Points of Unity

“We must recognize that we can’t solve our problem now until there is a radical redistribution of economic and political power…We must see now that the evils of racism, economic exploitation, and militarism are all tied together…you can’t really get rid of one without getting rid of the others…the whole structure of American life must be changed.”

—Martin Luther King Jr., Report to SCLC Staff (May 1967)

“The philosophers have only interpreted the world, in various ways; the point, however, is to change it.”

—Inscription on Karl Marx’s grave, from “Theses on Feuerbach”

Table of Contents

Like what you see?

1. We believe in the democratic road to socialist revolution, so our urgent task is to build a socialist majority.

Only a majoritarian, popular movement can pave the democratic road to a socialist revolution: a radical democratization of our politics, economy, and society. We can achieve this, in part, through winning governing power and passing transformational reforms for oppressed and working-class people, as well as through shop floor struggle in labor unions. We understand that the capitalist class will respond to advances by the working class with violence and repression—and we know that mass, democratic politics is our best defense.

2. We are socialists because we practice materialist politics, not socialist identitarianism.

We don't just want to talk about a better world—we have a duty to win power and start building it now. As materialists, we measure the success of our work and its adherence to socialist principles in terms of material outcomes—real changes to people's lives, and quantifiable power and organizing scale for both the socialist movement and the broader working class. We want to win, and winning necessitates mass socialist politics: organizing millions of everyday working-class and oppressed people to fight capitalism, build movements, and transform the political terrain.

Socialist identitarianism, on the other hand, is how we describe the tendency to treat DSA primarily as a space for the self-expression of socialist politics, and to measure the success of political work in terms of abstract ideas and individual moralism. Socialist identitarianism leads members to make decisions based on what impresses other self-described socialists or internally validates our socialist identity, not what advances real-world power and change for the working class. It orients our coalition building and recruitment toward already-organized socialists, instead of toward organizing the unorganized. This tendency moves DSA members away from mass work that grows our movement, and instead shrinks it by directing us inward toward increasingly abstract, sectarian, and power-averse politics.

3. We believe in a democratic, comradely, and effective DSA.

We’ll never build a better world if we don’t build a welcoming, functional organization. DSA’s greatest strength is our vibrant, dynamic, democratic membership model. Its greatest weakness is that we sometimes treat each other terribly.

If we want millions of people in DSA, it needs to be a place where millions of people want to be, not one that tears them down and burns them out. To ensure that, we must celebrate, empower, and retain member leaders, and treat staff as a critical part of our team who can help develop the organizing skills of the membership.

Our structure, culture, and organizing program must allow us to move through conflict to build a more democratic, comradely, and effective organization.

4. The working class needs a mass party that can contest for state power.

We believe in state power as a necessary and positive force for implementing democratic socialism. That means we need a working-class party—a democratic political organization that can organize a mass base of socialist voters; elect socialists to legislatures across the country; build caucuses of Socialists in Office; fight for transformational, working-class reforms; support further working-class organization; and eventually win the durable support of a working-class majority to implement a democratic socialist program.

5. The only viable strategy to build a party in the U.S., at present, is by using the Democratic Party ballot line.

Starting a third party with its own ballot line from scratch has not been a viable strategy in the United States for a century, and it is not a viable strategy in the current moment. Given DSA's size and the United States' legally restrictive two-party system, giving up the Democratic ballot line to pursue third-party politics would be a strategic disaster for our organization and a historic error for working-class politics in this country.

Our best option is to build the democratic, mass organization we need, while continuing to run candidates as unapologetic democratic socialists on the Democratic ballot line.

6. We are building popular movements against oppression and forming powerful coalitions.

Building a working-class party in the United States that can contest for power will take more than DSA: it will require a coalition of labor unions, socialists, and progressive civic and religious organizations. Popular movements of oppressed people and their allies (e.g. the feminist, anti-racist, queer and trans rights, immigrant, climate, and disability justice movements) are integral to a majoritarian fight for socialism and democracy.

We believe that socialists should participate in independent political organizations, unions, tenant associations, and other mass organizations that can reach, organize, and politicize working people in different ways. DSA membership increases during moments of popular upheaval, and we should strategically bring new members into long-term work in the socialist movement through these interconnected struggles. Today, the tip of the spear of the right-wing movement is aimed at our trans siblings—and we must defend them.

7. We are building a popular front against the right, and advancing a democratic socialist strategy within it.

The authoritarian right wing in the United States—and its primary political vehicle, the Republican Party—pose a historic threat to democracy, racial equality, trans rights and bodily autonomy, and the fundamental rights of all working people. To the extent the right secures state power, they will be significantly more effective in their attempts to repress the left and the labor movement by both legal and extralegal means.

