Scholar, philosopher, and prolific author Dr. David Bentley Hart joins the podcast to discuss Bible translation as an act of resistance, the Christian sources and support for social democracy, and the moral demands of human and creaturely relations to care for one another. Don't forget to join us at Theology Beer Camp (www.theologybeer.camp) and use the promo code HEARTGODPOD for a discount! – Check out his New Testament translation (https://yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9780300265705/the-new-testament/) – For essays on his theological and political ideas, check out "Theological Territories" (https://undpress.nd.edu/9780268107185/theological-territories/) – And per Hart's own request, check out his works of fiction like "Roland in Moonlight" (https://angelicopress.org/roland-in-moonlight-hart)

Democratize DSA (CB1), a proposal at this year’s national convention, is a bylaws change that would dramatically reshape the National Political Committee (NPC). Marxist Unity Group urges delegates to vote no.

What is the National Political Committee?

The NPC is DSA’s highest decision-making body between conventions. It consists of 16 members elected at DSA’s national convention and two YDSA co-chairs who each have half a vote.

Once elected, the NPC elects a five person Steering Committee (SC), which is required to meet at least bimonthly. The SC is responsible for decision-making between NPC meetings, planning meetings and agendas for the NPC, and coordinating the work of the committees of the NPC.

The remaining 11 NPC members are the At-Large NPC members. DSA bylaws require them to act as liaisons to national commissions, as well as to regional and state bodies and chapters. The full NPC is responsible for staff, finances, publications, and education. The NPC is responsible for hiring and discharging staff as necessary, and hears expulsion cases.

What happens in practice?

Many of the NPC’s decisions are made outside of meetings of the full NPC and with little deliberation through Loomio, an asynchronous online voting tool. The procedures for online voting by the NPC have been criticized and reforms have been made, but frustrations persist. There are complaints of overwork and burnout, but participation is extremely uneven (some NPC members serve on multiple committees while others serve on none). Despite recent efforts by NPC members to attend the district calls held by staff Field Organizers, the required liaising with chapter leaders has historically not happened.

What changes does CB1 make?

CB1 triples the size of the NPC to 51 members. 48 members would now be elected at the national convention, a major increase from the current 16. YDSA representatives expand from 2 members sharing a vote to 3 with their own individual votes. Once elected, the NPC would choose a 13 member SC and have the ability to recall any SC member.

Several powers of the NPC or other committees would be given to the SC. Steering would now be in charge of taking applications for the National Director position and recommending candidates for hire. The power to hire and fire regular staff would be taken from the NPC and given to the SC. Expulsion decisions would be made by the SC, instead of the full NPC.

CB1 could be summarized as adding many more people in the interest of adding capacity, and changes that mean the At-Large members need to vote less between quarterly meetings of the full NPC.

What does CB1 do? 

The rationale for CB1 in the convention compendium states that the NPC is too small for an organization that exploded in size over the past few years. In their own words, “the “NPC” would become an entirely new body; being on the NPC would no longer require a taxing full-time commitment, but could instead be as simple as attending quarterly NPC meetings, liaising with DSA chapters, and serving on a national committee, working group or commission. The NPC would retain its role as the highest decision making body in the organization between conventions, and would have deliberative, voting meetings in which it made binding political decisions, but would no longer serve as the executive body running the day to day operations of the organization.”

The authors write that their efforts to change leadership structures have failed at the past conventions, and describe CB1 as the simplest way to expand DSA’s leadership. However, the simplest way to expand DSA’s leadership is found in the recommendation unanimously put forward by the 2019-2021 NPC to expand the committee from 16 people to 25 without other changes. It is unclear why a massive expansion that shifts the balance of power on the committee must be done before attempting this much smaller change.

The rationale of CB1 primarily talks about increasing the capacity of our leadership. Adding more people to solve a capacity problem does not always have the intended result. If the NPC cannot ensure even distribution of work and adequate participation while there are 11 At-Large members, the drastic expansion in CB1 provides no solutions. Putting more people into a disorganized body will make it even more chaotic. The NPC must agree on who is responsible for making sure all NPC duties are fulfilled, which will be even more difficult with 51 people.

CB1 uses the familiar name of NPC but dismantles the committee as we know it. The sheer number of SC meetings between voting opportunities for At-Large members ensures that almost all decisions will be made by the SC. The authors describe the At-Large members as empowered to make “binding political decisions” while the SC handles day-to-day operations. The SC’s duties should not be overlooked: all of these daily decisions impact DSA resources and functioning, and they are political choices. The primary decision-making function of At-Large members will be to occasionally confirm or overturn SC decisions. This may seem like a minor distinction, but there are already problems with NPC members being denied information on decisions they are responsible for. If At-Large members are demoted from making decisions to reviewing SC votes, this problem is almost certain to increase.

CB1 transforms At-large members from equal members of top leadership into a new intermediate body that (supposedly) provides accountability to the SC and connects membership to them. However, CB1 does not provide any of the democratic structure necessary for a successful intermediary body. Increased time for chapter leader liaising is presented as a hollow stand-in for accountability and connection with DSA membership. Increased liaising with chapter leaders would be a good thing, but it is not the same as a clearly defined duty to engage with membership. Nor is increased liaising a mandate to represent membership as an intentionally designed middle layer would. Telling members there is now an accountable oversight method for our top leadership without actually having one is a recipe for dissatisfaction.

What about the elections and amendments?

If CB1 passes, convention would not select the people who make most of the important national decisions. Factions could coordinate to choose voting methods that would allow them to turn a slim majority on the NPC into a controlling super-majority on the SC. An alternative amendment for consideration would implement a direct election for the SC by convention delegates. While this amendment is an improvement over CB1, it does not fix how the body would function in office.

An amendment to the procedures for the special election states that the Convention Committee may use regions for the candidate elections. This amendment is intended to avoid incomprehensible rankings on an endless ballot in an election for 48 positions. Election by regions is not inherently problematic, but we all know the importance of maps to election results. The way in which these regions are created has a huge role in determining the winners. If members object to how the regions are set and lack avenues to appeal, the lack of advance approval by convention or membership could lead to a legitimacy crisis.

Small changes in how an election is run can have enormous effects on the results. We should not rush a bylaws change that requires many leaps of faith to (hopefully) have coherent elections. Changes of this magnitude should go through the Democracy Commission (Member-Submitted Resolution #10: Launch a Democracy Commission for DSA)  to allow delegates to evaluate whether these new methods of electing our leadership are acceptable.

What should be done? 

There are many possible improvements to our national leadership that do not create a lower tier of NPC members. The NPC could be expanded to 25 people as stated in the 2019-2021 NPC’s unanimous recommendation. The NPC should use the quorum requirements set in the bylaws to meet more frequently to reduce decisions deferred to the SC or made without debate. The NPC should adopt and enforce standards for the quality and quantity of liaising work for each NPC member. An intermediate body connecting DSA members to our top decision-makers between conventions must give members a democratic structure to engage with, not an arbitrarily assigned leadership liaison who can ignore membership.

Marxist Unity Group recommends voting no on CB1, with or without amendments.

The post The NPC Needs Improvements. But “Democratize DSA” Isn’t It. appeared first on Socialist Forum.

Read the Official Teamsters Press Release

Teamsters Win!

The Teamsters have reached a tentative agreement with UPS by staying firm to their demands, showing that if we fight for what we deserve we can win! The agreement includes major changes, including:

• Historic wage increases. Existing full- and part-time UPS Teamsters will get $2.75 more per hour in 2023. Over the length of the contract, wage increases will total $7.50 per hour.
• Existing part-timers will be raised up to no less than $21 per hour immediately, and part-time seniority workers earning more under a market rate adjustment would still receive all new general wage increases.
• General wage increases for part-time workers will be double the amount obtained in the previous UPS Teamsters contract — and existing part-time workers will receive a 48 percent average total wage increase over the next five years.
• Wage increases for full-timers will keep UPS Teamsters the highest paid delivery drivers in the nation, improving their average top rate to $49 per hour.
• Current UPS Teamsters working part-time would receive longevity wage increases of up to $1.50 per hour on top of new hourly raises, compounding their earnings.
• New part-time hires at UPS would start at $21 per hour and advance to $23 per hour.
• All UPS Teamster drivers classified as 22.4s would be reclassified immediately to Regular Package Car Drivers and placed into seniority, ending the unfair two-tier wage system at UPS.
• Safety and health protections, including vehicle air conditioning and cargo ventilation. UPS will equip in-cab A/C in all larger delivery vehicles, sprinter vans, and package cars purchased after Jan. 1, 2024. All cars get two fans and air induction vents in the cargo compartments.
• All UPS Teamsters would receive Martin Luther King Day as a full holiday for the first time.
• No more forced overtime on Teamster drivers’ days off. Drivers would keep one of two workweek schedules and could not be forced into overtime on scheduled off-days.
• UPS Teamster part-timers will have priority to perform all seasonal support work using their own vehicles with a locked-in eight-hour guarantee. For the first time, seasonal work will be contained to five weeks only from November-December.
• The creation of 7,500 new full-time Teamster jobs at UPS and the fulfillment of 22,500 open positions, establishing more opportunities through the life of the agreement for part-timers to transition to full-time work.
• More than 60 total changes and improvements to the National Master Agreement — more than any other time in Teamsters history — and zero concessions from the rank-and-file.

