Alienation, autonomy, and ideology
We have two at-large city council seats on the ballot in Iowa City in November 2023. For anyone who doesn’t know this, all the candidates go on the same ballot and the top 2 candidates win. Voters pick 2 from the total list of names.
Let’s talk about how it’s going to go down.
Bhaskar Sunkara kicked up a bit of a storm when he first wrote about ‘anarcho-liberalism’ in 2011. Sunkara wrote about this odd term as an extension of the politics of the New Left. Specifically the anti-globalization movement of the late 1990s and early 2000s. And when he used the term, Sunkara called to mind two things: first, a rejection of the mass working class institutions and politics of the left, and second, ‘revolutionary’ critique and action from people and small groups.
Let me narrow this down a bit in a way that readers might apply to their local situations. Anarcho-liberalism often amounts to a kind of knee-jerk cynicism and opposition toward government, especially at the local level. And it lacks any serious plan to build a movement to take power in the interests of the working class.
Insofar as anarcho-liberalism allows for an alternative, it falls back on NGOs, non-profits, or ‘mutual aid.’ And these are the best options. At its worst, it fails to go beyond ‘pestering’ local officials with no deeper goal.
In short, it’s a mess. And it has its backers in Iowa City.
Let’s talk a bit about that.
I haven’t had many encounters with the police over the years. Most of those encounters involve getting fined for petty driving violations. This probably lines up with the experience of most readers.
But my most recent encounter – from a year or two ago – highlights a few things for me. It shows, I think, the dangers inherent in any contact with police officers on duty. Even when nothing outrageously bad results from it.
On my Dad’s 40th birthday, my Mom took out an ad in the newspaper poking fun at him. I got a laugh out of it – as did the rest of my family – but the whole notion of turning 40 seemed absurd to me. 40 was just a giant number I’d presumably never reach.
Hey, I was 14. 40 was old. Now I’m turning 40 myself.
Let’s talk about that.
As the 2023 DSA Convention approaches, let’s try to answer a strategic question. The question concerns a big picture issue, one that I think people tend to lose in the details of the various Resolutions on display.
So, let’s talk broad, national strategy. I have in mind DSA’s ‘decision’ – quotes because it’s perhaps more a starting point than a decision – to run priority campaigns around issues rather than people. DSA builds its recruitment model on attracting people to issues like Medicare for All rather than reaching out to members of target classes and building campaigns around their ideas. An org can do both, of course. But DSA probably doesn’t have the resources to do both well. And, at present, it only does the former.
I’ll argue in this post that DSA should run grassroots organizing campaigns built around classes first, rather than issues.
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