most mediagenic conventions yet, with new media and streamers like Hasan Piker observing and engaging in real time, and mainstream outlets like The Guardian noting the energy of our winning streak and Rolling Stone going in-depth on how we are preparing to seize the political moment.

We also had dozens of volunteers helping staff and elected leadership with press, tech, security, and more, in a real show of collective organizing strength. And even members who did not attend were able to tune in for deliberation and to watch our first-ever Cross-Organizational Political Exchange with socialist parties from around the world and labor unions and social movement organizations from around the country — over 1400 unique viewers watched the Convention livestream online, averaging about 200 at any given time. You can read the preliminary results here, and we will be keeping you updated as the NPC considers the overflow items over the next few months.

There’s a real excitement that comes from charting a path forward, and now it’s time to knuckle down and get to work on putting these ideas into action. If you need a bit more inspiration, though, here are some things you can sign up for right now:

• Solidarity Dues Phonebank (Sunday 8/31 at 4pm ET/3pm CT/2pm MT/1pm PT): Member dues are DSA’s primary source of income and help create some of the amazing tools and resources that DSA offers. Help us call through folks and make the hard ask: can we count on you to switch to Solidarity Dues? It’s a friendly list of fellow DSA members, so these are fantastic folks to practice those organizing conversations with. 
• Fight Fascism, Build Socialism (Tuesday 9/2 at 7pm ET/6pm CT/5pm MT/4pm PT): The chaos of this second Trump administration is an onslaught meant to overwhelm us and make us feel powerless. But we are not powerless when we’re organized, and we’re still fighting for someone we don’t know. Join us on this call featuring how DSA members across the country are fighting back! After Labor Day, it’s time to take the fascists back to school.
• YDSA’s Fall Drive Launch Call (Tuesday 9/2 at 8pm ET/7pm CT/6pm MT/5pm PT): At campuses all over the United States, YDSA chapters are continuing their fights for ambitious demands around sanctuary campuses, worker rights, divesting from the genocide in Palestine, and so much more! To kick off this semester, we’re gathering to hear from successful chapters around the country about what they’re working on, how they plan to grow this fall, and what you can do to see the same impact locally!
• September Leadership Intensive (Saturday 9/6 and Sunday 9/7 starting at 1pm ET/12pm CT/11am MT/10am PT): Ready to take the step into chapter or committee leadership? The Leadership Intensive is the most comprehensive training that DSA provides (it’s 2 days long!) for folks who are ready to take on leadership work, and will get you familiar with everything from tech tools to the theoretical basis of the democratic project.
• Emergency Tenant Organizing Committee 2025 Fall Training Series (Saturdays in September beginning Saturday 9/6 at 2pm ET/1pm CT/12pm MT/11am PT): The Housing Justice Commission’s summer Emergency Tenant Organizing Committee (ETOC) cohort is now accepting prospective tenant organizers. ETOC is an initiative to promote the formation of militant tenant unions through tenant-to-tenant training and instruction. In this series, you’ll learn the fundamentals of tenant organizing on a citywide or regional scale.
• National DSA 101 (Sunday 9/14 at 2pm ET/1pm CT/12pm MT/11am PT): Whether you’re just now becoming a member or you’re a longtime member interested in doing more DSA work, come to this program to get a birds-eye view of what we’re up to. 
• Socialist Cash Takes Out Capitalist Trash Phonebanks (various times/dates): Help support our nationally-endorsed slate by spreading the good word about (and asking comrades for donations for) our candidates in Detroit, Jersey City, Atlanta, Renton, Tacoma, and Ithaca, all of whom are fighting like hell to win and build power at the municipal level. 

And that just scratches the surface of upcoming opportunities! Keep an eye out for new opportunities — we’ll keep sending them your way. 

In the meantime, solidarity to you and we can’t wait to see you at an event soon!

In struggle,

Megan Romer and Ashik Siddique
DSA National Co-Chairs

The post Your National Political Committee newsletter — Ideas into Action appeared first on Democratic Socialists of America (DSA).

The Housing Justice Commission’s summer Emergency Tenant Organizing Committee (ETOC) cohort is now accepting prospective tenant organizers. ETOC is an initiative of the Democratic Socialists of America to promote the formation of militant tenant unions through tenant-to-tenant training and instruction.

This ETOC cohort will teach you the fundamentals of tenant organizing on a citywide or regional scale over a series of 4 meetings.

The full schedule is below. Please attend all four sessions.

1. Saturday, September 6, 2 pm ET/1pm CT/12pm MT/11am PT – Social Investigation & the Tenant Movement
2. Saturday, September 13, 2 pm ET/1pm CT/12pm MT/11am PT – Building Campaign I
3. Saturday, September 20, 2 pm ET/1pm CT/12pm MT/11am PT – Building Campaigns II
4. Saturday, September 27, 2 pm ET/1pm CT/12pm MT/11am PT – From Organizing Committee to Mass Organization

The post Emergency Tenant Organizing Committee 2025 Fall Training Series appeared first on Democratic Socialists of America (DSA).

At campuses all over the United States, YDSA chapters are continuing their fights for ambitious demands around sanctuary campuses, worker rights, divesting from the genocide in Palestine, and so much more! To kickoff this semester, we’re gathering to hear from successful chapters around the country about what they’re working on, how they plan to grow this fall, and what you can do to see the same impact locally!

The post YDSA Fall Drive Launch Call appeared first on Democratic Socialists of America (DSA).

When disaster hits, don't wait for the boss — organize with your co-workers!

The post How to organize with your co-workers in a natural disaster appeared first on EWOC.

By Antonio Rhodes 

In their critiques of Donald Trump, many liberals focus greatly on the embarrassingness—for them—of his demeanor. They will be speaking at once of how his speech is not articulate and kind enough, not presidential. At another moment, they will be lambasting his fatness or his orangeness or how he choreographs his small hands when he orates. But whatever their immediate example, a large part of why they cannot stand him often seems to be that they perceive his office as President of the United States of America as a desecration. 

Socialists must oppose this critique of image—obviously not because they like Trump but for the two below reasons: 

1. The liberal view of Trump as a desecration presupposes an incorrect belief in the sanctity of the once and always wicked US Government.
2. The liberal satirization of Trump’s appearance and behavior does nothing to enhance the worldviews of those misguided members of the working class perhaps currently affiliated with the MAGA Movement, but possibly open to socialist revolution in the future. 

