The DSA skyrocketed in membership after the 2016 and 2020 Bernie Sanders campaigns. It went from a fairly obscure, irrelevant org of about 5,000 progressives and social democrats to 60,000 – and then later 95,000! – Berniecrats, social democrats, socialists, and other leftists by late 2020.
The org obviously likes to tout its growth when pitching to new members or talking to the press. But one thing it talks about far less: membership stalled at 95,000. And now it’s shrinking.
DSA isn’t shrinking as quickly as it grew. It still has around 85,000 members a couple of years after growth stalled and then declined. But, even though it doesn’t discuss the issue much in public, no doubt DSA leaders and staff are concerned about it.
Let’s talk about the big question, then: why?
Why is DSA Shrinking?
Wrong Answers
OK, so it’s not like no one is talking about this issue. You sometimes see it within internal DSA channels. Or on social media. But the answers in these channels flatly don’t work.
Many cite DSA political bickering as a cause. Especially dysfunction and ill-will within the DSA’s NPC. But this is a classic case of confusing cause and effect. Much of the NPC bickering happens because the org is shrinking, not the other way around. The same goes for the various ‘controversies’ the org faces – Jamaal Bowman and Palestine, and so on.
Most DSA members pay little attention to either NPC squabbles or the Bowman issue. I’d wager that 80% of DSA members couldn’t name an NPC member if asked to do so. Most DSA members have heard of Maria Svart, the National Director, because she regularly sends emails to members. Otherwise, DSA members either get involved in local or national campaigns, or they’re ‘soft members’ who join DSA as a club. Neither of these groups interacts much with the NPC.
NPC member Kristian Hernandez deserves credit for coming the closest to discussing the issue of shrinking members numbers openly. She wrote a recent article in In These Times that tacitly addresses the problem. But her solution is to double down on electoral progressivism and the defense of U.S. democratic institutions.
This merely doubles down on an unsustainable growth model.
Right Answers?
Where does that leave us? I’ll start by pointing out that the left usually shrinks after Democrats win national office. Aside from some failed adventures in party building, left activism shrunk to its core during the Bill Clinton years. And then grew during the W. Bush years. Anti-war activism atrophied and died shortly after Barack Obama took office in January 2009.
So, that gives us part of the answer. Biden defeated Trump, and his win cut down on the sense of urgency and immediacy that produces growth in orgs like DSA.
But there’s a second and more helpful cause that DSA could address – namely, the unsustainable growth model I referenced above. The DSA latched onto the 2016 and 2020 Sanders campaigns to build membership. To retain all these new members, the org needed to integrate them into concrete, local projects. It needed to work them into the org in ways that would survive the end of the Sanders campaign.
It didn’t do so. Some chapters did some useful things. But most didn’t. The National org hired Field Organizers – very good ones, in fact! But the National org focused far too much on the national political narrative and on centralized, national campaigns. It needed to focus more on its Field Organizers and their work.
Why Didn’t It Happen Sooner?
If I’m correct about the causes, then it’s not too surprising that the DSA is shrinking. Indeed, I owe the reader a confession. I thought all the way back when I joined in 2017 that the DSA would quickly crash in member numbers. I’m amazed that the crash still hasn’t really happened 5+ years later. So, why didn’t it happen much sooner?
The DSA found several ways to extend its unsustainable growth model. Trump won in 2016. His win provided a sense of urgency that pushes people to join orgs like DSA. Bernie Sanders ran for President again in 2020, allowing the DSA to once again grow on the basis of his association with the term ‘democratic socialism’ and popular enthusiasm for his social democratic program. These forces provide the DSA with additional bases of new members.
Of course, all this amounted to kicking the can down the road. Have we run out of road?
What To Do About It
The bad news? DSA will continue to shrink. The good news? I don’t think all is lost. I doubt the DSA will go all the way back to its lowly 2015 state. At least not in the next few years.
In the short term, DSA could soften its fall and even push toward targeted growth and expansion of power. But to do so, it must come up with a more sustainable growth model. It can’t just latch on to progressive electoral campaigns and fish for new progressive and ultra-progressive members. The DSA is far too driven by the national political narrative. It’s too focused on national campaigns that are either explicitly or implicitly (e.g., Medicare for All, Green New Deal, even its forays into labor organizing) electoral.
Instead, DSA should build and strengthen its local chapters. And, once strengthened, they (i.e., the local chapters, not the NPC or National Convention) can establish regional or state orgs. The National org should hire more Field Organizers rather than spending money on its various national campaigns. And they can help local chapters get out into the community and have conversations with working-class people who don’t already self-identify as progressives.
That’s the base of potential power, longer term, in both society and DSA.
