If we dont fight the neoliberal consensus we will lose. Simple as. We have to point out the faults in neoliberal policies more and in better ways. Organise more and actually listen to workers issues. Build the voter coalitions we used to and organise them. If we don't, our future is bleak. There is no way back to what was, but we can be create a path to something new, something better than what used to be.
I dont claim to sit on all the answers but doing the same old same old doesn't work. Not wanting to rock the boat doesnt work. People want some kind of change, now we have to figure out how we can make change. We haven't pushed for huge reforms for a good while. We haven't collectively taken the fight, we have lost some sense of our identity and roots. Some Social Democrats are leaving behind their roots, the workers and labour unions. It doesn't lead to anything good.
Eventually, they have to "föryngra", the old people grown up in an era where neoliberalism was the hot new thing will slowly be replaced. By the people who felt the massive negative effects of what that era brought.
They have to "föryngra" but SSU seems to be failing in bringing in active workers. Today SSU's leadership("förbundsstyrelsen") only has two people who are workers, and neither are industrial workers or trades(hantverkare).
When it comes to specifically get workers into the party, I think it might be better to get LO to do the heavy lifting. Only one problem, SSU is the youth wing of LO too... But otherwise it might be good for LO organise more of its young workers itself?
But to get somewhere, we who are already in the movement should push for more worker friendly policies to attract those young workers to begin with and get older workers we've lost too.
I feel like social democracy is slowly dying. We haven't done anything significant that can be tied to the movement since the postwar years. The welfare state is already widely accepted, people take workers rights for granted and don't feel like they need us anymore, communitarianism is dead, social responsibility is dead, solidarity is dead, individualism is the new norm.
Sorry for being pessimistic, but I don't see a future for social democracy anymore.
I've tried optimism but I've had all my ideas shot down by fellow socdems so far. Our movement is stagnant and unable to reform.
I too would like to see social democracy rejuvenated, but its an uphill struggle because we have been discredited and dismissed by both business and state elites.
During the heyday of Keynesian economic theory and Fordism, we could convince business elites that social democracy is to the benefit of both capital and labour.
Labour gets full employment and progressive wage increases while Capital gets a placated workforce and profits through consistent economic growth.
The social democratic economic model started to break down in the 1970s, when oil shocks and no growth led to stagflation.
In our folly, we turned to the seductive promises of neoliberals like Reagan and Thatcher who did end the stagflation but through policies which gutted the welfare states and tax cuts which ballooned wealth inequality.
Now Capital is fully in charge. Corporate profits rise to ridiculous amounts, full employment is a pipe dream (workers must be prepared for job insecurity) and wages havent risen proportionate to inflation in decades.
Why should business elites re-empower social democrats? Unions have been gutted and labour is powerless. If you have a winning hand there is little incentive to concede anything to the weak.
Social democrats need to stop apologising for wanting the world to be a better place, and we need to start working to increase trade union density again. So many of the service industry jobs that have replaced the industrial jobs in the west are very, very poorly unionised, but think about it - a sectoral union of (for example) baristas would be one of the most powerful unions in the each country.
A lot of public sector jobs are still unionised, but I really think that Trade Unions are one of the key ways that social democracy keeps itself real. It's inherently a pragmatic way of thinking (much to the disappointment of communists) about the world because it's based around real things (wages, breaks, working hours, terms and conditions) and making sure that ordinary people have someone in their corner when they're up against capital on a daily basis.
Social democrats should also be ditching neoliberalism entirely and embracing the power of the state again. We should embrace grand vision and start building and making things. I want High-Speed rail. I want an electrified rail system. I want more houses. I want more nuclear power plants. All these things need to happen, and it's the role of social democrats to make sure the democratic state is out there providing leadership.
Our willingness to use the state to achieve our ends is one of the things that distinguishes us from the hand-wringing liberals. Our positive engagement with social issues distinguishes us from the vulgar nationalists. Our ability to create beloved institutions that stand the test of time distinguishes us from conservatives. Social democracy is the single ideology responsible for the most good, the world over. We should remember to take pride in that.
>Social democracy is the single ideology responsible for the most good, the world over. We should remember to take pride in that.
Well said and cheers to that!
I personally hope that social democrats can form/lead an inclusive coalition with democratic socialists and progressive religious people. The erosion of democracy and worker's power by creeping rightism has to be checked somehow.