To begin with the first. The imperialist-capitalist US Government is not something which should be preserved through wise leadership—it is something to be vanquished from below. This divine institution in the eyes of liberals has its origins in the repetitive holocausts of all those peoples from the Atlantic to the Pacific and in the enslavement of an entire race. This is a divine institution which commits atrocities all across the world—now in the Philippines, now in Korea, now in Vietnam, now in Afghanistan, now in Iraq, now in Palestine—in pursuit of a policy of hounding the world left and all other forces of liberation, and of taking more land and labor for the imperialist bourgeoisie of which it is representative. As for its home front, as a state for a propertied few, it is a divine institution which allows for the immiseration of the unpropertied masses of its citizens, in the spheres of food security, housing, healthcare, and education—despite its possession of the most abundant economy in the whole world. It was never dignified. Whether a Marcus Aurelius or a Caligula is its face and highest administrator is not a question in which those who fight for the popular class and all other oppressed have a personalized stake. To stick with the Roman analogy, they will always be on the side of a Spartacus. 

Now for the second. When one says that Trump’s looks and so on are a desecration before, say, some underpaid cashier at a Dollar Tree in an underdeveloped, remote county who voted for him, they only confirm that person’s understanding that a connivingly large element of society is hellbent on defaming a glorious fighter for the people. In opting for caricaturish ad hominem, they fail to act on that person’s real and legitimate, if misplaced, anti-establishment sentiments. 

For his part, Trump has been shrewd in using populist rhetoric to win his bids for the White House. He has spoken of “draining the swamp,” and during his first bid, he even called the Iraq War what it was—i.e., an unnecessary invasion based on a lie for a casus belli. In confronting working class Trumpists, socialists must not resort to ad hominem, for they have all the ammunition required to convert these people. They can speak of how Trump has chainsawed healthcare aid, food stamps, and whatever other tiny good which the working class had previously won from the capitalist state in his Big Ugly Bill; of how he is not some anti-imperialist but another neoconservative who continued the War in Afghanistan, meddled in Syria, permitted the Saudi Invasion of Yemen, enabled Israel, choked Venezuela and Cuba, antagonized China; of how he comes from and works for the same privileged, propertied ilk as all the Democrats and old-school Republicans against whom he often pretends to be fighting. 

Trump is only another gator of the swamp—perhaps more flamboyant, perhaps prouder but nevertheless only another gator. Socialists must always clarify that the swamp existed long before him; that it is what produced him; and that if our approach degenerates into the liberal lines of attack described, it will exist after him. We are better than a chorus of liberal caricatures.

The post On Donald Trump: Avoid the Liberal Image-Based Desecration Narrative  first appeared on Rochester Red Star.

By: Yash Khaleque

Theme song: Kino — Peremen

DSA National Conventions are a truly unique social phenomenon. Terminally online sickos swarm the streets of Chicago like an invasive species, sporting their red lanyards and esoteric emblems, chanting “Death, Death to the IDF” outside a fashion store turned nightclub. The Convention is a gathering of over a thousand influential organizers and thought leaders within our organization set towards the task of charting the course for the next two years. The energy of the room is excited and exuberant, ready to tackle whatever fresh hell the world has in store for us. It makes you feel like there are no obstacles the party cannot overcome, and that change is right around the corner.

Convention is a place where ideological caucuses, which are usually not impactful in day to day work, find themselves as the forefront institutions deciding the future of American socialism. They organize campaigns to lobby undecideds in their favor. Tables end up littered with the myriad literature that gets handed out. Tensions certainly rise over aggressive politicking, procedural nonsense, and decisive votes, but we often come out of the experience with greater respect and solidarity for our comrades across factional lines.

Perhaps it’s easier for victors of a political struggle to feel jovial about it. I write this as a member of the Marxist Unity Group (MUG), which accomplished nearly all of its strategic aims this year.

• The Light and Air publication continues to be unrivalled in print newsletters analyzing the previous day’s proceedings and upcoming votes. Not even the Trotskyists from Reform & Revolution (R&R) could match our paper game!
• We won 3 out of 3 National Political Committee seats we contested, and we assisted our R&R allies in scoring a seat as well.
• Won key policy votes, including the last second buzzer beater R07: “Principles of Party Building.”

The topic of Palestine featured heavily in this year’s convention, two years into the genocide in Gaza, and the proceedings were absolutely phenomenal. “A weapon is a weapon” said Rep. Rashida Tlaib at the plenary session, a clear attack against Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s vote for Iron Dome funding.

It’s been said you can differentiate between different types of communists by when they think the Russian Revolution failed. Similarly, one may identify tendencies based on when they soured on AOC. For me, it was when she voted for President Biden’s strikebreaking measures against railway workers after the 2023 derailment and environmental disaster in the prophetically named East Palestine, Ohio. This is not merely a fringe opinion — a resolution to censure AOC was agendized even before the Iron Dome incident.

While we ran out of time before this could be debated, the question of electoral discipline and renegades will be continuously prescient in our burgeoning party-like structure, especially as we assume executive office in NYC and Minneapolis in the coming months. It shows that victory alone is not enough, and that we need to understand what to do with it or else face disaster.

MUG advocates for a couple of principles on electoralism: A Strategy of Patience where we seek a majority in the legislature, or at least dominance in the streets, prior to taking executive office. We also back a Tribunes of the People model wherein electeds work to build the socialist movement as a whole rather than merely their influence in government. This means unconditionally supporting the people against injustice without making backroom deals for expedience or “pragmatism.”

The other bombshell on the topic was the passage of R22: “For a Fighting Anti-Zionist DSA,” which has been the cause of some charged discourse online. I’ll leave it to other articles to explain the mythbusting around this resolution in greater detail, but I will reiterate that it does not sanction mass purges of DSA, require un-endorsement of Zohran Mamdani, nor imply that nay voters are all Zionists. What struck me about this piece is that the failure of the 2023 version of the resolution at Convention caused the Palestinian Youth Movement (PYM) to issue an embargo against cooperation with DSA. Over the next two years, 50+ chapters representing about 40% of national membership worked to pass local versions of this to restore relations. With the culmination of this resolution as national policy, inshallah we can return to work with PYM and the rest of the movement.