The decision has not yet been officially ratified, but given that all of the contract demands were met by UPS, it seems likely that this will be agreed upon by all Locals.

What can we learn from this?

As socialists, what can we take away from this? Although there are many elements to this complex organizing effort that has culminated after years of change within the Teamsters and within UPS from before the pandemic until now, let’s highlight two things in particular that made this successful:

1. Meaningful demands and unwavering commitment to them. UPS creates a list of demands that improves the workplace for everyone, from rookie part-timers to full-time veterans. This sort of contract is appealing to all workers and shows that they are looking out for everyone. As organizers, we should always be seeking buy-in from the entire working class and responding to their individual circumstances as best we can. Additionally, once we agree upon our demands, we should not be willing to abandon them for the sake of expediency. UPS Teamsters were willing to go on strike until their demands are met and we should always keep our ambitions as high.
2. Practice pickets show the capitalists our power. UPS Teamsters mobilized their workers to perform a dress rehearsal for the strike and held practice pickets nationwide, including here in Wilmington. Not only does this help workers improve logistics for a real strike, but the attendance for these practice pickets seems to have shown the bosses that workers were serious about their strike threat. By doing acts that demonstrate our power, we can make the capitalists more willing to concede to our demands because there is a credible threat to their power and wealth. If a practice strike is enough to get a full concession, imagine what more could be won.

Congratulations to the UPS Teamsters on this historic victory!

Thorn West: Issue No. 168

State Politics

• CalMatters details early industry spending on 2024’s public ballot initiatives, including a massive expenditure from the fast-food industry on a measure that would overturn a state law establishing a fast-food workers’ council to set wages and work safety standards.

Police Violence and Community Resistance

• Measure J was an LA County ballot measure that mandated 10% of the county budget be spent on social services, and not police or jails. After it passed in 2020, a lawsuit successfully had it overturned in the courts. Now, in a reversal, Measure J has been found constitutional on appeal. “Measure J was our response to what we think public safety is and what it should look like,” said Councilmember Eunisses Hernandez, who co-chaired the electoral campaign for the ballot measure.

• The mayor’s office and the Los Angeles Police Protective League have come to a tentative agreement over the next labor contract for the LAPD. The agreement includes a 13% increase in starting pay for new officers, who will now start near $86,000. This is meant to address the fact that the number of LAPD officers has dropped by 1,000 as it has struggled with recruitment. The decrease in police officers has not corresponded with an increase in crime.

• Los Angeles took another step toward initiating a pilot program based on the CAHOOTS model of unarmed response to people experiencing mental health crises. A funding mechanism passed this week, as the city council returned from summer recess.

Incarceration

• LA Public Press has continued in-depth coverage of last week’s planned disruption of a Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors meeting demanding the closure of Los Padrinos Juvenile Hall. The protest captured more attention this week after several of the children interned at the facility attempted to escape.

Labor

• Today, representatives from the Writers Guild of America and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers met for an hour, the first such meeting since the writers strike began, three months ago. The meeting lasted one hour.

• Hotel workers in UNITE HERE Local 11 continue to organize walkouts as they seek fair contracts from 60 area hotels. This week, the union, along with many California politicians, called on singer Taylor Swift to delay her Los Angeles tour dates this weekend, in solidarity.

Housing Rights

• The LA Times editorial board asks if City Attorney Hydee Feldstein Soto is deliberately obstructing the construction of a supportive housing project on a city-owned parking lot in Venice.

• A town hall meeting to discuss 30 proposed units of interim shelter in CD 5 was overrun by opponents of the units.

The post Hotel Workers Call on TSwift + Tentative LAPD Contract Contains Massive Increase in Starting Pay appeared first on The Thorn West.

Member-Submitted Resolution #2 (MSR 2), “Defend Democracy through Political Independence,” contends that the Republican Party and its Trumpist elements pose a threat to the multiracial working class (although much less of a threat than in 2016) and that Democrats—not Republicans—are the principal opponent of socialists in blue states. The authors assert that global authoritarianism is on the rise and socialists need to defend the rights of oppressed people and our democratic infrastructure. However, we need to do so without “being subsumed into the Democratic Party and its NGO apparatus.” While we agree with the importance of building DSA as an institution and increasing our independence from the Democratic Party, the resolution contains a poison pill that will divide DSA and undercut our efforts to fight the right: requiring the National Political Committee (NPC) to publicly condemn elected comrades who show support for “centrists.”

While proponents of MSR 2 have focused on the aspects of the resolution that are positive and proactive, such as acting in coalition to fight the fascist right, building up our youth wing, and creating alignment within the organization in preparation for the 2024 presidential race, the real meat of the resolution is punitive and divisive. The measure requires the NPC to “publicly communicate disapproval to endorsed candidates and elected DSA members who reject this strategy in order to explicitly or tacitly support centrist leaders of the Democratic Party (for example, by attending rallies on behalf of centrists, political communications, or explicit endorsement of centrist Democrats).” There are multiple issues with this directive. First, it is built on a flawed organizing premise—that DSA elected officials are not members to organize with, but servants to control and punish. Organizers know that imposing a decision on stakeholders without their buy-in is unsustainable. On top of that, DSA is not yet powerful enough to back up our bark with a bite, especially for federal-level electeds. So we would be alienating our elected comrades for nothing. Second, “centrist” is not well defined in this resolution. While most members would agree those who identify as socialist are not centrist, who will define the line between a progressive and a centrist? While this distinction may not matter much now, the authors of the resolution make this definition critical when they require the NPC to publicly condemn our electeds who support centrists.

Third, this would directly undermine many of our priorities, especially our efforts to fight the fascist right, a priority the authors seek to support. In many swing states, DSA electeds from safe Democratic districts have given critical support to Democrats running statewide against far-right Republicans. In 2022, incumbent Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer was in a close race against right-wing election denier Tudor Dixon. DSA Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib supported Whitmer and worked to boost voter turnout, including by attending a rally for Whitmer hosted by Barack Obama. This resolution would require the NPC to condemn Tlaib for this—not only alienating us from Tlaib, but also from the progressive voters who help elect our socialist candidates and potential coalition partners like the United Auto Workers union, which have benefited from the end of right-to-work in that state, ushered in by the victory of Whitmer and other “centrist” Democrats that took control of the state legislature.

Even in blue states, DSA electeds’ strategic support for establishment Democrats has advanced DSA priorities. For example, in New York, centrist Democratic incumbent Kathy Hochul faced an unexpectedly competitive general election opponent in Lee Zeldin, a Trump-supporting far-right Republican. While New York’s DSA chapters were not pressured by DSA electeds to support Hochul, many of those comrades in office did events with her re-election campaign. Hochul is certainly not a progressive, and NYC-DSA continued to target her throughout the election, but New York electeds and many in DSA leadership recognized that her victory would be critical to passing DSA’s legislative priorities like the Build Public Renewables Act, which was included in the this year’s budget and signed by the governor. Zeldin simply could not be pressured into doing that. In swing states, centrists can be the only option to prevent fascistic conservatives from winning power. Even in blue states, centrists in power can be a key tool for winning our socialist priorities.

