Transformative Strategies and Electoral Politics

Monday, June 14, 2021 - 1:00pm
CDT
John Lawrence

The popularity of the Bernie Sanders campaign in 2016 and again in 2020 demonstrated the appeal of progressive ideas among the electorate.The success of numerous young candidates who are now in Congress showed it was possible to even win elections.This has inspired John Lawrence to dream big.He asks, can the Left build a progressive party which could defeat the corporate oligarchs and start to build an egalitarian democratic society?He will tell us how he thinks it can be done.

Fragmentation is the Achilles Heel of an oppressed majority, he says.The capitalist class dominates the majority working class in large part because the working class does not have the institutional capacity to democratically plan, coordinate, and act in unison. In the U.S., the corporate-dominated two-party system in the U.S. has effectively prevented a working-class party from forming.

In an essay in Jacobin entitled “A Blueprint for a New Party,” Seth Ackerman laid out a strategy for building a mass working-class party that can organize inside or outside of the Democratic Party.

In this talk based on a paper published in Socialism and Democracy, John Lawrence argues that the U.S. Left should start planning the organization of such a “party” now. Taking lessons from progressive electoral activism since the 2016 Sanders campaign, the Left should plan big and imagine scaling electoral activism and fundraising to actually compete with corporate parties. Polling data indicates that a well-organized working class in which everyone votes has the potential to overcome the rigged electoral system and vie for power with the capitalist class. To win, the “party” will need to organize a comprehensive fight for our democratic rights. Moreover the “party” will need to model an innovative internal mass participatory democracy. To inspire mass participation, the "party” platform will have to be both bold, envisioning a transformational, environmentally sustainable political economy grounded in democratic egalitarian principles, and specific; the nuts and bolts of the platform need to be understandable and doable. Now, is the time to plan BIG!

UPCOMING TOURS

March 3, 2025 to March 7, 2025

We will depart from San Miguel early in the morning to Patzcuaro, where we will spend three days. We will visit the most important buildings and churches in Patzcuaro and also visit a number of nearby indigenous villages:

Upcoming Forums & Films

Monday, January 13, 2025 - 1:30pm
CST
Jeff Faux
Location:
Join in Person at the Hotel Quinta Loreto Community Room

We are a week before the inauguration of an unstable megalomaniac, totally unfit to be president. His loyalists control the Congress and the Supreme Court. And his stated agenda could destroy American constitutional democracy.  Yet his political opposition hasn’t a clue how to respond.

The issue is not whether the Democrats... Read more

Monday, February 3, 2025 - 1:00pm
CST
José Alfredo Gutiérrez Falcón
Location:
Join in person at the Hotel Quinta Loreto Community Room

While much of the world is shifting to the right, Mexico is moving in a progressive direction. In 2018, the electoral victory of Andrés Manuel López Obrador of the National Regeneration Movement (MORENA party) initiated "The Fourth Transformation" which is working, against entrenched opposition,... Read more