What saddened me about moving to Detroit was that the metro’s status as the center of Arab American and Muslim life is not reflected in its DSA chapter. Back in Dallas, the YDSA and Students for Justice in Palestine ran thick as thieves, and the Anti-War Working Group did their all for international solidarity. In nearly a year of being in this chapter, not once have we done education on Palestine or made solidarity work a chapter priority. In the DSA 2.0 we’re inaugurating, I’m now confident we’ll find our way back to the righteous path.

And what is this new DSA? It is the internal and external recognition of DSA as its own thing and not merely a faction of liberals. Passing “Principles of Party Building” does not automatically conjure political independence and partyist structure into being. But rather it is a useful barometer for how the majority seeks to move and a benchmark for local and national bodies to meet. It must be stressed that political independence is more than whether the ballot line reads Democratic, Independent, or Socialist. It’s about whether we can formulate and execute action without reliance on state and capitalist institutions. As it stands, Detroit DSA is still dependent on the progressive blob/NGO complex for direction. We need to develop the desire to instigate against the ruling order on our own terms and learn to ditch the training wheels of the liberal coalition. This I believe is a growing conversation within the chapter that will become increasingly relevant as we head towards a national turning point in 2028.

It would not be wholly accurate to boast about a #MUGSWEEP without addressing a couple near misses that overperformed expectations in such a way that defeat actually stung. The first is R34-A01: “A Fighting Socialist Program for DSA,” an update and expansion to Workers Deserve More. The vision and objectives of the proposed program are too long to elucidate here and we recommend interested readers to refer to the Resolutions Compendium. A strong belief of mine is that the national program ought to be decided by the Convention. With the failure of this amendment, it will default to a Program Committee chosen by the NPC whose members are selected from national body leadership, general membership, and the NPC itself. What this means is that our program will be written bureaucratically and through horse trading in personnel selection. This centers politicking over actual politics. We would hope that Convention delegates would be the ones voting among a number of draft programs, but alas only MUG-R&R had the initiative to try to advance one.

A second failed item of note was CR10-A01: “A Partyist Labor Strategy.” It’s based on the idea that only an independent socialist party can provide the basis for an independent labor movement and effectively connect actions between the economic and political spheres. It’s the sense that we need a visible socialist nucleus in the unions to point out the failure and betrayal of the reformers (e.g. the Teamsters’ turn to the Republicans). A need for a partyist approach to labor was shown in the dissolution of the UAWD, a source of controversy in our chapter. As I am neither UAW nor an auto worker, I am ultimately dispositional on who’s right and wrong. But what I did find disconcerting is that DSA members were central figures on both sides of the split. An argument has been expressed that we should be free to act as we please outside of DSA. The problem with this line of thinking is that it shows outsiders the impression that DSA is an incoherent [dis]organization incapable of leadership.

More broadly, this touches on the topic of democratic centralism, a core advocacy of the authors’ vision of internal democracy. It’s best described as “diversity of thought, unity of action,” a middle ground between the “Tyranny of Structurelessness” that arises from laissez-faire governance and bureaucratic centralism, a leadership-centric “rule of experts.” It entails respect for the majoritarian decision while maintaining freedom to criticize it and organize for change. For example, many in New York spoke against endorsing Zohran for mayor, yet took action in key organizing roles anyway. Let’s work to build a culture of democratic discipline here as well.

I joined MUG right after the 2023 Convention. In high-level terms, MUG is a caucus that purports orthodox Marxism, democratic republicanism, and a practical approach to revolutionary ethos. What I found compelling about them was their grind in producing convention bulletin articles and the renowned 500-page MUG Reader, the mandatory study book for prospective members. It showed to me that this is a group that’s truly dedicated to learning from the successes and failures from the past, and that they seek to raise up quality membership rather than merely whip votes. The potency of our crew has been made evident in the ideas we’ve pushed into becoming DSA consensus: pursuit of programmatic unity (as opposed to ideological unity), the need for a democratic republic, and now partyism. Plus, our logo is super cool. And that’s what matters most, right?

DSA has come a long way since I joined it in October 2018. Gone are the days of looking towards Bernie Sanders’ next campaign as our savior. Gone are the stagnant doldrums of the Biden era. We asked for change, and we got it!

Bonus track: Utro v Tebe — Karl Marx

This article represents the opinion of the author and does not necessarily represent the views of The Detroit Socialist or Metro Detroit DSA as a whole.

We Asked For Change And We Got It was originally published in The Detroit Socialist on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

By: Micah J.

Reflecting on the 2025 DSA National Convention, I feel profound joy, excitement, angst, and trepidation. The theme of this convention was “Party Building,” and the debates and resolutions were primarily focused on preparing ourselves and our organization — our Party, if I may be so bold to say at this point — for the next decade. When reflecting on this convention, I am likewise reflecting on the past decade of the DSA (the birth and maturing of what many call the “new” DSA) and on my own life. Writing this in August 2025, I am 27 years old, turning 28 this coming January. I reached adulthood concurrently with the DSA renaissance; my political awakening was the 2016 election, in which I voted for the first time, casting my vote for Bernie Sanders in the Democratic Primary, and then refusing to vote for Hillary Clinton in the General Election.

I am seized with the joy, hope, and confidence in a better world, in a way typical of revolutionary socialists. I am likewise quick to sink into melancholy, despair, and bitterness at the state of the world, also in a way typical of revolutionary socialists. Therefore, as I reflect on this convention, I am simultaneously filled with pride in our organization, certainty in the righteousness of our cause, and assuredness in our inevitable victory, as well as with fear of our coming struggles, of the enemies we must overcome, and the possibility that — though the working class will someday triumph — we, as in the DSA, may lose. This is a possibility that all of us must honestly reckon with, and was the fate of nearly every liberatory organization (socialist, communist, progressive, or what have you) in history. This is not to say that we should approach our struggle fatalistically, with our eyes on our own destruction, as if it were a foregone inevitability, or even a purifying self-sacrifice (a la Jesus, Johnny Silverhand, or Macbeth — pick your favorite reference). It is however something that is occupying my thoughts. The ramifications of this past convention, particularly with the resolutions that were passed, mean an inevitable heightening of contradictions, both within our organization, as well as with how our organization relates to our society as a whole. We are far stronger after this convention than we were before it, and that is the point I will try to make in this piece. But as we become stronger, so do the challenges and enemies that we will have to face.