We’ve limited ourselves like this before. At the 2019 convention, DSA passed “In The Event of a Sanders Loss” which was couched in anti-Trump language but pledged that DSA would only endorse one Democrat for president: Bernie Sanders. As the political situation in the US got worse and worse the next year, this resolution had a chilling effect on what DSA chapters and members felt they could and could not do. To be clear, the authors and Socialist Majority Caucus do not think we should have endorsed Joe Biden (nor do we think DSA should do so in 2024), but the language in the 2019 resolution caused comrades across the country to question if they could do anything formally as DSA in the effort to defeat Trump—an outcome critical to not only DSA’s strategic goals but to curtail the worst of far-right fascism. In part due to this chilling effect, our organization became the subject of negative editorials in The Nation and New York Times and infighting around public letters distracted from the task of defeating Donald Trump and beating back the Trumpist right.

Thanks to massive organizing and more, Trump lost, but we need to learn from the experience of these unnecessary, self-imposed strictures. In early 2021, without any self-inflicted limitations, DSA supported anti-GOP work in the two Georgia US senate runoffs and helped swing the body to a Democratic majority. That majority has made Bernie Sanders the chair of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions, where he highlights workers’ struggles ignored by that body for decades. Again, working with centrists, while not an end in itself, proved a smart short-term tactic for supporting our medium and long-term socialist goals.

Winning socialist power in the real world requires grappling with real world conditions, not striving for an ephemeral sense of ideological purity. In this moment, a centrist Democrat who believes people should be able to vote, that trans people should be able to live, and that abortion is a right is better than a fascist Republican alternative. Condemning our electeds for saying so is not only wrong, it is antithetical to our goal of building a powerful, multiracial working-class organization. It will alienate us from the working class we hope to recruit into socialism and DSA. Electoral work is messy. Governing is messy. Only way to avoid complexities and complications is to avoid anything that would actually build power. We should not create self-imposed constraints that divide us and make our work harder. We must continue to do the complicated, hard work required to gain meaningful power.

The post Defend Democracy Through Defending Democracy appeared first on Socialist Forum.

Steering Committee member Michael M contributes to the ongoing discussion on Metro DC DSA's recent delegate election.

This article is a response to “Socialists Don’t Vote for Cop Budgets” – eds.

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Socialists in office fight an uphill battle in hostile terrain. They thread a strenuous needle between upholding their most optimistic socialist principles, while effectively navigating a system that is stacked against them, in order to produce real material gains for working people. Not long ago, we were all but locked out of the halls of power. Today however, our resurgent movement has begun to see the fruit of our project blossom, with the election of over a hundred socialists around the country in recent years.

These few initial victories have unlocked a new battleground, on which we’re still finding our footing. In Los Angeles, DSA has three members elected to City Council. It is one of the most powerful city councils in the country,  with just fifteen members for a city of nearly four million. Since the election of Nithya Raman in 2020, followed by the election of Eunisses Hernandez and Hugo Soto-Martínez in 2022, there has been an intense and hopeful scrutiny on these socialist electeds from the left.

Jack Lundquist takes a harshly critical look at two recent votes cast by two of these members, emphasizing a vote to approve a city budget with significant funding for the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD). The article, which is ultimately used to promote a specific proposal at the upcoming DSA National Convention, shows a limited perspective of the work of DSA-LA’s electeds, and cites “sources” including various individuals on Twitter, while the author did not communicate with DSA-LA about our work with our endorsed electeds. Still, it raises questions about electeds’ responsibilities that should be at the forefront of any socialist’s mind, and allows an opportunity to consider the balance between coalition building, socialist independence, and antagonism.

In this article, we’ll argue that socialists must set expectations based on material analysis, not idealized visions of “resolutionary” victory. Elected officials must navigate complex coalitions in order to have influence in government, even after election. There is a time for antagonism as well as negotiation, and our movement is not served by joining in the eagerness of our enemies to punish our own socialist champions.

The Budget and the Vote

To begin, let’s analyze the context of the primary vote for which council members Raman and Soto-Martínez have been called to account. On May 18, 2023, the Los Angeles City Council voted whether to approve the mayor’s proposed city-wide budget. What’s more, the outcome was also predetermined by a united bloc of the other twelve council members who had already committed to approve it. DSA members Nithya Raman and Hugo Soto-Martinez joined in the “ayes” and member Eunisses Hernandez cast the sole “nay.”

Leading up to the vote, our representatives had already done the difficult political work of negotiating a number of budgetary gains. They won huge increases to the budget for providing housing and fighting homelessness, and they successfully allocated an unprecedented amount of funding away from police and toward unarmed response – a significant decrease in the LAPD budget from the mayor’s original proposal. Our DSA-endorsed council members also identified specific strategic fights they could win, like a motion diverting $7.4 million intended for a new LAPD helicopter to be instead used for electric school bus funding, which is currently moving through committees. In fact, while the overall police budget did grow due to contractual obligations for cost-of-living adjustments and pensions, the city’s discretionary spending on LAPD actually decreased for the first time in years. While a budget with a huge share of total funding to LAPD is not anything our city should be proud of, there are reasons to be proud of the work that was done to revise it.

Ultimately, two DSA representatives chose to express overall support, and one chose to withhold it. Regardless of how they voted in this instance, we stand proudly with all three of our DSA members. We did not win every point on this budget, but we engaged in politics.

If the outcome of the vote was beyond the influence of any DSA member, all we’re left to talk about are the optics. Would DSA and the socialist project have benefited if all our members took a symbolic and antagonistic stand here? Or was there something to be gained by a decision to side with the majority for a budget that would pass regardless? Through the rest of this article, we’ll look at the balance of what can be gained and lost from the political approaches of coalition building and negotiation versus antagonistic purity.

The Realities of Coalition Governance

DSA-LA alone did not win office for any of our electeds. All three were elected with the backing of large political coalitions, including progressive nonprofits, community organizations, and organized labor. This was the only option. DSA is not in a position to be the sole driving force behind large elections if we want to win real gains.

This reality doesn’t stop when a socialist takes office. In order to win policies that materially benefit their constituents, socialists form coalitions in office. The alternative is to maintain a hardline approach at all times, demanding concessions from opponents, while making no concessions themselves. Politicians can be petty and vindictive, and it is no small challenge to build power in office as a socialist. But the reality is that socialist minority blocs will never pass legislation unless they win votes from people who do not share their ultimate vision for a transformed society.

Contextualizing Local Criticism

The article criticizing LA’s socialists in office cites Twitter posts from a single account as an example of “the trust lost from activist and working class Los Angelenos.” The referenced Twitter account and some of the folks behind it, an organization reported by the Los Angeles Times to have a total of 12 members, have been hostile to DSA, but their inclusion actually presents a perfect opportunity to look at contrasting approaches to winning power and results.

Differences between members of that group and DSA-LA spilled into public focus in 2020, when one such individual was running for Los Angeles City Council in the same district as Hugo Soto-Martínez. Their candidate’s hardline approach to issues like defunding the LAPD were moral and admirable on the surface, but their antagonistic, posting-led approach did not build any coalition and did not translate into any impact on city politics. The candidate finished last place in the primary, earning just 4.4% of the vote, compared to Hugo’s 40.6%.

Socialists do need agitprop, which the folks behind the aforementioned Twitter account excel at. But we also need to be savvy and distinguish between times when criticism of our own is useful, and times when it is being used to undermine our democratic project. Lundquist seems to share the approach of the Twitter account they quoted. We fear that a DSA following those political instincts would see similar results at the polls and produce no tangible wins for the left.

Weighing the Risks Locally and Nationally

In DSA convention season, most of the focus is on national politics and socialist electeds like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (AOC). There are lessons to be learned when comparing the influence of municipal socialist leaders in Los Angeles and national ones like her in Congress.

The biggest difference, perhaps, is the tiny size of the fifteen-person LA City Council. In Los Angeles’s city hall, navigating personalities and personal relationships becomes incredibly important when aiming to construct a bloc capable of passing votes. Interfering with initiatives championed by other council members or the Mayor puts a council member at risk of having their own positive initiatives scuttled. In fact, for decades LA City Council has operated under an assumption and practice that council members don’t interfere with projects or funds specific to another district. This is not a democratic practice, but it does mean that socialist electeds enjoy an almost executive oversight over funding in their own districts. Taking a stand against proposals in other districts could upset this balance and jeopardize their own abilities to serve their constituents. It’s a cost-benefit analysis not taken lightly.

Demanding principled isolationism is complicated even further when we examine the political makeup of the council compared to past years. Many sitting council members, even those who are opponents of DSA’s priorities, are stalwart allies of organized labor, and current Mayor Karen Bass appears open to progressive influence and collaboration. By taking principled isolationist stands at times when there is not a mass, organized base of Angelenos proactively demanding them, we risk harming our ability to win new battles that are near majority support. Our members are not navigating a deadlocked Congress with an unapologetically neoliberal executive, but a government much like that of Brandon Johnson’s in Chicago, where DSA is on the verge of a pro-labor social democratic governing majority.