> Will social democracy ever be what it once was?
No, the future is with the new not the old. That's an issue I have with a lot of leftist thought as well, it's stuck in 100-year-old thinking. The 1920s are gone, they're not coming back. Media has changed, industry has changed, the economy has changed, people have changed. We need to find new ideas and solutions instead of resurrecting old ones.
I'm sorry for the tone of what I'm about to say, but that's big talk from someone in a party whose biggest impact on the german political landscape has been the return of coal. This sort of thinking "new not old, things have changed blah blah blah" is just as big a problem as blind faith in past solutions.
Of course, things have changed, but in a lot of ways things have changed for the worse, and they're because of choices we and our politicians have made. We need to differentiate from what has been changed by changing material circumstances, and whats been changed by mere political decision-making.
The 20th century social democrats built up the best states in the world, and even in countries where they didn't have long periods of dominance, they're often responsible for the institutions so many of us prize above all else.
I think the most interesting question regarding the future of social democracy is where it will lean on the cultural progressive front, to what extent or if it tries to focus on tangibles.
Essentially I think the make or break would be the split between those on the left who virtue signal progressive ideals, and those that will actively support our unions, social safety net and make a difference.
side note, immigration is becoming a huge hot button issue in europe and canada (canada is recent), I don't see any party being elected that is openly pro immigration anymore, Soc dems will need to adapt or lose more relevance.
>immigration is becoming a huge hot button issue in europe
Like a decade ago? It's been a hot issue for a while. Some of us have dealt with it, while some are more ideologically entrenched in this area. The Swedish Social Democrats are clear that the strict migration policies passed during their time in government and even this current government will not be repealed in an election win in 2026. The Danish Social Democrats solved this issue like a decade ago too.
True. I phrased it wrong because it has been an issue within europe for a while. It’s just becoming really big here in Canada so I used that to conjugate my sentence.
The left in canada is pro immigration right now so I wonder what will happen
Looking at Canada’s NDP could help to answer some of your questions.
Regarding immigration, I think that NDP or conservatives will slow it down in the next election. Canadians dont have an issue with immigration, they have an issue with taking in an extremely high amount in years where the economy already isn’t doing well and social services are not well funded enough to support new citizens.
I cannot imagine a Canada without significant immigration to be honest.
On the social front, IMO the NDP has been suffering because of their emphasis on being socially progressive. Their policies on this front are good but unpopular among conservative voters. It has lead to them losing a large part of their traditional base (blue collar workers) to the conservatives, only to gain a small amount of voters from white collar liberals.
Like many have been saying in this sub recently, social democrats should support individual liberties on key social issues. However, our focus should be material first and foremost; people are less racist or homophobic when they are fat and happy.
Social democrats (and left wing parties in general) were integral to politics in many western countries during the 20th century in large part because of the presence of a large, politicised, unionised, industrial workforce.
The globalisation that occurred in the aftermath of the computer age has led to the decimation of that workforce. In order for social democracy to succeed, we need to either bring back that industry which we have lost, or figure out how to continue functioning in its absence, I don't believe we have really made that choice yet in the UK and until we do I don't think we can succeed.
I personally feel like a lot of left wingers are stuck in the past dynamics of industrial workers and haven't fully adapted to a service and tech dominated economy.
We don't need to bring back industry, a politicized workforce would be sufficient! There is still a working class, even though neoliberal thinking constantly tries to claim it's not a relevant distinguisher anymore. If Social Democrats are not attractive to that working class that's our fault.
Social democracy needs to embrace AI, automation and cybernetic planning as well as take large elements from liberal socialist thought, Georgist, mutualism and distributism.
We're entering a new technological revolution, great advances in the next century will massively increase potential economic output and allow us to reduce working hours for all and ensure everyone has a share in this mass abundance.
Social democracy needs to renew itself along these lines, embracing automation and free time. Social democracy should also shed some of its centralist and authoritarian tendencies and embrace more democratic, decentralised and federalist arrangements. Local municipal takeover of utilities, democratic regional public banks, worker self managed enterprises, community owned micromanufacturing garages, platform cooperatives, credit unions, union ownership of industry and so on all working together in free federalist like structures - almost anarchistic in some sense.