Before I plunge forward, I must make clear my own affiliations, as I was not a neutral party at this convention. I am a member of the Marxist Unity Group (MUG), and am a fervent partisan for Orthodox Marxism. I recognize and understand the central role of the mass socialist party in the revolutionary struggle. I dream of a socialist democratic republic, first in North America and then throughout the entire world, in which the working class will have taken its rightful seat as the ruling class. And I believe that the working class, by winning the battle for democracy and becoming the ruling class, will lead humanity towards a stateless, classless, moneyless society, in which the means of production are held in common and used for the benefit of all, towards a society in which human history will truly begin: communism.

The Anti-Zionist Resolution: Reification and Honesty

The first and most clear evidence of our organization’s maturation is the passing of Resolution 22, “For a Fighting Anti-Zionist DSA.” It is difficult to put into words the joy I felt seeing the adoption of this resolution. At long last, the Democratic Socialists of America has shed the last vestiges of labor Zionism that had so plagued it through much of the late 20th century. This is both its own qualitative, self-conscious step forward, as well as a natural, necessary advancement that was, frankly, a long time coming. I do not mean to imply that anti-Zionism is not already the hegemonic position within DSA, nor do I doubt the commitment of comrades who voted against this resolution towards Palestinian liberation (1). Rather, I liken this resolution to a person soberly reflecting on their past, realizing how far they have come, and that they are not the same person that they were only a handful of years previously. Having realized this, they then create a new path forward for themselves.

As I already stated, the underlying principles of this resolution are hardly controversial. Rare is the DSA member who in 2025 would say that they support Israel’s right to defend itself, or who are under the delusion of equating anti-Zionism with anti-Semitism, or who does not believe that the cause of Palestinian liberation is currently the nexus of the global anti-imperial struggle. Such views, though they may have been more common five years ago, or ten years ago, or certainly 20 years ago, are now rejected automatically by the newest member walking into their first meeting. What was missing was taking these principles and turning them towards programmatic ends. What does it mean for DSA to be an anti-Zionist organization? Is it enough for its members to merely chant “Free Free Palestine!”? This resolution seeks to answer that question, ensuring that DSA is firmly anti-Zionist, not just in inclination or rhetoric, but in actual practice.

Much of the content of this resolution is dedicated towards laying out groups that we must ally with, and campaigns we must join in, and the principles for future alliances, campaigns, and coalitions. These are all, to a group, chosen for their committed anti-imperialist actions and stances. The fact that these principles have been set forth, and that these groups (such as Stop Fueling Genocide, the Palestinian Youth Movement, the Palestine Solidarity Working Group’s No Appetite for Apartheid campaign, etc.) have been chosen by us to ally with, are natural consequences of the principles that all of us in DSA (and certainly all of us in Metro Detroit) hold proudly.

In light of our shared principles, we have through this resolution finally set down on paper something that we all understand and already believe: that there is absolutely no room for Zionism within DSA. Just as we will have no truck with those who say that trans liberation is a distraction from workers’ rights (as if trans rights are not workers’ rights), we will likewise not tolerate Zionism, either in behavior or in rhetoric. This resolution therefore stipulates that any member who can be shown to “have consistently and publicly opposed BDS and the Palestinian cause,” shown to be “currently affiliated with the Israeli government or any Zionist lobby,” or shown to “have knowingly provided material aid to Israel” is “thereby committing an expellable offense.” I am proud to be a member of an organization that takes such a firm, righteous stance — a stance that is a natural application of the principles of the vast majority of the national membership, and of every person within the Metro Detroit chapter.

(1) Almost every single person who thinks this way has already quit the organization, especially since the beginning of the Israeli offensive two years ago, when DSA held strong to its professed anti-Zionist stance.

Building the Party, and the Terms of our Struggle

One could say, quite honestly and accurately, that every resolution, every amendment, and every debate slot contained within it implications for what this coming “decade of party building” would be. The full scope of all of this will be elaborated in the countless reports and reflections that are even now being written. I want to home in on one particular resolution, which was, in fact, the last resolution that was debated and voted on in the entire convention — just barely squeaking in after a great deal of procedural obstruction throughout the weekend had caused massive delays in the agenda. This was the succinctly named “Principles of Party Building.” The purpose of this resolution was to go beyond implications and inferences for what the formal structure-building principles of our party may be, and states in clear, no-uncertain terms what it means for us, for DSA, to be a party in a qualified sense.

The resolution acknowledges that DSA does de facto already operate as a party, from a certain point of view. We already have a culture of political independence, we already run candidates under a DSA platform (though the explicit party line displayed on ballots still eludes us), and we are already talked about by the bourgeois press as being our own thing, distinct from all other political formations, the Democratic Party in particular. This last point especially is something that deserves its own careful appreciation. We are long past the days in which DSA and Democratic Socialists are considered a “progressive wing” of the Democratic Party, or even a fringe of the Democratic Party. Observers watching from the outside, even as the convention was ongoing, spoke of us as the center of a new type of movement. Now, to be sure, a curious liberal watching from the sidelines will have neither the understanding nor the vocabulary to describe our movement, but they can still see and feel that something is different about us.

Thus enters the “Principles of Party Building” resolution, and we have before our eyes the language that liberals lack, which we may use to describe ourselves, our Party, and our movement. In Point 1, we have the motivation for a revolutionary party program, the purpose of which would be to orient our party towards the goal of the democratic socialist republic, in which the working class holds political hegemony, acting, for the first time in American history, as the ruling class. Points 2–4 state the principles for our internal structure. We are to be a maximally democratic organization, in which decisions are made from the bottom up at general meetings, chapter conventions, and national conventions. Members shall be free to associate and group together in factions with distinct political lines, and thereby contribute constructively to the direction of our party. A diversity of views will be protected, as long as the promoters of that line are acting honestly and openly, without contradicting fundamental socialist principles, and with the understanding that after an honest debate and a vote is taken, all participants in that debate and vote will accept the results as legitimate and valid, and will be eager to carry out the decisions of the body. We most directly see this in Point 2, where we read, “Members must be able to critique the party’s program and organize to change it, as long as they are willing to accept fighting for it as the democratically-determined expression of DSA’s goals.” This is the essence of democratic centralism.

