Taken From ISO Pre-Convention Discussion Bulletin #21

January 21, 2019

Platform of the SC Majority, 1/18/19
Signed, Alan M, Ashley S, brian b, Danny K, Elizabeth T, Eric R, Haley P,
Jen R, Joel G, Khury PS, Leia P, Monique D, Nicole C, Ragina J, Todd C

1. The signatories of this platform were brought together by a collective reevaluation of our
internal democratic culture and political perspectives as well as a questioning of the ways in
which disagreement and initiative have been treated in our organization. After months of debate
inside the Steering Committee, the following political and organizational platform is a summary
of what has come to unite the majority. Beyond the SC, we recognize that members across the
ISO are taking the bull by the horns and building a stronger democratic culture. This is a process
in formation and not a finished product. This Platform is intended to contribute to that common
goal.

This is a political platform for the purpose of 2019 ISO national leadership elections. We ask all
comrades who agree with this platform to advocate for it (in whole or in part) in their branches.
Supporters of this platform will be developing a list of candidates shortly. We do not intend to
put forward nominations for every seat on the SC or NC as we want other comrades to promote
lists with ideas that are either opposed to, or complementary to, this platform. We believe that all
comrades should consider voting for candidates who do not share the views outlined herein;
however, we will advocate for an SC with a decisive majority that is committed to these views,
or other compatible perspectives. The comrades supporting this platform welcome, and will
consider, cross list endorsements.

We believe this Platform points toward a new course for the ISO. It does not attempt to respond
to every debate or detail a long list of proposals. We refer comrades to documents submitted by
the signatories of this Platform for more detailed discussion of the issues reviewed here. At the
same time, supporters of this Platform do not agree on every question facing the ISO today and
we will speak freely and openly in all debates; in fact, there are undoubtedly proposals coming
from branches and groups of comrades that we do not even know about yet, and we remain open
to being convinced by more effective proposals than the ones we advocate here.

2. We recognize the growing danger of a global slump, sharpening imperial tensions, escalating
misogynist and racist attacks on the oppressed, and widening political polarization (Brexit, Gilets
Jaunes, Bolsonaro, Trump, etc.). In the U.S, the past two years have seen a qualitative change in
the radicalization to the left, with a clear rise in social struggle and (especially) class struggle.
The roots of these developments lie in the Obama years, but Trump’s first two years constitute a
new phase. Struggles still lack robust political infrastructures, yet historically large mobilizations
and strikes (like those of the Red State Rebellion and now UTLA) are producing protest
organizations in their wake, most notably socialist organizations. Amidst an angry rejection of
Trump on the part of millions, the Sanders campaign magnified this radicalization and channeled
a growing section of it into a common-sense socialism.
3. The new socialist movement is young, and its instincts are mainly democratic and radical. It
rejects market solutions and the police state, gravitates toward solidarity, and includes a
significant layer of self-conscious Marxists, revolutionaries, left social democrats, and
democratic socialists--as well as a whole spectrum of contradictory ideas from anarchist
tendencies to Stalinism. The movement’s greatest weaknesses are its relative lack of vision of
socialism from below as the outcome of workers’ struggle, an underdeveloped theory of
imperialism and anti-imperialist practice, a tendency to downplay a necessary rupture with
capitalism and its state, and the danger of entanglement with the Democratic Party. DSA is its
most important organization, but the movement stretches beyond and numbers in the tens of
thousands. We do not stand outside this development; rather, we see ourselves as participants in
the new socialist movement as we confront the challenges to come, celebrate our common
victories, and suffer our inevitable setbacks.

4. The ISO can play an influential role in shaping this new generation’s politics, especially by
winning layers of it over to internationalism, workers’ self-emancipation, and the importance of
fighting all forms of oppression. But to do so effectively, we must recruit significantly.
Thousands of people are open to the ISO’s politics of socialism from below and are looking for
an organization to join today. We must change ourselves to meet this demand. We should open
the ISO to all who accept our basic politics and who agree to be active members and raise our
sights to build an organization of thousands in the coming years.

5. Crucial to this project’s success will be our ability to train hundreds of new cadre in a
historical and theoretical understanding of Marxism so that they may play leading roles in the
struggles to come. We support actively pursuing affirmative action goals to prioritize
recruitment, training, and promotion of comrades of color, women, and LGBTQ people. We must
pay special attention to developing a new generation of cadre that can take over all levels of
leadership of the ISO, as well as leading in unions, social movements, and a future socialist
party.

