DSA is almost entirely based on your local chapter and trying to ascribe a somewhat cohesive understanding of them from a national level is, in my opinion, not going to yeild accurate or useful results.
There are some chapters where the leadership of DSA is extremely socdem and liberal while the membership are commited Marxists, or at least anti-imperialist and nominally pro-AES. There are other chapters where it’s the reverse, and the leadership is a bunch of commited anti-imperialists whom are trying their damnest to sheperad baby leftists socdems into actual revolutionary politics but are constrained by the majority white leftist community. There’s also chapters where the leadership and membership are quite consistent in their views, be it socdem liberalism or commited Marxists who just needed an organization structure to begin doing actions and found it through the DSA.
This doesn’t take into account the conflicts between DSA and YDSA which is its own category of discussion.
I will say that according to a Comrade of mine who I know is within my local DSA, there’s currently a power struggle within the organization itself happening mainly through the local branches. The struggle is between the anti-imperialist faction who often find themselves amiable towards MLs and other Marxists due to the shared internationalist line, and the socdem liberal faction who focuses more of their attention on electoralism.
Right now, the latter faction seems to have institutional power of a certain degree, boasting socdem representatives within the US government, but they are increasingly at odds with the organization itself which seems to be becomimg more and more influenced by the former faction. I personally think that the socdems will eventually be overwhelmed and break into various splits while the DSA eventually comes under the control of the anti-imperialist faction.
This is also something I would suggest you don’t just take my word for it, as I mentioned prior, local chapters are the most important factor for determining how the DSA operates at a level that matters.
DSA is almost entirely based on your local chapter and trying to ascribe a somewhat cohesive understanding of them from a national level is, in my opinion, not going to yeild accurate or useful results.
There are some chapters where the leadership of DSA is extremely socdem and liberal while the membership are commited Marxists, or at least anti-imperialist and nominally pro-AES. There are other chapters where it’s the reverse, and the leadership is a bunch of commited anti-imperialists whom are trying their damnest to sheperad baby leftists socdems into actual revolutionary politics but are constrained by the majority white leftist community. There’s also chapters where the leadership and membership are quite consistent in their views, be it socdem liberalism or commited Marxists who just needed an organization structure to begin doing actions and found it through the DSA.
This doesn’t take into account the conflicts between DSA and YDSA which is its own category of discussion.
I will say that according to a Comrade of mine who I know is within my local DSA, there’s currently a power struggle within the organization itself happening mainly through the local branches. The struggle is between the anti-imperialist faction who often find themselves amiable towards MLs and other Marxists due to the shared internationalist line, and the socdem liberal faction who focuses more of their attention on electoralism.
Right now, the latter faction seems to have institutional power of a certain degree, boasting socdem representatives within the US government, but they are increasingly at odds with the organization itself which seems to be becomimg more and more influenced by the former faction. I personally think that the socdems will eventually be overwhelmed and break into various splits while the DSA eventually comes under the control of the anti-imperialist faction.
This is also something I would suggest you don’t just take my word for it, as I mentioned prior, local chapters are the most important factor for determining how the DSA operates at a level that matters.
My position stands. See above.