Points 5–8 state the premise and means for our operation within the current bourgeois state. We acknowledge the unfortunate reality that when running a candidate for office, we by sheer necessity will in nearly every instance be forced to run the candidate on the Democratic ballot. This is purely a tactical question, and must not be mistaken for any idea of reforming or realigning the Democratic Party. We thus are doubly compelled to build our own robust internal infrastructure and hold steadfast to our principles in order to avoid getting swallowed up in the whirlpool of the Democratic kraken. Our tactic is “party surrogate,” but always with the commitment to our own internal democracy, and with the long-term view of total opposition to the Democratic Party, the capitalist state, and all other bourgeois institutions. Properly stated, then, our formula must be “party surrogate in form, clean break in content.”

And finally, Points 9 and 10 state that though our current front of struggle is within the confines of the United States, our true fight is global, international. We are tasked to, even now, today, begin making connections and finding points of unity with comrades across the globe. We in the United States must make double — triple — sure of this, as we shoulder the burden of working within the core of the global imperialist machine. Just as the American state projects its influence throughout the globe, we must in turn form relationships and alliances with genuine socialist projects throughout the world. At convention, we heard from comrades from other nations, and in particular we received video messages from Cuba and from Jeremy Corbyn in the UK. I wept listening to the message of solidarity from our comrades to the south, in the only socialist republic in the western hemisphere, that is so cruelly kept under the boot of American imperialism. Our efforts in building solidarity with comrades in other nations must necessarily lead to the formation of a new International, through which we may struggle on every front in the global fight against capitalism. I dream of the foundation of this new International, and hope that this International will be the one that finally unites the human race.

Until the Final Conflict

And now the responsibility is ours, Motor City comrades, to take this convention, with its decisions and consequences, and march on. I will not lie to you all and withhold the fact that part of my jubilance in writing this article about this convention is because I was on the winning side of nearly all of the most consequential decisions. It is not because of any special insight or personal brilliance that I and my comrades in MUG achieved nearly all of our goals for this convention. It is rather because principled, unapologetic, proud Orthodox Marxism is the correct line. It was correct in 1871, correct in 1917, and it is correct today in 2025. Our organization, our Party, is maturing, and is therefore finding it necessary to ground itself in the proud tradition of historical Marxism. There is no shortcut on the road to power, no weird trick through which we can avoid the historical necessity of an independent mass socialist party. It is this line that I am convinced of, and because of it, I have absolute faith in DSA, and in the international working class.

This article represents the opinion of the author and does not necessarily represent the views of The Detroit Socialist or Metro Detroit DSA as a whole.

Fear and Resolve: My Faith is in DSA was originally published in The Detroit Socialist on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Seattle Democratic Socialists of America demands the immediate release of Zahid Chaudhry, a 52-year-old decorated and disabled veteran, who was detained today by ICE during a citizenship interview in Tukwila, WA. SDSA had the privilege of getting to know Zahid and his wife, Melissa, during her campaign against U.S. Representative Adam Smith in 2024. Neither Zahid nor Melissa have been informed of the legal basis for Zahid’s detention.

We must continue to stand against the unlawful detention of our community members. Seattle DSA will always stand in solidarity with all those who have fallen victim to our ever-expanding police state. While Zahid was someone our members knew personally, we know this ongoing battle is being waged with the expectation that those with privilege will not defend strangers who are not like them. In our fight against fascist violence, our mission is to deny the Trump administration that possibility. We believe that remaining unified behind those from different backgrounds and experiences is a crucial aspect of solidarity, and we take any attack on those in our communities as an attack on all of us.

Seattle DSA strongly condemns the use of immigration detention as an ongoing tool of political repression. We encourage our members, and the community of Seattle and King County, to get involved in resisting the continued kidnapping, targeting, and detention of immigrants, regardless of criminal background. When violence facing our communities comes from our own government, it is our collective responsibility to protect each other, care for one another, and keep ourselves safe.

Our Immigrant Justice Working Group will be holding a Migrant Accompaniment Training on Sunday, August 24th, and our Palestine Solidarity Working Group will be co-hosting a picnic with Seattle Families for Palestine at Columbia Park that same day. Finally, on Sunday in Tacoma at 2pm SDSA will be joining a coalition of organizations for an Emergency Protest at the NW Detention Facility. Please be sure to check our event calendar for more details. 

ICE OUT OF KING COUNTY!

By: Travis Wayne

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not represent the official position of Working Mass.

Build the branch to build the party.

“The party” has as many definitions as there are blades of grass. Each tendency and caucus tends to imbue “the party” with its own nuances, its own emphases. Substantial disagreements on the party form plague every single socialist movement, in every era, but the “party” itself doesn’t tend to particularly care about definitions – in fits and starts, in battle, the party splutters into existence as a self-organized vehicle the working class discovers on its own all over again. Its definition and its program are fluid products of the struggle in flux. In many but not all cities and towns across the United States, the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) has emerged as the mass organization that acts increasingly most like the party. Our numbers swell with each victory we win and each defeat the working class suffers.

The party forms in our collective hands, but our hands are diverse. Allende’s children sit alongside Harnecker’s on steering committees and ecosocialists share unions with anarchists. We’ve gotten about half of what Seth Ackerman’s Blueprint for a New Party advocated for in building the party surrogate – a party-like structure with no ballot line. But caucuses have different visions for the party of the future. To some, the party surrogate is the indefinite road of DSA’s success. Others prefer a clean break and independent ballot line. Others hold up the vision of the mass party, brought down from Kautsky and the RSDLP and Partido Ortodoxo, in which socialist organization is built within. For example, in 2021, now-NPC member Cliff Connolly of the Marxist Unity Group wrote that the party must “win political hegemony in whatever independent organs of proletarian power that we help build, using every available means,” by building “the local chapters of the mass party work together on a common, democratically agreed-upon plan.” In 2024, meanwhile, Bread and Roses’ Elizabeth Brown described a vision of a socialist labor party as one where we act as the political center for a wider affiliation network of “class organizations” built through a dirty break from Democratic control once there is a base for the break. Reform and Revolution counters this strategy by calling for “A Socialist Party in Years, Not Decades.”