There is a similarity between local and national dynamics. In attacking some DSA-LA electeds for prioritizing coalitional organizing over justifiable antagonism on specific votes beyond their influence, we see similar tactics to those who go after AOC for actions like normalizing a relationship with Nancy Pelosi. While we all love a firebrand, we’re also able to see that constant antagonism has consequences. An anti-progressive majority has the ability to punish their political enemies, and principled socialists are no exception. In Los Angeles, that type of punishment would have negative consequences not only for our electeds’ constituents, but for all Angelenos.

We’ve already seen an example of this type of punishment locally. From 2020-2022, Nithya Raman (along with non-endorsed DSA member Mike Bonin, until his retirement) often represented the only pro-renter perspective on city council. In the leaked conversations recorded in October 2021 at the offices of the LA Labor Federation, other council members were caught on tape discussing their plans to push Nithya out of office by redistricting her away from the most renter-dense sections of her district. By the time the tapes were released, we had already seen the results of this redistricting.

Our Fighters in Office

Lundquist attempts to demonstrate contrasting examples between DSA-LA’s socialists in office and others around the country, by only focusing on the negative elements of a single vote in LA, while pulling in inspiring quotes and examples from other socialist leaders.

To be clear, our electeds do pick fights for what we believe in. In nearly every council session this year, at least one standalone vote has called to increase LAPD funding through various grants. Council members Soto-Martinez and Hernandez have voted against every single one, sometimes joined by Council member Raman. Prior to council member Raman being elected, the establishment of new “41.18 Zones” – areas of the city where unhoused people can be arrested for sleeping – sailed through unanimously. DSA council members have voted against every single one, and the block of council members opposed to them has gradually grown, such that these votes now typically get 6 No votes. We can debate the merits of one vote, but the overall track record is clear. When called upon (and they are often called upon), Raman, Hernandez, and Soto-Martínez consistently stand up for the working class of Los Angeles, for labor rights, for the undocumented, for the unhoused, and yes, against the brutality and overreach of the LAPD, even if it means being in the minority.

Our three council members have just finished a successful fight for the beginning of a true Sanctuary City Ordinance, which will end any use of city resources or personnel cooperating with federal immigration authorities. This ordinance has been a focus of DSA-LA campaigning since 2017. In Hugo Soto-Martinez’s district, DSA-LA worked hand in hand with the council member to remove a fence around a public park (previously installed as a hostile anti-homelessness measure), and integrate outreach and services. The three show up to picket lines in solidarity with striking workers, and Hugo and Nithya were arrested last month, alongside DSA-LA members, as part of a civil disobedience action in solidarity with hospitality workers.

Even a short time into their tenure, there are many moments from our LA socialists in office that could have fit into the highlight reel perfectly – if one wasn’t just trying to score political points by sharing a one-sided narrative.

Material Conditions, Not Ideal Conditions

As we draw toward a conclusion, we must emphasize that we all as socialists need to base our approach on the material reality of this moment – not an idealized moment. Socialists have taken office in LA as a small minority bloc. But that is not a permanent condition. Our chapter, with the support of DSA members across the country, is pursuing a vision to build a majoritarian movement that can govern on behalf of the working class.

Looking at the material conditions of minority influence and the challenges it presents, we need to confront a crucial question: Does allowing our electeds the freedom to “compromise” in coalition serve to build the movement? Or are we sabotaging our chances at future majority power by forgiving “bad votes?”

In fact, in Los Angeles, we already have a clear example to answer this question. From 2020-2022, when Nithya Raman was the sole endorsed DSA member in office in Los Angeles (walking an even lonelier path then than now), she came under fire more than once from leftists who strongly disagreed with specific votes she cast. Those votes and the ire they drew did not meaningfully undermine our ability to elect more socialists to join her in office. The working class of Los Angeles, and the activists and organizers who are committed to building long term power, have demonstrated an understanding that our socialist vision will not be achieved overnight, and that the path we all tread is a difficult one.

We also know that governance structure and policy making bodies vary dramatically in their function, composition, and purpose around the country. Proposing a highly prescriptive approach to socialists in office that does not factor in varying conditions and structures will not succeed, and undermines the ability of local chapters, who know their organizing conditions best, to work toward tangible goals that align with DSA’s national platform.

Room for Improvement

We are not so arrogant as to think that we cannot do better. We have had some success, but we have not perfected our approach. The fact that our electeds were not able to unify in their vote on the city budget is a tough pill to swallow. In point of fact, on this controversial vote, our chapter did not have a recommendation for our electeds. We did not ask them all to vote a certain way. The situation reinforces our commitment to keep developing our nascent Socialists in Office (SiO) program, as well as the need for a strong national structure to support chapters like ours in building out this work.

Of course, the need to organize is not going to be permanently solved by passing a resolution and expecting our electeds to follow a line. But SiO programs can help. Such a program can allow for clear communication and coordination with electeds and can serve as a model to push DSA legislative priorities forward. Lundquist applauds the coordinated antagonism of NYC-DSA’s electeds on their own recent budget vote, but that coordination happened because of organizing. We’re learning from the experiences of NYC-DSA, and we hope that as DSA devotes more national resources toward this crucial work, others can one day learn from us too.

Conclusion

The vote to approve the city budget was not the only controversial one taken this year. On June 28, council members Hugo Soto-Martínez and Nithya Raman cast a vote in favor of a proposal that would reclassify pandemic-era food aid funding for an LAPD-led gang intervention program in a distant council district. This vote immediately drew attention and anger from many DSA-LA members.

Through the relationships built via SiO, DSA-LA is in consistent communication with our endorsed offices, and was able to express the strong feelings of our membership and collaboratively discuss options to move forward. When the proposal came back up for a vote on August 1, all three of our socialists on the City Council cast their votes against it. That’s the power of organizing – and of not just assuming agreement. We are proud of council member Hernandez for having the integrity to vote no on the proposal the first time around, and of her DSA colleagues for joining the second time.

Socialists who are actually put in positions of power confront conditions almost like a “fog of war.” In moments of decision and conflict, there is reasonable uncertainty about the potential influence of their actions or the plans of their opponents. There are benefits to both coalition-building and to expressing antagonism, and it’s not always clear what the right answer is on any of the dozens of decisions they make on a daily basis. We’ve learned from our electeds that not every choice is as easy to make in the moment as we wish it was. The important thing is to commit to the process of building power together for the long term.

We want to build power for the working class, and we don’t expect it to be a straight line. Our material conditions do not allow us to resolve our way to that power. We’re proud of our socialist electeds, Nithya Raman, Eunisses Hernandez, and Hugo Soto-Martínez, and we will continue to support them through our new Socialists in Office program, as well as organize them when their actions stray from our political line. The socialist project has begun to blossom in LA, and we have our eyes on a long term vision. What we do know is that if we reject our comrades over single votes, we will lose, and the left will surrender its gains.

(This is a personal opinion piece and does not claim to represent the official view of the chapter.)

The post Coalition and Antagonism in Los Angeles: The Realities of Having Socialists in Office appeared first on Socialist Forum.

This year, two of three city council members endorsed by DSA-Los Angeles, Nithya Raman and Hugo Soto-Martínez, voted YES on two separate occasions to increase the amount of public money going to the Los Angeles Police Department. Our  DSA platform classifies the police as a “white supremacist organization” that “disorganize[s] working class communities through the routine application of violence, intimidation, and coercion.” Beyond the more routine disorganizing acts like evictions and protest/strike-breaking, the LAPD is notorious even among police departments for its track record of state-sanctioned theft and murder targeting Black and brown Los Angelenos. So why did DSA-LA electeds vote to support more racist policing?

Socialist representatives currently have little leverage in the fight for control of state policy, which is monopolized by ruling-class representatives of the Democratic and Republican parties. Today, with both Democrat- and Republican-controlled governments pushing for cuts to public services and heightening state repression, the working class struggle for reforms can be lonely in the halls of power. Socialist electeds are under enormous pressure to compromise their principles in exchange for table scraps: in the LA case, it seems that a YES vote was cast to ensure the city provided their district with a small discretionary budget. In this context, it can begin to feel that socialists in office are powerless to enact the transformative platforms on which they were elected.