6. To accomplish these goals, the ISO must become a campaigning or struggle organization that
aspires to shape the strategy of a growing left. That will require us reevaluating and updating our
past political perspectives. This means focusing on critical areas of resistance such as anti-racist
and immigrant rights, feminism, ecology, anti-fascism, and student struggles. We must develop a
special focus on labor work, both in terms of strike solidarity and the work our members can lead
as union activists or in organizing their nonunion workplaces.

7. Initiatives to unite the socialist left (as well as broader forces) will be critical in the coming
period, including local and national united fronts and mass mobilizations, strike solidarity and
union drives, election campaigns and referendums, joint study groups and educational
conferences, exchanges, debates, and polemics shared between our publications, and the
construction of intermediary spaces for strategic planning and assessment. As important as these
efforts will be, they are not ends in and of themselves. Rather, our work should operate within
the framework of exploring and helping bring into being the basis for a new socialist party. The
ISO cannot meet this potential on its own, and it would be sectarian to try. Rather, the ISO
should approach comrades from a variety of organizations and currents to solicit their opinions
and jointly pursue a sustained campaign of engagement, debate and joint work as proposed in
“Prospects for an Independent Socialist Party” and other documents.

8. The ISO must build and sustain an intervention in the electoral arena over the coming years
and organize independent campaigns with other socialist currents and activists from social
movements and unions. We believe these campaigns should be independent of the Democratic
Party. But far from condemning us to isolation, we think there is a growing space for such
campaigns and that the ISO can spearhead efforts by running our own members and supporting
DSA members like Rossana Rodriguez and others such as Kshama Sawant. We can use our
organization to demonstrate a real (if still modest) strategic alternative to the two-party system
and thereby contribute to the new socialist movement and its sense of what it can accomplish in
this arena. We have always been advocates; now we must be consistent organizers of
independent politics.

We recognize that some comrades argue that the ISO should support endorsing candidates in
Democratic primaries or are weighing this question carefully. And although we believe socialist
campaigns should be independent of the Democratic Party, we know this will be a debate at
Convention based on motions already submitted. We defend those comrades’ rights to openly
state their views and will continue to do so. Bernie Sanders’ (almost certain) campaign represents
both an instance of this debate and a unique case. Thus, in the months following Convention, our
key tasks will include assessing how the Sanders campaign positions itself, other socialist
currents’ attitudes towards it, and the best way for the ISO to build a bridge to the tens of
thousands of young socialists who will join it.

9. To be more effective, the ISO must adjust our democratic-centralist practice along the general
concepts set out in “Retooling the ISO” which emphasize member and branch initiative and
deepening our democratic political culture. The initial Retooling document was put forward as a
discussion piece and we welcome the debates and ideas it has produced. Jen R will submit a
second “Retooling” document clarifying that Retooling proposes flexible bi-weekly branch
meetings--not monthly branch meetings--and that we do not mean it as a series of new mandates
regardless of whether you’re in a big district or a twig. It is a starting point to organize ourselves
in order: 1) To intervene and lead on the perspectives decided upon at our upcoming Convention
by shifting the balance from internal work and propaganda to more emphasis on external
initiatives; 2) To grow and deepen roots inside the multi-racial and multi-gendered working-class
and to make membership, training, and action in our organization more accessible to more
people.

Elected national leadership bodies will continue to be critical centers of debate, action, and
decision-making. Political leadership cannot be reduced to a coordinating or information-sharing
role, as important as those tasks are. Rather, elected leadership bodies must be vested with
sufficient authority to argue political ideas, seize upon initiatives, and direct the ongoing work of
the organization as a whole. This is why comrades should take leadership elections very
seriously. At the same time, the ISO’s SC must clearly break with past practices that constitute
bottlenecks and barriers, and must increase its level of transparency and accountability to the
whole organization. Over the past four months, new national working groups have readily
demonstrated how much the ISO has to gain by diffusing responsibility to wider layers of
comrades. We are cadre rich, with hundreds of comrades around the country leading in field after
field, from the border crisis to gender justice to strike solidarity to international work, just to
name a few. We must take this lesson to heart and reconstruct the democratic-centralist
relationship between branches, districts, working groups, and national leadership on a new and
more political basis.

10. The next few years will decide the shape of the socialist left for the next generation, and if we
are right about the interlocking economic, ecological and imperialist crises threatening the
planet, there is no overstating the stakes. The ISO must not stand aside and wait for this left to
come to us. We must set our sights on participating in its many facets to influence its
development, and be influenced ourselves. We must contribute what we can to expanding its
horizons, deepening its commitment to socialism from below, and placing our theoretical,
strategic, and tactical inheritance at its disposal.

Signed, Alan M, Ashley S, brian b, Danny K, Elizabeth T, Eric R, Haley P,

Jen R, Joel G, Khury PS, Leia P, Monique D, Nicole C, Ragina J, Todd C