Socialist Fundamentals Series
The Socialist Fundamentals Series was created by East Bay DSA's Political Education Committee (PEC) and elected committee leaders. The curriculum creates a shared vocabulary and understanding as the basis for debate, solidifies knowledge of socialist fundamentals, and enables members to make informed strategic and tactical decisions. Join us each month as we work through the curriculum. The material in the Socialist Fundamentals Series may be amended via recommendations from the Political Education Committee to the chapter Steering Committee.
We hope that studying the core curriculum will be a shared cultural experience that fosters a sense of connection between members and the larger chapter. PEC will organize a monthly Socialist Night School to work through the curriculum. Chapter members are highly encouraged to read the standard curriculum along with the Political Education calendar, even if they can't make every (or any) of the curriculum events the Political Education Committee puts on. The series is ongoing--once a month February through December, and restarting each February. All members and non-members are encouraged to attend! For exact dates and times and place of each session, see the Events Calendar.
Session 1: The Communist Manifesto
- Reading:
- The Communist Manifesto (1848) by Karl Marx and Freidrich Engels
- Themes and key concepts/ topics:
- Socialism/communism, materialism, idealism, class, class struggle, capitalism
- Socialist history
- Why the working class?
- Utopian/Idealist vs. “scientific”/ “materialist” socialism
Session 2: Introduction to Key Socialist Concepts
- Readings:
- Chapters 4-7 of The Point is To Change It by John Molyneux
- Themes and key concepts / topics:
- Socialism, communism, materialism, idealism, mode of production, class
- Why the working class
Session 3: Class and Labor Struggle
- Readings:
- Intro and Chapters 1,2, and 4 of Joe Burns’ Class Struggle Unionism
- Themes and key concepts / topics:
- The working class, class struggle unionism
Part 2: Developing a Socialist Analysis (Sessions 4-10)
Session 4: Social Reproduction and Socialist Feminism
- Readings:
- Social Reproduction Feminisms by Tithi Bhattacharya, Sara R. Farris and Sue Ferguson (excerpt from SAGE Handbook of Marxism)
- Excerpt from Genora Dollinger Interview [Genora (Johnson) Dollinger Remembers the 1936-37 General Motors Sit-Down Strike]
- Themes and key concepts / topics:
- Socialist Feminism and Gender Oppression in Capitalism
- Social reproduction
Session 5: Black Reconstruction and the General Strike
- Readings:
- Black Reconstruction by W.E.B. Du Bois excerpts (Chapters 1 “The Black Worker”, 2 “The White Worker”, and 4 “The General Strike”)
- Themes and key concepts / topics:
- US History, racism and racial oppression from a materialist perspective
- Expanding the conception of “the working class” beyond literal employed wage workers and “militant labor action” to properly understand that enslaved people launched and won the most successful general strike in US history
Session 6: Racial Ideology in the US
- Reading:
- Chapters 1, 3, and 5 of Mistaken Identity by Asad Haider
- Themes and key concepts / topics:
- There is no scientific biological basis for the idea of race
- American fealty to the idea of race has serious negative ramifications for our ability to confront class exploitation
- Racism remains a major obstacle to working class solidarity in the US, key for socialists to understand and confront.
Session 7: Ecosocialism
- Readings:
- What Every Environmentalist Needs to Know About Capitalism by John Bellamy Foster and Fred Magdoff
- Part 3 of Red Nation by Nick Estes
Session 8: Capitalism with Californian Characteristics
- Readings: Golden Gulag by Ruth Wilson Gilmore (Ch. 1: “Introduction” and Ch.2 “The California Political Economy”)
- Themes and key concepts/topics:
- Accumulation and surplus
- Discusses the end of the Fordist political moment and the brutal transition to neoliberalism, specifically through a focus on why California solved the capitalist crises of the 1970s and 80s with mass incarceration and the abandonment of public goods like education and child welfare
Session 9: Imperialism and Global Capitalism
- Readings:
- Excerpts on imperialism from From Marx to Gramsci, ed. Paul Le Blanc and Imperialism - the Highest Stage of Capitalism by V.I. Lenin
- Excerpts from Neocolonialism by Kwame Nkrumah
- Themes and key concepts / topics:
- Neocolonialism, imperialism
Session 10: Fascism
- Readings:
- Excerpt from Ernest Mandel’s introduction to The Fight Against Fascism in Germany
- “Let's Measure the Far-Right Threat Seriously” by Cihan Tuğal
- International case studies of fascism
Part 3: Socialist Strategy, Tactics, and Organization (Session 11)
Session 11: Building Independent Working Class Organization
- Readings:
- Democracy is About People Having Power by Mike Parker (article published on The Call)
- Goals:
- Understand that socialist power is derived from the independent organization of the working class; reckon with current constraints that the working class is not sufficiently organized to win reforms (much less revolution) until greater organization is achieved; be able to formulate questions to analyze current constraints and opportunities to increase working class organization; be able to engage with the question of what DSA's role, and what the party's role, is in building socialist power.