But there is incredible power to be harnessed in the mass movement for democracy and human liberation. This is especially true of the mass movement against the cops that re-emerged in 2020 and quickly became the largest protest movement in American history. DSA is active in this movement. We have a National Abolition Working Group; in NYC, the chapter’s #DefundNYPD campaign mobilized community members and over 40 city council candidates in support of their program; next week, DSA-LA will rally with Black Lives Matter Los Angeles for a Defund LAPD action. Socialist electeds at their best are champions for these mass movements of the working class, uplifting the work of DSA and the worker’s movement while exposing the odious machinations of bourgeois government and standing firmly against all forms of oppression.

Who can forget DSA-endorsed U.S. Representative Cori Bush’s five-day sit-in on the Capitol steps, which resulted in an extension to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s eviction moratorium. Bush is a socialist who came out of the Ferguson movement and understands the value of fighting alongside working people in our struggle for a better world. “This is why this happened,” she declared when the extension was announced, “Being unapologetic. Being unafraid to stand up.”

Who can forget the words of Montana legislator and self-described democratic socialist Zooey Zephyr against her state’s anti-trans legislation, words so powerful they got her barred from the House floor? “The only thing I will say is if you vote ‘YES’ on this bill and ‘YES’ on these amendments, I hope the next time there’s an invocation when you bow your heads in prayer, you see the blood on your hands.” Who can forget New York’s DSA Representative Zohran Mamdani joining taxi drivers in a successful 15-day hunger strike for debt relief? This alignment between our socialist legislative power and people power is what builds the socialist movement.

So why did DSA-endorsed council members go against the grain of DSA’s platform and vote to increase funding to the LAPD? A Soto-Martínez staffer reportedly stated that the vote was about tactics, not principles. This logic only works if one believes that defunding the arm of the state that violently represses our political project is not a tactical gain for socialists and the working class, or that chipping away at the criminalization of poverty (materially and ideologically) is less of a material gain than a small discretionary budget.

Some might still argue that voting against the budget would be merely symbolic without a deeper bench of socialist electeds. But what would it take to move beyond the symbolic? Adherence to the platform’s anti-cop position. Any leverage gained in the halls of power is not worth the trust lost from activist and working class Los Angelenos. Standing by our anti-cop position has more strategic value for DSA: in materially enacting our anti-carceral agenda, in building future constituencies for even more socialist electeds, and in building consciousness and organization for a socialist future.

If anyone tells you this can’t be done, just point them to New York City. This year, DSA electeds at the state and city level in New York put this strategy to the test and voted NO on terrible budgets. And these socialists didn’t just vote NO; they managed to increase their power. At the state level, they managed to pass the ecosocialist Build Public Renewables Act, and at the local level, they managed to bring more progressives into their no-voting bloc.

To grow DSA into a better structured party surrogate, we must develop clearer standards for our electeds, and create more open, democratic processes to hold electeds to those standards. In our amendment to the NEC resolution (“Towards a Party-Like Electoral Strategy”), comrades in Marxist Unity Group and Reform & Revolution put forward some red lines for socialist electeds:

• Socialists don’t vote to increase cop budgets

• Socialists don’t vote for the war machine

• Socialists don’t vote to break strikes

• Socialists stand against ALL forms of oppression

If these standards are violated, the amendment calls for an open discussion between members and electeds: as it stands, too much is decided by electeds and their staff behind closed doors, out of sight from the general membership.

Of course, like with any rule, there will be exceptions. But these kinds of rules are still crucial to establish. How can we expect DSA electeds to meet our standards without first letting them know what those standards are? Raman and Soto-Martínez’s votes aren’t the first for DSA, and they won’t be the last: just the other week a DSA elected in DC expressed support for pro-cop legislation, and since 2021 DSA has been rocked with a demobilizing controversy surrounding DSA electeds’ material and symbolic support for Israeli oppression. To respond better in the future, DSA needs clear expectations and strong democratic mechanisms to uphold them. Help us ensure that DSA electeds never vote for cop budgets again – vote YES on “Towards a Party-Like Electoral Strategy” if it makes it onto the national convention agenda, use the language of this amendment as a framework for your local chapters’ relationship to endorsed electeds, and get DSA involved in the mass movement by working with abolitionists doing the work in your community!

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For a response to this article, see “Coalition and Antagonism in Los Angeles: The Realities of Having Socialists in Office.” – eds.

The post Socialists Don’t Vote for Cop Budgets appeared first on Socialist Forum.

Member Bryce Springfield

Radical democracy is not a term that many of us are used to hearing in our political science courses. You might hear it in one of the few classes that cover social movements and extra-parliamentary politics, but in general students are exclusively exposed to a rather limited understanding of democracy that not only fails to acknowledge the possibility of democracy beyond government, but that also has a fundamental distrust in the capacity of the “bewildered herd” — as Walter Lippmann once called the public — to make its own decisions about the institutions that affect our everyday lives.

This system is one wherein constituents, under a particular constitutional arrangement, “freely and fairly” elect representatives who suggest and vote on government policies on the public’s behalf. In addition, it features a market-based economic system with non-democratic firm-level relations between private owners on the one hand, and non-owner workers and consumers on the other. Many would call this capitalist, representative system a “liberal democracy.”

From direct democracy to liberal democracy

Many prehistoric societies throughout a large span of the human experience saw direct or semi-direct democracy as a natural system of self-management in both politics and economics. Yet in recent history, some have treated liberal democracy as the form of social organization most compatible with human nature.

From what we know about early democracies, several early agricultural societies, such as those of Phoenicia and Mesopotamia, are thought to have adopted democratic institutions long before the Greek city-states did. Going even further back, a wide range of prehistoric societies tended to “make all important collective decisions by consensus, and many of them [did] not even have chiefs,” with larger bands often breaking into smaller units to allow easier consensus-making, according to a 1993 paper.

Some have argued that the democratic aspect of many early societies may have contributed to a largely “peaceful order.” Contrary to what many 19th-century Western thinkers theorized about prehistoric violence and war, available data suggests that only around 2% of human fossils from 2 million to 14,000 years ago show evidence of a “traumatic violent injury,” while that percentage dramatically increased following the development of centralized state societies after the Agricultural and Industrial Revolutions.

In Ancient Athens, from roughly the 6th century BCE to the 4th century BCE (with interruptions), “democracy” referred to a system of active popular participation (limited to adult male citizens) in the formulation of legislation and the exercise of executive functions. The selection of the citizens who performed these functions was accomplished via sortition, in that members of the public were chosen at random to participate in decision-making assemblies, similar to modern juries. Though limited in terms of inclusion, Athens exercised a much more direct form of democracy than that of today’s Western democracies. The Roman Republic (509 BCE — 27 BCE), on the other hand, is the most influential early case of a representative democracy, with popularly elected officials performing political duties instead of the people themselves, inspiring future democratic republics.

Fast forward to the 18th century, and one observes the “liberal democratic” model developing as an alternative to the radically authoritarian and feudal regimes that dominated Europe at the time. With the support of a range of Western intellectuals, often viewed as an extremist and unreasonable fringe by their contemporaries, the idea of a representative democratic government featuring constitutional rights and a capitalist economy posed a deep challenge to existing institutions. Over time, liberal democratic ideals gained significant traction among European publics, enabling revolutions first in the American colonies and then France, and later in other European countries and, eventually, their colonies as well.

I mention these details to put liberal democracy, particularly its representative democratic and capitalist elements, in perspective; they are but a blip in human history, and thus are clearly not the products of human nature until recent centuries.

Today’s crisis of liberal democracy

I agree with the premise that the formation and expansion of liberal democracy over the last three centuries marks a positive change in human development away from authoritarian and feudal systems of political and economic domination. This revolutionary process has normalized democracy as a universal ideal, and standardized legal equality as well as freedom of thought, speech, association, religion, and the press. Liberal democracies have often failed to live up to these same ideals, particularly when it comes to domestic social equality and colonial domination, but in many cases they have successfully challenged and overturned systems of oppression around the world.

In today’s age, however, there are a few respects in which liberal democracy is failing to meet the rising standards expected by working-class people who make up the global majority.

Capitalist economy

Recent polls reveal that a staggering 60% of an international sample of workers are emotionally detached at work, while only 33% feel engaged with their labor. In the US, the standard-bearer of global capitalism, 50% of workers report frequent stress at work, with their most frequently reported cause of workplace dissatisfaction being unfair treatment.