The 2025 DSA Convention, the highest-body of the largest socialist organization, chose instead to only endorse R07: Principles for Party-Building: “The fundamental purpose of a socialist party is to be a mass association of the working class formed for collective political action.” DSA is the party surrogate, for now, but what matters more than the ballot line is “our ability to take independent political action” with “local party organizations run by membership.”

In Boston today, I argue that these agreed-upon principles can be best honored through branch-building. Branch-building means organizing local party appendages closest to sites of struggle and connected to working class self-activity. That can include the industrial section, the labor or tenant union caucus, the neighborhood. Building branches closest to sites of struggle is how we ensure branches actually function as “local party organizations,” organically connected to the political arenas of everyday life where oppression is experienced and protagonism grown, while developing the layer of new members themselves to make those branches “run by membership.” Since many of Boston’s new members are entering into organization at the local layer, we can organize the party best by meeting them where they enter – the local. At the point of entry, new members can best be nurtured into core members by becoming protagonists: members, decision-makers, organizers in an organization of organizers.

Some have called the strategy of building the branch “decentralization.” Rather than detracting from building Boston DSA, branch-building lets us organize deeper into the lives and terrains of the working class. Branches connect people to the working class’s self-activity most closely because branches can prioritize lived experiences of oppression experienced in the workplace, the home, the community more effectively than chapter apparatuses tasked with dozens of other priorities for meetings, while also building the confidence of new members into leadership. Members can wield power, strategize, and campaign as a collective, learning collective lessons within one unit of the party itself. Branches can be incubators of member leadership for the party and also serve as healing grounds for party leaders to recuperate from burnout. The branch is a sign of vitality, not weakness. Instead of purposeless decentralization, as some allege, branch-building strengthens the sinew of the party itself.

Without these bridges to working class self-activity, there is no party at all.

From Neighborhood Groups to Branches 

Call it a local, call it a branch – the party needs bridging organizations. 

The local party appendage closest to sites of struggle acts as the conscious bridge between the party and the self-activity of the working class – the struggles below. Sometimes, the chapter can do this, especially if it serves a small area or when the political center of the chapter and the chapter itself are synonymous, as in small chapters or in locals with fifty or fewer active members. In those cases, chapters may be “branches.”

In Boston DSA, branches can only be organized as organic projects of the membership surges and self-organization of the membership. Since new members have started organizing neighborhoods, conscious efforts to build the party from those formations is branch-building. Since November 2024, new members have infused new energy into eleven “neighborhood groups” (the bureaucratic classification that separates them from working groups) across the Greater Boston area, with active formations of members in Cambridge, Somerville, Allston-Brighton, Arlington, East Boston, Jamaica Plain, Malden, Medford, Merrimack Valley, South Shore, and North Shore. Each has different projects, different profiles, different silos. Since new members began participating in Boston DSA in neighborhoods, core and active members also began in greater numbers. Some caucuses, like Bread and Roses, have made organizing the neighborhood groups a key priority enough to run as a slate on their development during local convention. A chapter co-chair candidate has also campaigned on developing the same layer – illustrating cross-caucus, multitendency recognition.

“Branches” don’t need to exist on paper to exist in practice; we can organize by people, not by resolution. Neighborhood groups are informal and vary in level of activity, according to the bylaws, which means some neighborhood groups are branches and some aren’t. Neighborhood groups are not automatically branches of the party because neighborhood groups do not automatically connect members to working class self-activity. 

A neighborhood group is a bureaucratic category that isn’t a working group; in Boston, a branch is a conscious political project to organize a functioning appendage of the party connected and intervening as an “independent political force” in sites of struggle. A neighborhood group can be passive; a branch must be active. Most obviously, a branch is more than a neighborhood group because it encompasses more neighborhoods – consciously building the party deeper and more local to everyday working and oppressed people’s lives.

In arguing for building the branch to build the party, I will use Somerville as a case study. I moved to Boston in August 2024, became active in Somerville DSA in November 2024, and have co-chaired since February 2025. 

Somerville represents one path to branch-building, but not the only one. 

The Branch as Local Party Organization

Like the party, the branch must be multitendency and shared by the movement.

Last winter, Somerville DSA had an active membership of fifteen members. Now, we have over seventy active members participating in party activity as recorded by listwork. At the beginning, administrative items were traded between core members saddled with significant chapter-level duties that ensured local work always took a backseat. An election led to a slide towards fascism. Then, new members began to show up – until active membership was largely newly-activated, including me and other members, who began to organize the branch.

First, we organized intentionally multitendency. While other working groups may have become caucus fiefdoms and subject to a winner-takes-all political culture that undermined solidarity, we sought to build Somerville to maximize the participation of as many members as possible across all tendencies. First, membership passed a resolution for formal neighborhood leadership to place administrative burden into the hands of elected leadership instead of branch membership. This immediately built ownership among a new core team over the key important cogs of the branch functions, including regular flyering, listwork, intentional agenda-setting, and a maximalist approach to turnout. Established also was the expectation that branch leaders were responsible for these items or to find someone to do these items – building up another layer of member leadership, beyond what may pass as an organizing committee – as a baseline and foundation of our leadership. Administrative clarity creates space for greater participation of members, which leads to both a more robust internal democracy, as well as more member leadership energizing that democracy. Party-building was understood from the beginning as the essential core responsibilities of member leaders.

In Somerville, we elected two co-chairs, one secretary, one moderator (tasked with liaising with the Harassment and Grievance Officers, as well as maintaining accessibility for all members), and one internal organizer (tasked with turnout and onboarding). This structure would then be adapted a few months later by the other largest branch in Boston DSA: Cambridge. Members of the Communist Caucus, Bread and Roses Caucus, and independent new members have all shared leadership in Somerville since our self-organization, working together to set agendas and improve meetings, developing new strategies to maximize turnout over monthly potlucks. We conducted one-on-ones with other new members to become priority campaign stewards, a framework adapted from Las Vegas DSA, where specific member leaders are responsible for bottomlining the branch’s priority campaigns. New members have become priority campaign stewards and also become active in other parts of the Boston DSA chapter by first developing into member leaders as priority campaign stewards. These include members from across the ideological spectrum, from the aforementioned caucuses to Boston DSA’s internal “Conifer” alliance to independent cultural organizers. Active membership shaping the branch, meanwhile, includes organizers from the Libertarian Socialist Caucus and Red Line. Already, the branch has served a role as the local party apparatus capable of building up new organizers across the ideological spectrum to build both the broader party and class organizations in sites of struggle.