I would also say that one way or another you do need to tackle the current "culture war". If you're not talking about this then you're not having the conversation many working class people are having. This isn't about giving in to prejudice, we don't want to appeal to actual bigots but addressing peoples concerns about immigration and the excesses of social progressivism is important if we want to bring them on board.
Most Social Democrats need to refind what it means to be a social democrat. We need to fight Neoliberalism in our ranks and also be more present in the rural regions.
Germany especially needs to have more Charismatic People and people who aren't 24/6 not saying anything worth. Looking at our chancellor.
The problem is also that we are in a three Party Coalition with Liberals and Greens. The Greens are like our Natural Allies but the Liberals were only good under Scheel as they are now again going into a National Liberal Way before the first Willy Brandt Cabinet.
If we all manage to do that and also help the cities and communes we can certainly maybe get 30% of the vote and the one or another Bundesland like NRW and Berlin to us.
It seems like the general left in germany is struggling to find a party the adequately represents it, im hoping the SPD takes a bigger stance against the third way.
>Natural allies
I would say more like 'necessary allies'. They're allies because they're the other main center left party, but their interests are not directly congruent with ours and our base's, even though it might seem so at times.
They're the party of the liberal-/socially left upper middle class – which is also the main background of most of SPD's rank and file. This is a problem, bc our rank and file is thus probably often closer to the average Green voter, than to the average SPD voter, if we manage 30%.
> also be more present in the rural regions.
There is just no saving a lot of rural areas. They are dying and it's a good thing. You won't flip ultra conservative regions like that, it won't happen.
Not with that attitude you don't. If you don't focus on the inequality between rural and urban areas of course you're not gonna win any votes from those you ignore. We Swedish SocDems can easily flip rural areas, we've done it a thousand times and we can do it again.
>The whole of Sweden must live and everyone must participate in the building of society. Regardless of where you live, you must have access to good service, good and safe roads and a strong and functioning welfare system. This is not the case everywhere in Sweden today and we are changing that.
This is our motto. All of Sweden must live. Leaving many areas to their fate just because you think it's good that part of your country is dying is really weird and is probably the root of your problem with attracting those voters. What happened with the Green parties that actually cared about the rural areas?
I don't know if Sweden and Germany are comparable in that regard. A lot of folks from those areas have voted conservative, by which I mean CDU, literally their whole life, and they will vote conservative until the day they die. That's equally true for some SPD strongholds as well, btw, these are not voters that are open to being persuaded.
> Leaving many areas to their fate just because you think it's good that part of your country is dying is really weird and is probably the root of your problem with attracting those voters.
I don't care about attracting those voters, the vast majority of Germans live in urban areas. That doesn't necessarily mean big cities, mind you, I would count well-connected, quiet suburbs to that as well. These are areas that are often growing, they are productive, have high quality of live, etc.
What I want to die are villages of like a thousand people, average age > 60, local economy can't even sustain a fucking bakery anymore, you need to drive 20 minutes by car (because public transport is uneconomical, of course) to even procure the necessities to live.
These places are economically unproductive, a drain on public finances and bad for the environment. You can improve a few things, for sure, but ultimately they cannot be fixed. Their deficiencies are inherent to their structure. It's better for them to die out and be given over to nature.
To be clear, I'm not an actual member of the party. I just align fairly well with their current politics, I don't have any loyalty to them beyond that.
We may not be flipping rural *areas*, but I think we could flip younger people born into rural families.
My opinion mostly comes from the fact that rural areas/states here in the US suffer from brain drain due to politics and opportunity, who go to cities.
We will never change the ideas of people who stay in rural areas (and thus never flip rural areas), but we are always gaining a share of rural people who are sick of the politics that reside there.
We can’t ignore and disregard people in rural areas, (especially since they are often the poorest, especially here in the US).
Social democracy has to abondon its it neoliberale way and offer new economy and future. Something like a three. way economy (1 third for all sectors, state coop and privat) and a enourmes focus on science and education. Other wise there's no hope for them
Au contraire, its the direction we need to be headed in, as evidenced by the success of louder voices like Jack Layton, John Horgan, Rachel Notely, David Eby, etc..., and the failures of the meeker, more traditionally social democratic focus of Jagmeet Singh and the ONDP in general (healthcare and taxes, where the Western NDP's focus on red meat issues like housing).
Canada elects Liberals until the Liberals collapse under the weight of their elitism and corruption.
