Skip Navigation
askchapo @hexbear.net
borschtisgarbo @lemmygrad.ml

What has the PSL done differently than other leftist organisations in the U.S. ,and the west more generally, that has allowed them to be so successful?

They have seen a meteoric rise in recent years. Their sister/front organisations like ANSWER, Codepink, People's Forum, BTnews have all become household names. When I look at protests in the U.S., it seems so many of them are organised directly, or indirectly, by them. In comparison, organisations like the CPUSA or the DSA are lacking behind.

How and why?

71 comments

  • Short Answer: Marxism-Leninism

    Long Answer:

    Extreme endurance on the part of the organizers, who began at a time when the US was in even more of a counterrevolutionary period and things would have reasonably seemed hopeless for socialist organizers.

    In addition, being mild in manner but radical in material, and instead of being abrasive and ultra-left in ways that alienate people, instead focusing on being approachable while bringing in radical politics.

    Finally, the movement for Palestine in the US has been in huge parts brought forward by them and allied groups. By advocating for Palestine for decades in what was originally an unpopular position, being consistent in their support for Palestine for decades meant that they were well equipped to help rise and be risen by the movements for Palestine in the U.S.

    Also it should be mentioned that the party's active practice of Democratic centralism gives them the ability to engage with these things on a national scale. While I have much love for many of the DSA Members I know, the DSA suffers from it's association with Bernie Sanders and the liberal party who do not reciprocate this support; and it's a very decentralized organization which means that many branches do not work together or follow national's lead the same way that PSL branches do.

  • I've attributed their success to three things. They aggressively weed out any potential cops or feds. I've never seen any organization take it this seriously. If they even catch a whiff of cop on you, then you're out.

    The second part of it is probably money. Party dues are very high compared to other orgs, so they have a bunch of money to work with.

    Third is how willing they are to work with other groups. I know PSL and Marxist orgs in general have a reputation for being rigid and controlling, but that hasn't been my impression at all. Branches are frequently in coalition with other local groups, like my local PSL coordinates with Mexico's MORENA and several indigenous/latino groups.

  • I think PSL's winning ticket is neither the Presidential campaign nor the educational content. Other parties do those and aren't nearly as large or popular.

    I think what PSL does well theoretically and practically is address intersectional issues and decolonization, anti-racism, and so on, which are the order of the day. Most PSL people I see, and this may just be good propaganda, are non-White and this tells me that they are effectively reaching out to POC communities and comrades in ways others aren't. Let me drop some older, experiential knowledge.

    DSA, ISO, even anarchist circles, etc. have always had a White leadership and racism problem. Some organizations, like ISO (Trot, I know), would even dismiss the importance of racial, decolonial questions as "identity politics" that they didn't get involved with. Many were and are class reductionists that only want to discuss the problems of the proletariat, which of course includes cishet White men as a default. This can feel not only dogmatic but incorrect to comrades or potential comrades who don't have the luxury of keeping an issue in the abstract because they live it daily.

    Rewind the clock 15 years ago, and, I'm sorry to say, no one really gave a fuck about Black people or decolonial struggles generally. No one even really cared about using slurs or making racist jokes or comments. Precious few cared to even carry it as a real issue, even among Left spaces as BLM was starting. Obama was seen as having resolved racism in the country, not a joke nor hyperbole on my part. It rubbed White men the wrong way to be on the other side of history and critique, which created a lot of problems in groups. Presumably, this is why Left spaces and organizations were maintained as predominantly White. It was a self-filtering, most POC didn't want to stick around to deal with that bullshit, but there was also gatekeeping of people who were seen as problems for criticizing these issues and in particular criticizing certain leaders. You can still see this play out on Hexbear, by the way.

    Now, everyone likes to say and think they're allies. Parties and people want to pretend like that didn't happen and they were always anti-racist, but that's easy to say and hard to prove when there are still POC who were there and have not forgotten what happened not that long ago. You can see the same thing happen with the Democratic Party who rejected BLM when Trayvon Martin was murdered, Obama himself dismissed it, but now that BLM grew into this toothless iteration like to act like they are its champions. That shit might work on White people who want to believe they were always good, but it won't work on POC with half a brain to remember. Another example, albeit different, is how DSA handled the question of Palestine—not 15 years ago but 15 months ago!!

    It seems that PSL does not have a reductionist (read, "reactionary") line. It has welcomed a lot of people who didn't feel comfortable with that shit and, unsurprisingly, feel comfortable in spaces where they are accepted and anti-racism is put into practice in a radical way. I'm not entirely sure but it seems they were practicing this since the beginning and have good credit on this to make newer people coming in feel at ease. Further, younger people are growing up already understanding intersectional issues as important and necessary to address. They don't have the same baggage from previous times. When they interact with a group like PSL, it feels like PSL has a line which matches the thought of the youth, which is critical. When younger poeple encounter other groups, it feels like walking into an irrelevant but well-preserved museum. I'm cishet but I would assume (hopefully correctly) that PSL carries intersectional thinking to its logical conclusion with regard to LGBTQ issues as well, which resonates well with the youth and those communities too. PSL rests in good theory on that front and I, personally, have a lot of respect for them in this aspect. I think that theory leads them to good practice which has led to a lot of support from these communities which previously had to stick to 'identity'-based groups, for lack of a better term. This allows PSL to grow in ways other groups aren't or are doing slowly.

    I'm not a member of PSL, by the way, and have other critiques of them but this is good.

  • I think it's premature to take a victory lap so soon. We shit on the CPUSA for being sheepdogs for the Democrats and rightfully so, but the CPUSA overall has faced more state repression in its entire history than the PSL. It's through that state repression (on top of a not particularly good political line) that the CPUSA was reduced to a shadow of its former self worthy of mockery. That's something to keep in mind.

    I believe the PSL has undergone enough quantitative changes that it's on the cusp of a qualitative change, and once that qualitative change happens, the bourgeois state will also change COIN tactics to accommodate that next qualitative stage. COIN texts point to the early moments of each new qualitative stage as weakness that the state apparatus can exploit to ultimately liquidate insurgents. It's like how a moth is at its weakest and most vulnerable when it just emerges from its cocoon. The next test will be whether the PSL can pass the trial by fire after undergoing that qualitative change.

  • They have a solid organizational structure and have been able to survive the circumstances that tend to kill leftist orgs long enough that they've capitalized on the radicalizing conditions more than other orgs.

  • They put on some many events in my city including stuff like film screenings, crochet nights, salsa dancing lessons, open mics. Most of these are usually accompanied with some type of labor or history lesson. They are just a really approachable group here and are constantly engaging the community. That kind of stuff really draws people in (including people who aren’t really super interested in politics)

  • I haven't seen that many of those PDF posts of members bombastically denouncing the party or party members over petty personal shit or publicly exposing dirty laundry, I've seen some, including here, but not many. And from what I understand the DSA is rife with that shit, which is surprising cos I would've thought the further left you go the more you get stuff like that.

    Not because there's actually bad shit happening, moreso because of the types of personalities far-left organizations attract these days

71 comments