This constant focus on building up member leadership is in line with the framework of Antonio Gramsci when the founder of the Italian Communist Party called for “a continual insertion of elements thrown up from the rank and file into the solid framework of the leadership apparatus which ensures continuity and the regular accumulation of experience.” Beyond the branch’s multitendency nature, branch-building can be party-building also through articulation. In the words of Salar Mohandesi, “the primary task of the party is not actually to create social forces, but rather to facilitate their coming together into a broader unity.” The working class self-organizes in a turbulent below, an underbelly of capitalism that eats at our will and seeks to disorganize us in racial and gendered and intersectional ways, so its formations are as “fluid, unstable, personal” as Mario Tronti described the class struggle itself. Rent goes up and markets crash. Some unions win recognition from the state and some don’t; some people organize in workplaces, some in buildings, some in community spaces. Union reform caucuses rise and fold. News stories change and people pivot. The democratic socialist party press has received some investment and Working Mass continues to grow its subscriber base, but the majority of members do not have a reliable finger on the pulse of the fractured and disorganized conjuncture: what Maria Poblet describes as “a combination of circumstances or events usually producing a crisis, long or short-term, relating most to the short- and medium-term interventions.”

Branches of the party are uniquely capable of strategizing across all terrains within one set turf, all of the circumstances or events that may produce a crisis in the local area where the branch organizes, but only through the conscious political organization of the branch. 

In Somerville DSA, we first sought to strategize by power-mapping. We did that for two meetings. Now, we incorporate “updates from the working class” into the top of every branch meeting agenda. This is intentional. Last month, updates included reports from the strike of sanitation workers rocking the North Shore, concessions workers’ striking at Fenway Park for the first time in 113 years, contract fights by the local teachers union, and information from the eviction defense in Nubian Square by the Greater Boston Tenants Union. Members heard reports and asked questions. This month, we did the same. This month, in August 2025, members discussed the Hamilton Tenants Association rally against their landlord, Somerville 4 Palestine’s ballot initiative to divest the city, and a report from a conversation with a representative of Partido Socialismo e Liberdade (PSOL), a mass socialist and democratic party in Brazil. This structure of updates provides a space for members to literally engage with updates from across working class self-activity in the area, including Marx’s famous dress rehearsals for revolution in strike updates, coming collectively to understand what’s happening and through that process to report to one another on these struggles – to study them, on each other’s behalf, for one another. We aim to ask members to give reports with a particular focus on strategically asking members who have not stepped up as leaders before, to facilitate that end. Through these asks, we build up more ownership over the branch – the party.

But reports are not enough. The point of talking about what’s happening is to intervene in what’s happening. We analyze updates from the working class in Somerville to participate in struggles in Somerville. And since the branch can prioritize time for discussions not only of working class self-activity but also its own collective projects, its own interventions, the branch can bridge the party to the working class and vice versa. In other words, Boston DSA branches can become vehicles themselves, but also vehicles for members to become organizers, which bridges new members directly to working class self-activity. The branch facilitates both ways.

The branch, as a unit of the party, seeks to constantly engage with the turbulent self-activity of the working class because it’s a necessary if insufficient ingredient to actually articulate local struggles into a broader unity – the historic role and power of the party. “Some of these social forces may be working independently towards alliances, but their coming together is not inevitable, and in most cases efforts to coalesce will end in failure,” Salar Mohandesi continues: “But through the party, then, acts as a kind of binding element, trying to find a way to bring together diverse social forces, and to help them stay together, despite the many tendencies pulling them apart.” As a binding element, it can ultimately become undone. Just because a party branch exists does not mean it continues to be a party branch.

But effective branch-building doesn’t stop at conjunctural analysis or direct connection in struggle as a means to develop members as organizers. We also need branch-building as a means of creating the local vehicle for “independent political action,” just as agreed upon in the Principles for Party-Building passed by the 2025 DSA Convention.

The Branch as Laboratory

Independent political action is developed in the laboratories of the working class. 

The working class, in building its party, must try things to gain confidence. Our own collective capacity for risk is a direct result of trying things together. We cannot take on projects capable of changing material conditions, of intervening as an independent political force as the party must, without first learning what works and what doesn’t together – and earning trust through praxis. That does not happen automatically and it does not automatically pass down with lineage. Instead, trust must be relearned, relationship by relationship, year by year. And we can do this doubly effectively by creating the base layer parallel to the center, because the branch doesn’t just exist in neutral parallel to the center – it reinforces it.

In Somerville DSA, we adopted a one-for-one proposal as a unanimous membership of nearly fifty of the then-sixty three active members of the branch. Somerville would adopt one external priority campaign, one internal priority campaign. Campaigns would need to be renewed every six months by proposal and vote of membership. Choosing priorities forces membership to grow and, by making collective decisions, becomes a collective conscious of its own power. This collective-making process not only built consensus across conflict lines in Somerville; it also created ownership. Even when proposals failed, openly encouraging and building new members to make proposals increased their confidence in the short-term and participation in the branch in the long-term even in the first round following the passage of the resolution. Ownership over the branch increased. The democratic process of choosing a priority, of debating between proposals, let members feel and then claim ownership.

Membership proposed multiple proposals for both the external and internal priorities of the branch. Participation was at its highest during the meeting of the debate. Ultimately, members chose to prioritize electing a cadre democratic socialist and branch member Willie Burnley, Jr. as mayor of Somerville, while our internal priority campaign became a combination of two proposals that blended together organizing training, socials, and political education. Another proposed external priority campaign would have charted us to fundraise to forgive the medical debt of local residents. The debate between these proposed priority campaigns underscores the breadth of possibility available to a branch becoming a vehicle for independent political action in the external priority campaign. Other priority campaigns could include strike support, building a community-wide strike committee, an ICE watch operation, an eviction defense operation in partnership with a local tenants’ union, a local No Appetite for Apartheid initiative to build a base of apartheid-free stores, or a local ballot initiative for socialist policy. Through the one-for-one structure, the process of rigorous and open debate to choose only one priority per sphere produced two collective projects shared across tendencies in the Somerville branch. 