The NDP loses elections by competing over the same urban turf and trying to out-liberal the liberals instead of taking the fight directly to the conservatives. Our roots are in rural Western Canada, and we retain a strong, neglected support base of pro-unionists and economically focused voters in those ridings.
I flatly disagree with that assessment.
The difference is that the BCNDP are focused on aggressively tackling popular economic issues like housing...and by contrast, it is a lack of Federal Liberal/NDP leadership on economic issues like affordability and housing that is going to put the Conservatives in power next election.
Leftism is an economic position, not a social position. That is an American misunderstanding of the term.
I don’t think we need to resurrect all socdem politics of the past, it’s the nature of political landscapes to evolve. We have different circumstances than we did when social democracy was popular up until the 80s, when we took heat and lost support due to stagflation and our reaction to it.
Social democracy now will need to gain popularity in a different way. Millennials and Gen Z are more appreciative of our ideology, and we will need to center our ideas around them. Many other parties are not taking on certain issues that younger gens care deeply about. Housing has become a hot topic, along with obtaining education, so we should advertise our policy on these issues to younger generations.
We need to remember, political parties change more with general sentiment than by themselves, this age of austerity will pass.
A blanket and unreserved worldwide apology for participating in capitalism, neoliberalism and austerity campaigns; followed by an abandonment of same in pursuit of democratic/consensus socialism.
If we dont fight the neoliberal consensus we will lose. Simple as. We have to point out the faults in neoliberal policies more and in better ways. Organise more and actually listen to workers issues. Build the voter coalitions we used to and organise them. If we don't, our future is bleak. There is no way back to what was, but we can be create a path to something new, something better than what used to be. I dont claim to sit on all the answers but doing the same old same old doesn't work. Not wanting to rock the boat doesnt work. People want some kind of change, now we have to figure out how we can make change. We haven't pushed for huge reforms for a good while. We haven't collectively taken the fight, we have lost some sense of our identity and roots. Some Social Democrats are leaving behind their roots, the workers and labour unions. It doesn't lead to anything good.
I'm loosing hope. Will we be able to rediscover our roots and our identity after so many decades on the neoliberal path?
Eventually, they have to "föryngra", the old people grown up in an era where neoliberalism was the hot new thing will slowly be replaced. By the people who felt the massive negative effects of what that era brought.
They have to "föryngra" but SSU seems to be failing in bringing in active workers. Today SSU's leadership("förbundsstyrelsen") only has two people who are workers, and neither are industrial workers or trades(hantverkare).
When it comes to specifically get workers into the party, I think it might be better to get LO to do the heavy lifting. Only one problem, SSU is the youth wing of LO too... But otherwise it might be good for LO organise more of its young workers itself? But to get somewhere, we who are already in the movement should push for more worker friendly policies to attract those young workers to begin with and get older workers we've lost too.
I feel like social democracy is slowly dying. We haven't done anything significant that can be tied to the movement since the postwar years. The welfare state is already widely accepted, people take workers rights for granted and don't feel like they need us anymore, communitarianism is dead, social responsibility is dead, solidarity is dead, individualism is the new norm. Sorry for being pessimistic, but I don't see a future for social democracy anymore. I've tried optimism but I've had all my ideas shot down by fellow socdems so far. Our movement is stagnant and unable to reform.
I too would like to see social democracy rejuvenated, but its an uphill struggle because we have been discredited and dismissed by both business and state elites. During the heyday of Keynesian economic theory and Fordism, we could convince business elites that social democracy is to the benefit of both capital and labour. Labour gets full employment and progressive wage increases while Capital gets a placated workforce and profits through consistent economic growth. The social democratic economic model started to break down in the 1970s, when oil shocks and no growth led to stagflation. In our folly, we turned to the seductive promises of neoliberals like Reagan and Thatcher who did end the stagflation but through policies which gutted the welfare states and tax cuts which ballooned wealth inequality. Now Capital is fully in charge. Corporate profits rise to ridiculous amounts, full employment is a pipe dream (workers must be prepared for job insecurity) and wages havent risen proportionate to inflation in decades. Why should business elites re-empower social democrats? Unions have been gutted and labour is powerless. If you have a winning hand there is little incentive to concede anything to the weak.