Though even Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels openly acknowledged the incredible power of capitalism as a force for global industrialization, capitalism is a fundamentally undemocratic system wherein the owners of the means of production (i.e., capitalists) hold outsized power over those who operate the means of production (i.e., workers). Similar criticisms have been made about many state socialist solutions, like those of the Soviet Union, Maoist China, and various other experiments where production was controlled by an undemocratic bureaucratic apparatus holding outsized power over the workers they claimed to represent — an arrangement often justified by asserting that the Communist Party aristocracy was the workers, or even that the masses were too stupid to direct their own workplaces. Yet mainstream political commentators rarely extend this criticism to capitalism, even though a nearly identical logic applies.

As the anti-authoritarian left has understood for generations, in either of these systems — no more in the authoritarian socialist case than in the capitalist case — the workplace where most workers spend the majority of their lives is dictatorially controlled by an unelected executive or board of executives, who may arbitrarily set wages and undemocratically select unit managers. Even in wealthy social democracies with strong welfare programs and powerful labor unions, workers are forced to remain employed to avoid a squalid lifestyle. Meanwhile, in the Global South, the consequences for those who choose not to degrade their bodies, minds, and time enough for capitalism can include starvation or death. In either case, it is a “free” choice between exhaustion or poverty.

Working conditions around the world are often very poor, woefully ill-compensatory for the economic value produced, and even unsafe due to workers’ lack of influence over workplace decision-making. On the other hand, if workers could exercise democracy in the workplace, it is highly likely that they would not make the same decisions as those of a disconnected capitalist on issues related to safety, benefits, wages, and employment. Not only that, workers would also have more direct incentives to reduce irresponsible risk because of profit sharing and increased sensitivity to the threat of losing their jobs. Reducing risk throughout the economy would then mitigate the possibility of bankruptcy and wider economic crises, and give innovators fewer negative incentives and more financial stability to do their valuable work.

Furthermore, workplace democracy would address the “local knowledge problem” that right-wing economists seem all too happy to attribute to centrally-planned economies. This theory refers to the argument that central planners, such as those of state socialist regimes, lack much of the information necessary for rational economic decision-making, as such information is distributed amongst individual actors.

Yet under capitalism as well, owners, executives, and high-level managers frequently do not have extensive direct experience in everyday work, limiting the information they have to make informed firm-level plans. By ensuring that all of those who work for the factories, the shops, and the gig services have an input in the direction of their respective firms, whether through representatives or direct decision-making, firms can be better equipped to improve efficiency, productivity, and stability.

These theoretical predictions are generally supported by major literature reviews of both worker-owned cooperatives and, to a lesser extent, union-represented workplaces. Worker cooperatives tend to be more productive and stable through recessions than other firms, and they also tend to have longer lifespans, greater employee satisfaction, lower employee turnover, and greater efficiency. Union-represented workplaces also see significantly higher pay than comparable workplaces, as well as better workplace safety and increased firm stability.

Representative democratic government

Although some countries express satisfaction with their representative systems, support for democracy in many countries has significantly declined, while in others pro-democracy sentiment has simply always been low. In a 34-country survey conducted by the Pew Research Center in 2019, the median country had 52% dissatisfaction with democracy in their country, compared to a mere 44% satisfaction. In Latin America, a very high portion of respondents — 70% — said they were dissatisfied with democracy in their respective countries, with countries like Ecuador and Peru in particular seeing around 10% satisfaction. This data reflects significant declines in democratic satisfaction from just two or three decades ago.

What is causing this? One possible reason could be that populations are feeling increasingly disconnected from their representatives, with 64% of citizens in the median country surveyed by the Pew Research Center agreeing that elected officials do not care about “what people like them think.” In many representative democracies, campaign donations and politicians’ own investments provide incentives to stray from the popular will in favor of special interests. In the US, we can see this tendency expressed in relation to a vast range of policies — from universal healthcare to free college, to marijuana legalization, to abortion rights, to a $15 minimum wage — each of which have strong public support, but none are currently close to promulgation at the national level. A variety of studies have demonstrated that United States representatives, though partly influenced by voter preferences, frequently give outsized preference to policies favored by the wealthy.

One factor that may explain this proposed relationship is the fact that elected representatives, on average, are not of comparable socio-economic status to that of the general public, typically being significantly wealthier. As a consequence, even those potentially sympathetic to the working class simply do not experience the everyday difficulties that workers regularly face, and can therefore suffer from, again, the local knowledge problem frequently cited by right-wing economists.

These developments are especially dangerous in light of the democratic backsliding that has recently occurred in Hungary, Poland, Nicaragua, Bolivia, India, Tunisia, Turkey, and other countries where executives and single parties have increasingly dominated over legislatures and courts, and have enforced laws that seriously limit media and associational freedoms. These trends likewise menace the United States, where several major politicians have denied election results and where state governments regularly limit voting rights. As confidence in democracy declines, more and more countries are at risk of autocratization — an alternative that I, along with liberal democrats, assert is worse than the liberal democratic arrangement.

Some theorists of democratic backsliding, such as the authors of How Democracies Die — the book that apparently helped push Joe Biden to run for president in 2020 — have argued that merely “restor[ing] the basic norms” of liberal democracy and including a more diverse range of people within the liberal democratic mechanisms will be enough to save democracy. However, the true roots of democratic backsliding go much deeper than this, as has been shown in the above analysis.

Further than merely questioning the status quo — a civic duty in any healthy democracy — authoritarian populists threaten democracy by claiming to be the only ones who can truly represent the “real people.” But creating the institutions and providing the spare time for people to represent themselves could put a significant number of obstacles in the way of these despotic distortions of the public will. The capacity of authoritarian populists to skillfully abuse the top-down model of representative democracy in order to disseminate antidemocratic attitudes and reforms would be largely immobilized in such a scenario.

Given that authoritarian populists are the usual suspects in advancing democratic backsliding in the modern day, and that said authoritarian populists gain power through the personality-oriented politics of representative democracies, it would serve democrats well to push for an alternative that makes the path to autocratization much more challenging.

Radical democracy as an alternative

A few radical democratic projects have succeeded in reviving direct democratic as well as workplace democratic ideals in the last few decades, while simultaneously maintaining the benefits of constitutional rights prioritized by liberal regimes.

In 1994, for example, a large portion of the Mexican state of Chiapas established autonomy through the high-profile Zapatista Uprising, which was waged in protest against what the largely indigenous population saw as an authoritarian and undemocratic government. Since then, 360,000 Zapatistas have enjoyed participatory democracy in a decentralized system of government, alongside a democratic economy consisting of worker cooperatives and common ownership of land, and a democratic education system involving both students and parents.

In 2012, during the Syrian Civil War, four million people suffering under the aggression of the Syrian and Turkish governments, as well as of ISIS, formed the Democratic Federation of Northern Syria (also known as Rojava). They gained their autonomy through the establishment of a federalist system of participatory democracy, with significant sectors of the economy being managed democratically through worker cooperatives and workers’ councils.

But what would such a system look like for Princeton students? I will end with a description of a hypothetical alternate universe in which Princeton students live in a radically democratic society.

Suppose that in this alternate universe, there is a major push among students for the University to divest from fossil fuels. If the level of support for this change was similar to that in our universe, divestment would be an overwhelmingly obvious policy to pursue, given that 82% of undergraduates favor it. Assuming that a majority of University employees and graduate students also agree with this change, which is a fair supposition given the high number of faculty endorsements behind it and the generally liberal or leftist political attitudes of students and working New Jersey residents, the matter of fossil fuel divestment could be resolved almost immediately, as opposed to only partially after many years.

Suppose that just like at the real Princeton, the alternate Math Department enjoys an atrocious reputation among undergraduate students for the poor organization of its courses and the mind-numbing teaching style of some of its professors. With student input actually counting for something, rather than simply being diverted into listening sessions, and then committee meetings, before finally being ignored, perhaps students could successfully influence the department into seeking out more dedicated lecturers rather than only researchers who may not be passionate about teaching their students.

Suppose that you work at the local Starbucks on Nassau Street, and you hate the grueling working conditions there, as plenty of baristas have expressed in our own universe. If the Starbucks were a worker cooperative, the employees who keep the store running would have significantly more power over their wage rates and working conditions, meaning they could raise wages to a level that encourages both higher productivity and more job applicants. Workers would ensure that profits are no longer aimed at supporting investors and executives, but rather at supporting all who contribute to the productive process.

