Challenges Facing the US Left

There is no revolution without crisis. But crisis does not necessarily lead to revolution. Over the last months, diverse movements, rallying under the banner #BlackLivesMatter, outraged by repression and exhausted by forced isolation, have stood up to militarized cops in every U.S. state, knowing that doing so risks horrific outcomes – losing an eye to a rubber bullet or gas canister, contracting the coronavirus, even death. And yet these protests have spread globally, with massive demonstrations in dozens of cities over five continents. This is a time for guarded optimism and bold mobilization. Caught in the moment of rebellion but constrained by a deadly pandemic as well as by the limits of present Left political capacities, we ask, How should socialists respond to these re-emerging social movements? In what spirit should we engage the unfolding debates and contests on the streets and in the voting booths? Four strategic considerations stand out: (1) the need for coordinated mass organization; (2) new opportunities for synthesis around race and class; (3) the exposed weakness of capitalist state institutions and ideology; and (4) the fundamentally international character of the crisis.