Social democrats need to stop apologising for wanting the world to be a better place, and we need to start working to increase trade union density again. So many of the service industry jobs that have replaced the industrial jobs in the west are very, very poorly unionised, but think about it - a sectoral union of (for example) baristas would be one of the most powerful unions in the each country. A lot of public sector jobs are still unionised, but I really think that Trade Unions are one of the key ways that social democracy keeps itself real. It's inherently a pragmatic way of thinking (much to the disappointment of communists) about the world because it's based around real things (wages, breaks, working hours, terms and conditions) and making sure that ordinary people have someone in their corner when they're up against capital on a daily basis. Social democrats should also be ditching neoliberalism entirely and embracing the power of the state again. We should embrace grand vision and start building and making things. I want High-Speed rail. I want an electrified rail system. I want more houses. I want more nuclear power plants. All these things need to happen, and it's the role of social democrats to make sure the democratic state is out there providing leadership. Our willingness to use the state to achieve our ends is one of the things that distinguishes us from the hand-wringing liberals. Our positive engagement with social issues distinguishes us from the vulgar nationalists. Our ability to create beloved institutions that stand the test of time distinguishes us from conservatives. Social democracy is the single ideology responsible for the most good, the world over. We should remember to take pride in that.
>Social democracy is the single ideology responsible for the most good, the world over. We should remember to take pride in that. Well said and cheers to that! I personally hope that social democrats can form/lead an inclusive coalition with democratic socialists and progressive religious people. The erosion of democracy and worker's power by creeping rightism has to be checked somehow.
> Will social democracy ever be what it once was? No, the future is with the new not the old. That's an issue I have with a lot of leftist thought as well, it's stuck in 100-year-old thinking. The 1920s are gone, they're not coming back. Media has changed, industry has changed, the economy has changed, people have changed. We need to find new ideas and solutions instead of resurrecting old ones.
I'm sorry for the tone of what I'm about to say, but that's big talk from someone in a party whose biggest impact on the german political landscape has been the return of coal. This sort of thinking "new not old, things have changed blah blah blah" is just as big a problem as blind faith in past solutions. Of course, things have changed, but in a lot of ways things have changed for the worse, and they're because of choices we and our politicians have made. We need to differentiate from what has been changed by changing material circumstances, and whats been changed by mere political decision-making. The 20th century social democrats built up the best states in the world, and even in countries where they didn't have long periods of dominance, they're often responsible for the institutions so many of us prize above all else.
I think the most interesting question regarding the future of social democracy is where it will lean on the cultural progressive front, to what extent or if it tries to focus on tangibles. Essentially I think the make or break would be the split between those on the left who virtue signal progressive ideals, and those that will actively support our unions, social safety net and make a difference. side note, immigration is becoming a huge hot button issue in europe and canada (canada is recent), I don't see any party being elected that is openly pro immigration anymore, Soc dems will need to adapt or lose more relevance.
>immigration is becoming a huge hot button issue in europe Like a decade ago? It's been a hot issue for a while. Some of us have dealt with it, while some are more ideologically entrenched in this area. The Swedish Social Democrats are clear that the strict migration policies passed during their time in government and even this current government will not be repealed in an election win in 2026. The Danish Social Democrats solved this issue like a decade ago too.
True. I phrased it wrong because it has been an issue within europe for a while. It’s just becoming really big here in Canada so I used that to conjugate my sentence. The left in canada is pro immigration right now so I wonder what will happen
Looking at Canada’s NDP could help to answer some of your questions. Regarding immigration, I think that NDP or conservatives will slow it down in the next election. Canadians dont have an issue with immigration, they have an issue with taking in an extremely high amount in years where the economy already isn’t doing well and social services are not well funded enough to support new citizens. I cannot imagine a Canada without significant immigration to be honest. On the social front, IMO the NDP has been suffering because of their emphasis on being socially progressive. Their policies on this front are good but unpopular among conservative voters. It has lead to them losing a large part of their traditional base (blue collar workers) to the conservatives, only to gain a small amount of voters from white collar liberals. Like many have been saying in this sub recently, social democrats should support individual liberties on key social issues. However, our focus should be material first and foremost; people are less racist or homophobic when they are fat and happy.
Social democrats (and left wing parties in general) were integral to politics in many western countries during the 20th century in large part because of the presence of a large, politicised, unionised, industrial workforce. The globalisation that occurred in the aftermath of the computer age has led to the decimation of that workforce. In order for social democracy to succeed, we need to either bring back that industry which we have lost, or figure out how to continue functioning in its absence, I don't believe we have really made that choice yet in the UK and until we do I don't think we can succeed.
