Every major social/political movement over the last 125 years has inevitably split in two because of ambition, policy, tactical disagreements, and personality conflicts.
In Russia, it was the Bolsheviks and the Mensheviks. The two factions officially split into separate political parties in 1912. The Bolsheviks, led by Lenin, argued that Russia could bypass a prolonged capitalist phase by forging an immediate alliance between industrial workers and peasants, seizing power directly through a radical vanguard, and establishing a “dictatorship of the proletariat.” The Mensheviks, led by Julius Martov and Pavel Axelrod, favored a broad, inclusive party structure open to trade unionists and sympathetic workers. They believed Russia was still in an almost feudal stage of development and needed to go through a capitalist phase before achieving true communism.
The Bolsheviks ultimately seized power during the October Revolution of 1917, establishing the foundation for the Soviet government and eventually suppressing the Mensheviks.
This is a diplomatic characterization of the constant internal friction that exists between the so-called left- and right-wing sects of DSA over which ideological compromises are worth swallowing to advance the socialist project. While some of this “internal democracy” is confined to the DSA’s members-only discussion forum, much of it plays out publicly on X, where even mild criticism of national DSA leadership or Hamas can be met with public ridicule from other DSA members.
On the national level, members divide themselves into different ideological groups. The mass politics–focused factions, such as the Socialist Majority and Groundwork caucuses, believe that socialists must use the Democratic ballot line to help the broader left combat the ills of right-wing fascism. The New York City chapter, the largest and most electorally successful chapter in the country, is seen as a national paragon of the so-called “right-wing” or pragmatist faction, and is expected to unite behind AOC’s prospective 2028 presidential campaign should she run.
With the political success of the DSA, some of its more outrageous policy positions have come to light. And to explain how the DSA would eliminate the police and the Pentagon, and give free stuff to all, the media usually grabs a DSA member from the most radical faction: the Marxist Unity Group.
But the DSA leadership insists that’s not who they are. The largest faction, the pragmatic Socialist Majority and Groundwork caucuses, want to continue running DSA candidates as Democrats, seeing that as the quickest path to legitimacy.
In fact, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s presumed presidential run is revealing the party’s fault lines like nothing else. When the DSA’s radical platform was released earlier in the summer (“Workers Deserve More“), it “laid out the group’s political vision, including several controversial proposals such as abolishing the Senate, defunding the Department of Defense, and working toward ‘fully abolishing the police and prison system,'” according to Axios.
AOC distanced herself from the document and even denied being a member of the national DSA. She claimed she was just a member of the NYC chapter.
Axios:
Zoom in: The DSA also includes ideologues who likely will fuel further rifts within the group going into 2028.
- The DSA’s Marxist-Leninist-Maoist Caucus, for example, posted a letter recently saying it “rejects any effort to present [AOC] as the future presidential standard-bearer for DSA, or for the broader socialist movement.”
- The group continued: “AOC’s record demonstrates a consistent pattern of opportunism.”
Longtime DSA members acknowledge there have been growing pains, but say that a record number of people are joining the group.
- They also argue that socialists have always been factional and often disagree — sometimes passionately.
I should add that the Democrats appear totally helpless. They are now in an “if you can’t beat ’em, join ’em” phase, where prominent Democrats are announcing their acquiescence to the new socialist reality. And why not? Refusing to support the DSA is nearly suicidal in many Democratic strongholds.
“When some DSA spokespeople go on large media platforms and bite the bullet on every wildly unpopular and poorly thought-through maximalist idea that’s arisen in our movement—cheerfully affirming that, yes, we do want that—it’s an easy way to win points for loyalty and radical commitment within the circles of the already converted,” Jacobin columnist Ben Burgis recently wrote. “But it’s a very bad strategy for making our case to a broader public.”
In other words, walk softly, smile a lot, reassure the voter that none of that radical stuff is possible today, and besides, it’s “aspirational.”
Do the Marxist crazies have the patience to wait for the revolution to come to them? America is trending that way as younger voters, ignorant of what turning to socialism really means, are seduced by promises of Utopia and free stuff and are voting for socialists in large numbers.
The same promises that have been made by socialist scalawags since Karl Marx published Das Kapital in 1867.
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