Dear Comrades,
Greetings from Francesca and Bryan, your newly elected CT DSA chapter co-chairs! We are honored and humbled by this responsibility, with the rest of our Steering Committee, to steward our chapter through our continued struggle for socialism in Connecticut.
We write to you to share with you, comrade to comrade:
- our understanding of the current moment,
- our analysis of our chapter’s health and
- our most urgent tasks in 2024.
How should we understand our current moment?
The last few years have seen a crisis in the (neo)liberal consensus and the growth of organization and experimentation among the U.S. left, both fueling and fueled by the mass mobilizations behind socialist politicians such as Bernie Sanders, AOC, and Rashida Tlaib; the resurgence of a militant labor movement; and recurring moments of mass mobilizations against police violence, white supremacy, and war.
The current rupture, caused by a global uprising for Palestinian liberation and against imperialism more broadly, has brought about the following:
- More segments of society expressing increasing dissent against the pro-war political establishment and cohering more towards the left;
- More people connecting the dots from issue-based grievances to the system at the root of these grievances–capitalism. This trend means that interest in socialism is growing, despite the lack of grand unifying campaigns like Bernie 2016 and 2020;
- A sense of the need for organization – structures for developing leaders, articulating political analysis, and raising political consciousness so that we sustain movements beyond spontaneous uprisings.
The crisis of liberalism, however, has created a vacuum for increasing waves of right-wing reaction, which have intensified in recent months in response to the movement for Palestinian liberation – including racist, transphobic, misogynist backlash to the hard-fought struggles of queer people, women, and people of color; attacks on civil rights and organizing, most directly exemplified by the political, legal, and police repression of the Stop Cop City movement in Atlanta; and attacks on the public sector and public services.
Socialists must contend, on one hand, with the threat of a possible Trump second term; and on another, with a Democratic Party that has increasingly compromised the veneer of liberal democracy in favor of repressing the working class. We must be able to fight back against the fascist forces that are coalescing to support Trump’s bid for the presidency, while maintaining our political independence and presenting socialism as a true alternative to the Democrats’ doomed neoliberalism. What does this mean concretely for Connecticut and our chapter?
What is our analysis of the organizing terrain in Connecticut?
Over the past couple of years, we have seen the following as the strongest dynamics that have shaped our local terrain, both with and without CT DSA’s influence:
- The tenant movement has firmly re-established itself, with the formation of organizations like the Connecticut Tenants Union, the Cargill Tenants Union, the Emerson Tenants Union, and the politicization of the rampant housing crisis;
- The sharpening fight for state budget equity through the Connecticut For All coalition has politicized union members, nonprofits, and faith communities around the demand of tax equity to properly fund public services;
- An incessant neoliberal chokehold at every level of Connecticut politics, upheld by the Democratic Party – modest reforms are dependent on advocacy and won by appealing to the morality of our political class; rarely are organized segments of the working class challenging capitalist power and extracting concessions from bosses, landlords, and politicians.
We see our primary task as socialists is building militant working-class organizations – which includes CT DSA, as well as the tenant unions, labor unions, neighborhood associations, and social movement organizations.
Through organization, we can meet our neighbors and coworkers where they’re at, and discover together the social conditions that make our lives miserable – such as the housing crisis, low wages and exploitative working conditions, limitations on reproductive and sexual autonomy, our taxes funding war, and so on. These conditions are not inescapable, as we have been led to believe, but are imposed on us by the ruling class.
Through organization, we can confront the power of our landlords, bosses, and politicians and force them to yield concessions – and eventually, build a world in our image rather than theirs.
What is our current state of organizing?
It is easy to forget that CT DSA is virtually a new chapter. We formed last year out of Central CT, Western CT, and Quiet Corner DSA merging into the third statewide chapter in the country. While we benefit from these legacy chapters, many of our current structures are brand new. Given this early stage of our statewide organization, we have accomplished a lot! We still have much to do, however, in consolidating our structures for membership and leadership development, to build a fighting working class in CT.
We have had a wide range of successful campaigns and organizing drives under our belt – like winning Right To Counsel in 2021; electing the Hamden Socialist Slate in 2021 and defending it in 2023; starting Connecticut Tenants Union in 2022; the Strike Ready labor solidarity campaign with Teamsters, UAW, and Starbucks Workers United; and surpassing expectations for the Uncommitted CT campaign in 2024.
While a lot of our organizing peaks during these short-term campaigns, it tends to wane afterward. Too many existing and new members become inactive after these campaigns, and we struggle to identify areas for continued organizing beyond the campaign cycle. Although we face challenges in engaging most of our members consistently, our membership and finances are healthy compared to most DSA chapters, which have been hemorrhaging members over the last few years.
In the past couple years, we have seen many signs of chapter growth: our first two state campaigns; two new branches for a total of six active branches; and new working groups, bringing us to eight active working groups sustaining simultaneous and parallel work. However, we still need stronger integration and political coherence between different organizing projects, across both local branches and working groups.
What are our most urgent tasks?
We believe that there are no shortcuts to constructing socialist politics – we must commit to the regular spadework that builds fighting working class organization. In that light, our most urgent tasks are:
- Cultivating more spaces for organizers to develop political analysis, for activists to become organizers, and for cohesion across the rank and file of different unions and social movement organizations. DSA members must organize each other to encourage active, not passive, development of people.
- Building greater internal structure that allows for better distribution of labor and leadership. This entails a vibrant member democracy that invites people to step up and take charge, develop organizing proposals, and discuss political visions and priorities.
- Recruiting from and expanding into segments of the multiracial working class that we’re less integrated into. We must actively take steps to move out of the college-educated, white-collar milieu that predominantly make up DSA. Our members must keep embedding themselves in the fabric of working class life – such as in neighborhood associations, unions, and social movements.
- Preparing to respond to shifts in our organizing terrain: As a sign of our chapter’s growing maturity, we are forming an Election Response Committee to strategize our response to the developing national conditions. We encourage interested members to fill the ERC nomination form by August 12, when the Steering Committee will appoint committee members.
We won’t sugarcoat it – our tasks ahead are numerous and complex, and our conditions are growing more severe and treacherous.
However, we are socialists because we resolutely believe in the agency of the working class, realizing its destiny; the protagonism of every comrade, taking charge of their fight; and the possibility of a better world, built through love and solidarity. We are excited to keep struggling alongside you.
In solidarity and in struggle,
Francesca and Bryan, CT DSA Chapter Co-Chairs