What happened?

https://jacobinmag.com/2021/02/a-left-that-matters

“In 2015, Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) held its biennial national convention at a small Christian retreat center in Western Pennsylvania. The organization’s entire activist core was there, but the total attendance, including staff, official delegates, and observers, couldn’t have been more than two hundred. The most controversial topics were a floor vote on DSA’s affiliation with the Socialist International and reports that someone at the convention was pestering the center’s nuns about atheism. There was absolutely no media coverage. Five years later, DSA and the broader left have grown into a meaningful presence in American political life. Politicians who call themselves democratic socialists command international media attention. Socialists have been elected to hundreds of offices around the country, and the organization is nearly a hundred thousand strong. For better or worse, you can now watch live coverage of DSA’s national conventions on C-SPAN.”

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It was all socialism circa 1850 to 1920. After the Russian Revolution of 1917 the Communists split off. The remaining socialist current was led by Eugene Debs until 1925 and then Norman Thomas (1930 to 1960) and then Michael Harrington (1965 to 1985). It was fading away until Harrington founded DSOC (the Democratic Socialist Organizing Committee) in 1972. That became DSA (Democratic Socialists of America) in 1982.

I was a charter member of DSA. It was marginal for three decades. That didn’t concern me because I had moved over to the Green Party around 1990. But, suddenly, DSA blew up into a mass organization starting five years ago.

There were three reasons for that phenomenon: (1) the worldwide financial collapse of 2007–2008 and the ensuing Great Recession motivated a new, stronger, deeper critique of the capitalist system; (2) the success of a national candidate calling himself a democratic socialist (Bernie) gave credence to the idea that a significant number of people would consider a systemic alternative; and (3) enough time had passed since the failure of Soviet socialism for a new generation to not be overly influenced by that debacle.

The US is the only “advanced democracy” that has never had a mass socialist party. Will the socialist alternative finally become a viable force in American politics? Personally, I hope we just bypass that Red phase and embrace the “new paradigm” Green alternative instead. But it could turn out to be one or the other or both or neither.