The Left’s Electoral Strategy Is Working. Let’s Keep Building It.
Democratic socialists have made their most significant electoral inroads in years by operating as a left-wing faction in the Democratic Party. Chris Maisano argues that we should own that strategy, and push it further.
Representatives Rashida Tlaib (D-MI), Ayanna Pressley (D-MA), Ilhan Omar (D-MN), and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) take questions at the US Capitol on July 15, 2019. (Alex Wroblewski / Getty Images)
I welcome Nick French’s critical response to my recent piece on the Left, the Democratic Party, and electoral strategy. It shows that the US left is moving beyond the most sterile versions of these debates and has gotten over the notion that definitively futile efforts like the Green Party or the People’s Party are worth anyone’s time.
Still, French’s article reflects how the Democratic Party remains a source of vexation on the Left. I disagree with the thrust of French’s argument, yet I found myself agreeing with some of his specific points and propositions: the need to elect democratic socialists to office through Democratic Party primary elections; the usefulness of “party surrogate”–style organizations like Democratic Socialists of America (DSA); the often undemocratic nature of official Democratic Party institutions like state or local committees; and the need for the socialist left to maintain its own political identity. None of this is in question here, yet we find ourselves disagreeing with each other. Why?
Party in the USA
The primary source of disagreement, in my view, has to do with the nature and purpose of US-style political parties. These are very odd contraptions quite unlike their counterparts in comparable countries, which is why attempts to emulate the labor and left-wing parties that are commonplace elsewhere have repeatedly failed here.
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