Within the government of this alternate universe, perhaps marijuana would be quickly legalized, so students would not have to worry about state violence or University discipline against them for using the drug. Perhaps we would already have a public healthcare system that eliminates the frustrating and expensive reimbursement bureaucracy we face with the Student Health Plan, and we would not have to carefully search for in-network doctors nearby — instead, we would know that all doctors are covered.

And finally, with mechanisms of direct participation, perhaps we could reduce the level of atomization and loneliness in our society, and therefore develop a better sense of mutual understanding and respect for each other and the issues that matter to us. Maybe psychologists both on- and off-campus would be offered higher pay through their own workplace democracies, as well as through popular participation in public healthcare policy. This would encourage more psychologists to come and support young people, a particularly vulnerable demographic in terms of mental health issues, a key concern for many in the Princeton community given the alarming number of recent mental health-related tragedies.

Liberal democratic institutions are failing us at this stage of human development. Radical democracy, on the other hand, provides answers to many of the dissatisfactions that students, workers, and voters now face. Thus, radical democracy offers a new understanding of democracy appropriate for a new age.

This piece was originally published in The Princeton Progressive.

Member Bryce Springfield

During my first semester at Princeton, I, like many students, decided to look into student organizations that I could get involved with going forward. Apart from wishing to satisfy my “speedcubing” hobby with the Cube Club, I also looked into left-wing organizations to which I could contribute, as I had been a committed socialist for several years at that point.

While several left-wing organizations had gone dormant, one that caught my interest was The Prog. A quick glance at the description made The Prog seem like a great fit for me: it is Princeton’s only left-wing campus newspaper written by and for students. However, after taking a look at The Prog’s website, one piece raised a lot of questions for me: “OPINION: What’s Really Happening in Xinjiang?” by an anonymous author. As I read the article, I found myself disappointed with the article’s arguments, which sounded similar to points I had heard from some Marxist-Leninists and even the Chinese government’s own public comments.

My first thought was this: the Left is meant to question the status quo and its institutions. Considering the pervasiveness of capitalist institutions in China’s economy and authoritarian bureaucracy, one should think that a minimization of the Chinese government’s oppression of minority groups should be something that leftists radically reject. However, I did not find this article to follow that ideal.

In its introduction, the author of “What’s Really Happening in Xinjiang” rightly points out that the United States has utilized unfounded claims and racist propaganda to justify its imperialist ambitions. Most visibly, this is what happened after the September 11 terrorist attacks as President George W. Bush declared a “War on Terror” in response. Many Muslim Americans were targeted and discriminated against by individuals and the government, which has had lasting repercussions until today. Even in recent years, nearly half of Americans see Muslims as a group more inclined to violence than others, and Muslims are the least approved-of religious group in the United States, according to survey data from the Pew Research Center.

The War on Terror gained widespread legitimacy and support through the construction of an Islamic “threat” that justified US-backed wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, and other regions, leading to at least 37 million displacements, mass food insecurity, and the deaths of 897,000 to 929,000 people.

Yet, alongside vague references to “CIA front groups, defense contractors, and Western government sources” fabricating empirical support for key claims regarding the genocide, the author resorts to suspiciously familiar fearmongering about the “increasing radicalization of some of [Xinjiang’s] Islamic citizens” — referring to a few notable cases of terrorism — as, seemingly, a mitigating factor for the oppression that the Chinese government commits against an entire population. Though I applaud the author for at least acknowledging officials’ “eager[ness] to surveil, arrest, and racially profile Uyghurs,” some parts of the article appear to me to question whether key claims of atrocities in Xinjiang are true or imply an alternative framing of “vocational schools.”

In this article, I hope to demonstrate compelling evidence from the Chinese government itself and other openly available sources to emphasize the state oppression of Uyghur Muslims in the majority-minority Xinjiang province, particularly from 2017 to 2019. Then, I will discuss how leftists can reconcile legitimate claims of atrocities with anti-imperialism and international solidarity against statist and capitalist systems that profit off of oppressed groups.

Genocide

Of course, “genocide” is often a loaded term used to overcharacterize a wide range of atrocities, as the author of the opinion piece points out. For the sake of using this word in line with international standards, I will compare the United Nations’ definition of genocide with what I believe is occurring in Xinjiang based solely on the information presented in this article.

In Article II of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, or simply the Genocide Convention, ratified or acceded to by 149 countries, including China, the following definition was approved:

In the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:

a. Killing members of the group;

b. Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;

c. Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;

d. Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;

e. Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.

Most people likely immediately only think of part (a), but this excerpt demonstrates that genocide also includes other sorts of atrocities while maintaining clear, defined bounds. In the case of Xinjiang since at least 2017, I would argue that, with the points made in this article, at least (b) through (d) likely apply due to mandatory “re-education” for Muslim practices and especially forced birth prevention. Therefore, I will use the term “Uyghur genocide” to refer to the state oppression particularly against Muslims in Xinjiang, but that may also target others in Xinjiang.

For the purposes of this article, in addition to mentioning a few things about forced cultural assimilation (which some refer to as “cultural genocide”), I will primarily focus on the genocidal aspects of oppression in Xinjiang according to the UN definition, although there is also much to be said about surveillance and repression of free expression in Xinjiang for the sake of “stability,” including against activists pushing for — and this is of particular interest to the Left — environmental protections.

Internment Camps

The most well-reported aspect of the Uyghur genocide is perhaps its internment camps, described by the Chinese government as “vocational education and training centers” or “re-education camps.” According to Chinese government officials, there is an “urgent need” for these camps in order to fight the “Three Evil Forces” of terrorism, separatism, and extremism that have threatened Chinese territorial and civil stability “[b]etween 1990 and the end of 2016.”

Shortly after this policy realignment, the creation of internment camps was first observed in 2017. In 2018, Xinjiang officials responded by either denying the camps’ existence or justifying them as agents of social stability and economic growth. What is interesting is that in 2015, a few years before this major policy shift, Chinese government officials claimed that they had already been extremely effective in preventing terrorist attacks, indicating that the new policies in Xinjiang were not in response to heightened terrorist activity.

Since then, Chinese government sources have shifted toward acknowledging the re-education camps and have even invited Western journalists to observe them under highly restrictive conditions, presenting them as bona fide educational facilities. However, an analysis of the birth rates and arrest rates in Xinjiang suggests something more nefarious.

Crude birth rates and incarceration rates

One does not need to rely on Western researchers or on testimonials to find drastic irregularities that cannot reasonably be explained by normal demographic or developmental trends. In fact, we only need to look at the Chinese government’s own annual statistical reports, the China Statistical Yearbooks, which it publishes online and in print. Unfortunately, the Yearbooks do not report on ethnic breakdowns. Regardless, an analysis of the provided data points to abnormal trends in Xinjiang, which is mostly populated by minority groups and nearly half Uyghur, that are not observed in other regions in the same time frame.

The first piece of evidence that should raise serious concern is Xinjiang’s change in birth rates over the last few years. Although the Chinese government began omitting regional birth rates from the 2020 statistics, the data up to 2019 is clearly unusual.

My analysis begins with recent regional birth rate data from 2013 through 2019 provided by the China Statistical Yearbooks. Below are a couple of graphs I constructed to visualize the data. In the first, we see a significant drop of 49% in the annual birth rate in Xinjiang between 2017 and 2019, which is a much faster drop than that of China as a whole. This brings the regional birth rates significantly below that of the country, which is all the more concerning given that Xinjiang’s historical birth rates had been notably higher than that of the national average.

To compare this to other regions in China, below is a histogram showing Xinjiang as the lowest instance of birth rates from 2017, when the “vocational camps” opened, to 2019. One thing to note is that with the rescinding of the One Child Policy in 2015 and 2016, according to many Chinese demographers, we should see an immediate increase in birth rates followed by decreases over this period — due to “two-child policies” — to a greater extent than natural changes. Given that Xinjiang was exempted from having one-child restrictions as mentioned in the article, meaning it should not have experienced shocks from this, it should be concerning that it is an extreme outlier even compared to other Chinese provinces that were expected to experience significant changes.

The only comparable drop in reported birth rates since 1950 that I am aware of is that of Greenland from mass sterilization under Danish colonial rule, which is a fitting comparison. Even this, however, was over the course of nearly a decade rather than two years.