Even more importantly, though, the one-for-one structure of renewal every six months ensured that the branch became a laboratory for working class experimentation. Proposals are created by members working together, which after meetings involving conjunctural analysis of the moment each month, inherently involve the process of collective strategizing on behalf of the branch even to make a proposal. Developing winnable collective campaigns within the capacity of a group is an inherently good skill to develop as a member of Boston DSA. Key also is the six month term. The campaign must be time-limited, not only to make it winnable, but to ensure that the collective can remain coherently organized. It’s easier to contribute to a project even when your favorite one fails when you can try again in the fall. 

The product of collective choice is member leadership. The process of choosing priority campaigns can be cultivated by branch leaders, but engaging members as fully as possible in the process of the choice itself can turn new members further into organizers. When members feel like they themselves can shape the future of the branch’s activities, they are more likely to continue to contribute to the party. By organizing new members at the layer closest to sites of struggle and orienting the party branch around those sites of struggle, we can most effectively build those members into organizers in the workplace, the home, the community – participants in the struggle itself. Already, in Somerville, this is clear – not only do Somerville members regularly attend tenant union eviction defenses and participate in strike support, they also sign up for tenant organizing trainings, workplace organizer cohorts, and practices for systematic one-on-one structured organizing conversations.

This member leadership element of organizing the branch into a local vehicle for “independent political action” is key. The branch is our membership, no more or less. We are as powerful as our members, collectively. As a result, learning how to leverage the maximum power of our collective is key to becoming an independent political force. The process itself is transformative. While the primary product is member leadership, one byproduct of building the branch as the party is the seismic force of a tightly-organized party cell in the wider community. At its most formidable, the branch is a “mountain,” party cells that “[loom] large and formidable over their region… [where the] development of the party as a governing institution required that these “mountaintops” would subordinate themselves to the work of the party as a whole.” By avoiding mountaintopism, the branch builds the party and avoids decentralization by nurturing organizers into the collective force we are capable of together.

The creation of powerful “mountains” is the byproduct of branch-building, but the power of that force in the bourgeois political system cannot be understated. In Somerville, one comrade who participates in branch-building wondered whether an end result of our strategy would be a socialist version of Boston’s old Irish ward system. Martin Lomasney, once-boss of the West End, used to run the ward with iron power: “his organization was broken down so that he had a competent leader in every precinct. That leader had a dozen lieutenants… It was the job of each to see to it that every voter on his street went to the polls on election day and, what was more important, voted for the Lomasney candidates.”

It’s true that a byproduct of branch-building may be the lattices of an electoral machine that closely resembles the Lomasney presence – especially since our first external priority campaign, in Somerville, has been an electoral campaign. We have canvassers at doors or calling voters most days of the week, overseen by three priority campaign stewards, connected both to the Electoral Working Group and the campaign. But by connecting to the turbulent and oceanic power of the working class from and beyond the more limited political horizons possible through diasporic community organizing, the branch connects to even greater sources of power. Electoral campaigns end but the branch remains. And instead of top-down patronage systems dominated by patriarchal white men, the branches can be organic and dynamic outgrowths of empowered memberships developing new organizers from members returning to their workplaces and their buildings and their communities to fight. 

The potential power of branch-building far surpasses the political power of the old machines that ruled Boston for more than half a century.

The Branch as Party 

There are plenty of contours of the party question to debate. But every conception of the party is strengthened by a layer of party organization that bridges the central party to working class self-activity, training new organizers who can become not only effective members of the party, but effective protagonists of their own struggles. The branch can serve as the local party organization and the laboratory of the working class, a site of political experimentation closest to where exploitation is both experienced and can be politicized in collective action. And while in Boston, the branch is a conscious political project that can be organized from the neighborhood groups, the “branch” is not unique to Boston. Anywhere there is a unit of a few dozen members who can connect to the working class can form a bridge between the party and the turbulence below through following a branch-building strategy. 

There are other aspects of branch-building as party-building that there isn’t time to explore here. One is how the branch is uniquely suited to house cultural organizing. Socials happen at the local level; this is why socials are a key part of Somerville DSA’s first internal priority campaign. More generally, in the process of organizing the party, NYC-DSA and Triangle DSA and DSA chapters in New Jersey, along with countless other chapters, all discovered the need for cultural organizing. There are running clubs and dating clubs in New York City; in the Triangle, members form hiking associations and crafting formations; in Boston DSA, members meet to play basketball under the team name “United We Dunk” regularly.

But realizing branch-building unlocks new terrains for political experimentation, a laboratory for members to try things together, also means embracing the branch as a site of political imagination. Building branches, if undertaken across the city of Greater Boston, has a destination. Imagine: every part of Boston, each with a branch of the party. From Somerville to Roxbury, from Jamaica Plain to Cambridge, from Allston-Brighton to the South Shore – each home to a machine of localized “independent political action” driven by members, which means internal democracies with robust and participatory worlds, training workers and tenants into organizers of the party and of mass organizations: the labor unions, the tenant unions, the assemblies and the neighborhood councils. That is a vision of socialist and mass struggle merged into one. The branches, tightly-organized, each may have their own flavor, their own identity, informed by the social forces they articulate. Some may work on electoral interventions, others on fighting gentrification. Over time, the branches may begin fundraising projects for party offices. Party offices could grow across the city, one for every district, one for every neighborhood. That is a vision of a party not dissimilar from the workers’ parties around the world, with corner offices embedded deep inside the neighborhoods of the urban landscape.

These are examples of different horizons. Each belongs to membership to explore – or not. The branch is a conscious project of party-building, which means it can only exist through members breathing life into its vision. But that’s no different from other parts of the party. DSA is nothing but its members, which is no different from the branch. And when we think of “Principles of Party-building,” we need to take seriously how we can best pursue that goal as a mass organization at the most hyper-local levels of disorganization.

It may not be the only road, nor the only one necessary to accomplish the goal of party-building, but it is certainly an important one: build the branch to build the party.

Travis Wayne is the deputy managing editor of Working Mass and co-chair of the Somerville branch of Boston DSA.

The post OPINION: 2025 DSA Convention – Build the Branch, Build the Party appeared first on Working Mass.