To win socialism, we must keep the far right from power, preventing a suspension of democracy and working-class organizing. This requires participating in a popular front against the right in general elections. We know a popular front alone cannot liberate the working class from capitalism, so we must also advance socialist politics by fighting corporate Democrats in primaries, highlighting the shortcomings of liberalism while offering a political alternative.

8. Rank-and-file organizing is the key to revitalizing existing unions and organizing the unorganized.

One of the central tasks of DSA at this moment is to help rebuild the labor movement. We believe that workers organizing on the shop floor as union members in already-unionized workplaces and fighting to form new unions in strategic sectors is the primary strategy for reforming our unions and pushing the labor movement in a more militant, democratic, and left direction.

The shop floor is where workers can overcome divisions, develop class consciousness, and build supermajorities that win material gains through collective action.

9. We are cohering the left pole in a revived labor movement.

Socialists should work to build the alliances necessary to cohere a pole of the labor movement that can build power on the shop floor, coordinate a working-class electoral strategy, and win democratic control of the economy and society.

That means working to unify the workplace and electoral struggles democratic socialists are engaged in—waging fights on racial and social justice issues that affect members and their communities, building a working class political program that unions can get behind, and building a bench of elected officials dedicated to passing that program through legislatures. Our unions need to meet the moment and invest the resources required to organize the unorganized, so that we do not continue to be outflanked by the bosses.

10. We are building a multiracial movement for socialism by advancing a popular, anti-racist politics.

We recognize that race and racism don’t exist purely as ideology, but also as a material reality rooted in how capitalism developed in the U.S.—particularly through the enslavement of African people, the dispossession of Indigenous people from their land, the exploitation of generations of migrants, and the role of the United States as a colonial and imperial superpower. Socialists must engage seriously in the struggle against racism, even when anti-racist movements exhibit heterogeneous politics or a contradictory class character.

Our ultimate goal is the development of a popular anti-racism in the United States—a working-class ideology that makes ending racism an animating force in the struggle for working-class power. In all of our work, we must intentionally recruit leaders and build teams that reflect the diversity of the working class. 

Gender is used to divide and exploit the working class under capitalism, which relies on the unpaid and under-paid work historically done by women (and disproportionately women of color) in order to function. This labor is necessary to reproduce, care for, and educate human beings, who in turn become workers that are exploited by capital.

Organizing for universal rights to healthcare, childcare, and education, as well as organizing working-class women in these industries, are strategic imperatives for DSA, as is fighting right-wing attempts to control our bodies and ban trans and reproductive healthcare. Within DSA, we must create an organizing culture that empowers women, trans, and non-binary comrades to participate and lead.

11. We are building a socialist feminist society and organizing culture.

Capitalism is a global system—one that we seek to replace with an international, ecologically sustainable, socialist society, in which goods are produced and distributed democratically based on need and where security is determined collectively. Today, we must sow the seeds of a democratic socialist future by building relationships with a variety of leftist parties and mass organizations around the world, including those fighting against authoritarianism, fascism and imperialism.

As socialists at the heart of American empire, DSA must work to build a popular, anti-war movement to demand respect for the self-determination and human rights of people in other nations. We must make a strategic priority of organizing among the tens of millions of US workers who themselves crossed our borders as migrants and refugees.

12. We are sowing the seeds of an international socialist future.

On June 14th, 2024, members of Socialist Majority completed an all-member vote to adopt a new set of Points of Unity for the caucus. 99% of votes were cast in favor.

Over the past year, many SMC members have felt that we needed to articulate our political perspective within DSA and the larger left more clearly. SMC believes that it is essential to build a mass socialist movement and ground ourselves in majoritarian socialist politics.

The stakes could not be higher: if we do not succeed at those tasks, we cannot defeat the ruling class.

Our Process

To initiate the Points of Unity process, our Steering Committee appointed a Drafting Committee to write and circulate language to Steering Committee members and other SMC members for multiple rounds of feedback.

Following that process, we had an all-member meeting to vote on amendments, and an all-member vote to adopt the new Points of Unity. After a robust deliberative process, we are happy to share our position with the rest of DSA following a democratic vote of all caucus members.

These new Points of Unity replace SMC’s Shared Principles, adopted when the caucus was founded in 2019. 

If you are a DSA member who shares our vision for a mass, multiracial socialist movement that can build the power necessary to win socialism, apply to join Socialist Majority today.