We see unusual changes in official contraceptive data in 2018 in Xinjiang, as well. In the China Health Statistical Yearbooks, we see rapid increases in the national proportion of sterilizations — which include vasectomies and “tube tying” — in Xinjiang especially in 2018. The author of the original article correctly notes that Adrian Zenz, a far-right fundamentalist and senior fellow at the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation widely cited for claims about the Uyghur genocide, performed serious errors in his calculations of sterilizations in Xinjiang, but the data displayed below demonstrates the point to be generally correct, despite his obvious biases and propensity to exaggerate.

In addition to information on birth rates and birth control, we can look at incarceration rates reported by government officials in various work reports. Analyzing the official work reports of the Xinjiang provincial government and the Chinese national government, I produced the graph below to represent the percentage of arrests in China as a whole that were in Xinjiang. Clear abnormalities are present from 2017 to 2019, and provincial reports are notably missing from 2022, when national arrests exploded from the White Paper Protests, where protestors sang “The Internationale” and other socialist messaging against authoritarian suppression, particularly aggravated by the Ürümqi fire in Xinjiang. Incidentally, while the arrest reports mention the regulation of monopolies and fraud, their defense of capital is evident in their talk of promoting the “deep integration of party building and business,” “serving private enterprises,” and highlighting the punishment of “crimes against the legitimate rights and interests of private enterprises.” This is a topic I will return to later.

Despite Xinjiang being just 1.5% of the national population, it quickly went from making up less than 5% of national arrests to more than 20% after 2017, and arrests remained quite high in the following years. Considering that terrorist incidents in Xinjiang did not more than quadruple between 2016 and 2017, this should suggest that a campaign against a more vast swath of the population had been coordinated.

Razing of cultural sites

Beyond statistical data on reproduction and incarceration, it is also important to look at the cultural effects of the Chinese crackdown in Xinjiang, which may also help us think about why China chose to ramp up repression in the region despite declining terrorist incidents. Evidence from publicly available satellite imagery has been studied to look at how religious and cultural sites in Xinjiang have been affected. Systematic studies have demonstrated an unusual 32% of mosques in Xinjiang having been destroyed and another 28% significantly damaged between 2017 and 2020. One of the more visible examples of this was the erasure of the ancient Imam Asim Shrine, where thousands of Muslim pilgrims regularly prayed and tied flags just a decade ago before its apparent destruction.

Islamophobic legislation

Next, I will examine the policies and prevailing ideas that may be driving Uyghur persecution in Xinjiang. For this, I closely read the 2017 “Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region Regulation on De-Extremification,” hosted on the Xinjiang regional government’s website. While I used a browser extension to translate the document, which could lead to misinterpretation, others have performed their own translations, which read similarly to my computer translation. Revisions to the law in 2018 see nearly identical restrictions.

Beginning in Chapter I, article 3 of the legislation, the definition of “extremification” is left very broad. Specifically, it notes that “[e]xtremification … refers to speech and actions under the influence of extremism, that spread radical religious ideology, and reject and interfere with normal production and livelihood.” Extremism refers to ideas and behaviors that “incite hatred and discrimination, and advocate violence by distorting religious teaching and other methods.”

What is inciting hatred and discrimination, or violence? What is “radical religious ideology”? What is considered an interference “with normal production and livelihood”? These questions are not answered in the document and these terms are left open to interpretation so that any idea one may find challenging could be a “violent” thought and any behavior deemed atypical could be “radical” and interfere with “normal production.” This enables the document to provide sweeping powers to the government to persecute Muslims in Xinjiang who adopt more visibly Islamic clothing, speech, traditions, and political and religious thought.

The legislation specifically prohibits “irregular beards or name selection,” the wearing of “burqas with face coverings,” or other “symbols of extremification” in Chapter II. The former two restrictions are common presentations and behaviors of Muslims worldwide, and the latter can describe anything the government deems as “extreme,” leaving ample room for arbitrary discrimination.

In Chapter III, the legislation reveals the main objective of these strict regulations: “De-extremification shall persist in the correct political orientation and direction of public opinion” (Article 12) and “shall do a good job of … combining ideological education, psychological counseling, behavioral corrections, and skills training [emphases added]” (Article 14). From this 2017 legislation, the pervading theme seems to be the Chinese and Xinjiang governments’ interest in forcing cultural and political conformity and the “correct political orientation” of Xi Jinping onto the Uyghur and Muslim populations of Xinjiang.

Global imperialist and capitalist intersections

As mentioned in the opening paragraphs, it is important to recognize that the justifications given by Chinese officials for increased control of the Uyghur population is a continuation of the global “War on Terror” proliferated by the United States. After the September 11 attacks, Chinese state rhetoric on the Uyghur population shifted toward dubiously connecting Uyghur organizations and jihadist groups rather than emphasizing “pan-Turkic separatism.” In fact, some of the United States’ current foreign policies in Central Asia may actually bolster the deportation of Uyghur Muslims to China, as the US subsidizes security systems and massive hauls of military equipment for authoritarian regimes in the region who are themselves supportive of the crackdowns in Xinjiang or who find some of their own Uyghur citizens too disruptive.

It should be mentioned that the Chinese government stands to benefit from oil deposits and other economic opportunities through its grip on Xinjiang and by employing War on Terror-esque justifications against the majority Muslim peoples that populate much of the province.

In addition, while labor conditions in China as a whole are quite squalid, oppression and surveillance in Xinjiang have been particularly beneficial to global capitalism’s exploitation of workers for endless profit. Regardless of concerns about human rights violations in Xinjiang, companies like Nike and Tesla benefit from the province’s cotton and polysilicon production supported by forced laborers and actively try to water down labor laws related to it; and billions have been invested in public-private security technology partnerships, drastically higher than in previous years. Meanwhile, as hinted in the section on incarceration, the Chinese Communist Party’s deep defense of private interests is clear in its own rhetoric and overt actions, even incorporating capitalist CEOs and business leaders as a major part of the National People’s Congress and as a core piece of the Party itself.

* * *

There is far more to be said about the complexities of state oppression in Xinjiang, including the silencing of left-wing activists, anti-LGBTQ laws, the government leaks of mass surveillance data, the heavily restricted conditions of foreign inspections, and more. Alas, there is only so much that can fit in one piece.

Of course, several aspects of what has been documented in Xinjiang have been committed by Western governments, particularly toward indigenous and Black populations. However, this does not mean that the Uyghur genocide is any less troubling because other countries do the same. It does indicate that the working class has multiple competing enemies sustaining the same system of globalized state capitalism. To this day, state oppression in Xinjiang benefits global capitalism, including Western firms, through its securitization and production of materials under poor conditions. We must find ways to liberate the oppressed in Xinjiang, regardless of the atrocities of either “side.”

We should always question government and corporate media narratives as well as their motives. However, we can look at concrete data and other public information to substantiate at least some claims espoused by agenda setters. Perhaps exaggerated conclusions and the history of US imperialism rightly result in a higher degree of skepticism, but, in this case, we have convincing primary source evidence available, free from the manipulation of US propaganda outlets, Adrian Zenz, or any other potentially biased Western source.

As leftists, we should respond to the clear motives that some interest groups and US officials have regarding the expansion of US imperialism not by trying to dismiss or mitigate claims of atrocities as only “in service of a larger imperial project” or by giving credibility to government-constructed visits or other authoritarian governments’ representatives and ambassadors, but by educating our peers about what war hawks wish to do with information of atrocities. US statements and policies acknowledging the Uyghur genocide are not the problem; the problem is the imperialist tendencies of the United States and the influence that pro-interventionist interest groups have over our government.

It is not easy to provide a simple solution to end and provide restitution for the oppression of Uyghur Muslims in Xinjiang, but surely most leftists can agree that putting American boots in China or attempting to externally change the country’s regime aren’t viable options if we want to reduce violence and promote freedom across the world. Part of the solution will need to involve teaching international solidarity for the liberation of all working class people, including for Chinese Uyghurs potentially seeking refuge. This is what many in the Muslim world have already demonstrated through mass demonstrations in Bangladesh, Nepal, India, and Indonesia, just to name a few, and through polls in Palestine. It may also involve accepting refugees, and independent socialist groups developing alternative media and support infrastructure to aid those potentially suffering from oppression or organizing for liberation.

Neither the US’s democratic capitalism nor China’s capitalism with Marxist–Leninist aesthetics will save us. Only the working class can save itself through building solidarity and, in this case, critically assessing claims of atrocities without lending fallacious credibility to either imperialist or denialist tendencies.

This piece was originally published in The Princeton Progressive.