Our Challenge in the Southland

Barack Obama is the first Democrat that’s figured out that a winning Democratic Party strategy needs to make use of the solid progressive majority that exists in almost every state in the Union. This includes the South.

Since the Reagan electoral victories of the 1980’s, Democratic candidates have used one of two strategies in their attempt to regain control of political power in the United States. Candidates like Bill Clinton successfully won the White House by moving to the right on issues such trade policies, dismantling social programs, and the economy. Candidates like Al Gore and John Kerry attempted to take the White House by winning in “blue states”, trying to flip “swing states”, and largely ignoring most of the rest of the country. Bill Clinton had to move to the right on economic and foreign policy issues. And in the most blunt and straightforward indictment of the Gore/Kerry electoral strategy, one analyst rightly said: “Democrats just don’t seem to be able to count.”

Even though the majority of the South identify as Democrats, their own party refuses to court their vote. In fact, has Bob Moser routinely points out, in order to win Southern Democrats, the Democratic Party would have to move left on economic issues, not right as many coastal Democrats often assume. In the Southland in particular, but also across the entire country, lies the opportunity for tremendous growth of the political Left.

The ideology of the Democratic Party has consistently prevented it from moving to the left on a wide range of issues. The Party is a center-right to moderate grouping with some slightly liberal leaders (though mostly on only a few issues each). It is thoroughly pro-capitalist and is organized is such a way so as to prevent any challengers from coming to power within the party.

The ideological commitments of the Party prevent it from building power in the central way a progressive political party can: by moving politically to the left and actually relating to people on the issues that matter to them.

The Left can gain tremendous ground by capitalizing on this fundamental weakness of the Democratic Party. In the coming decades, if Democratic strategists learn anything from the Obama campaign and the shifting demographics of the American Southland (especially the Southwest), they will begin to attempt to compete in so called “red states”. If a progressive political party actually started building power in the South, it could force the Democrats to move to the left on certain economic and military issues or risk being permanently irrelevant. Like all dilemma situations, this could lead to two positive outcomes for the Left: the Democrats could actually improve their positions (a win) OR a new progressive party or political bloc could gain ground and adherents in a new geographic location (which could happen either way, and also a win).

As revolutionaries serious about winning the struggle for political power in this country, we can learn a lot about what the Left would need to do in order to compete in the South by reading Bob Moser’s new book Blue Dixie: Awaking the South’s Democratic Majority. Much of the same advice Moser tells Democrats can be applied by progressive organizers interested in organizing a left alternative.

The stagnation of the American Left can be ended if we actually begin to map out our nation, region by region, state by state, community by community, figuring out where we can gain ground, on what issues, and how. When we start to think how we can strategically build a new world, we’ll actually start to get there. It seems simple enough, but its worth repeating often.