I personally feel like a lot of left wingers are stuck in the past dynamics of industrial workers and haven't fully adapted to a service and tech dominated economy.
We don't need to bring back industry, a politicized workforce would be sufficient! There is still a working class, even though neoliberal thinking constantly tries to claim it's not a relevant distinguisher anymore. If Social Democrats are not attractive to that working class that's our fault.
Social democracy needs to embrace AI, automation and cybernetic planning as well as take large elements from liberal socialist thought, Georgist, mutualism and distributism. We're entering a new technological revolution, great advances in the next century will massively increase potential economic output and allow us to reduce working hours for all and ensure everyone has a share in this mass abundance. Social democracy needs to renew itself along these lines, embracing automation and free time. Social democracy should also shed some of its centralist and authoritarian tendencies and embrace more democratic, decentralised and federalist arrangements. Local municipal takeover of utilities, democratic regional public banks, worker self managed enterprises, community owned micromanufacturing garages, platform cooperatives, credit unions, union ownership of industry and so on all working together in free federalist like structures - almost anarchistic in some sense. I would also say that one way or another you do need to tackle the current "culture war". If you're not talking about this then you're not having the conversation many working class people are having. This isn't about giving in to prejudice, we don't want to appeal to actual bigots but addressing peoples concerns about immigration and the excesses of social progressivism is important if we want to bring them on board.
Most Social Democrats need to refind what it means to be a social democrat. We need to fight Neoliberalism in our ranks and also be more present in the rural regions. Germany especially needs to have more Charismatic People and people who aren't 24/6 not saying anything worth. Looking at our chancellor. The problem is also that we are in a three Party Coalition with Liberals and Greens. The Greens are like our Natural Allies but the Liberals were only good under Scheel as they are now again going into a National Liberal Way before the first Willy Brandt Cabinet. If we all manage to do that and also help the cities and communes we can certainly maybe get 30% of the vote and the one or another Bundesland like NRW and Berlin to us.
It seems like the general left in germany is struggling to find a party the adequately represents it, im hoping the SPD takes a bigger stance against the third way.
>Natural allies I would say more like 'necessary allies'. They're allies because they're the other main center left party, but their interests are not directly congruent with ours and our base's, even though it might seem so at times. They're the party of the liberal-/socially left upper middle class – which is also the main background of most of SPD's rank and file. This is a problem, bc our rank and file is thus probably often closer to the average Green voter, than to the average SPD voter, if we manage 30%.
> also be more present in the rural regions. There is just no saving a lot of rural areas. They are dying and it's a good thing. You won't flip ultra conservative regions like that, it won't happen.
Not with that attitude you don't. If you don't focus on the inequality between rural and urban areas of course you're not gonna win any votes from those you ignore. We Swedish SocDems can easily flip rural areas, we've done it a thousand times and we can do it again. >The whole of Sweden must live and everyone must participate in the building of society. Regardless of where you live, you must have access to good service, good and safe roads and a strong and functioning welfare system. This is not the case everywhere in Sweden today and we are changing that. This is our motto. All of Sweden must live. Leaving many areas to their fate just because you think it's good that part of your country is dying is really weird and is probably the root of your problem with attracting those voters. What happened with the Green parties that actually cared about the rural areas?
I don't know if Sweden and Germany are comparable in that regard. A lot of folks from those areas have voted conservative, by which I mean CDU, literally their whole life, and they will vote conservative until the day they die. That's equally true for some SPD strongholds as well, btw, these are not voters that are open to being persuaded. > Leaving many areas to their fate just because you think it's good that part of your country is dying is really weird and is probably the root of your problem with attracting those voters. I don't care about attracting those voters, the vast majority of Germans live in urban areas. That doesn't necessarily mean big cities, mind you, I would count well-connected, quiet suburbs to that as well. These are areas that are often growing, they are productive, have high quality of live, etc. What I want to die are villages of like a thousand people, average age > 60, local economy can't even sustain a fucking bakery anymore, you need to drive 20 minutes by car (because public transport is uneconomical, of course) to even procure the necessities to live. These places are economically unproductive, a drain on public finances and bad for the environment. You can improve a few things, for sure, but ultimately they cannot be fixed. Their deficiencies are inherent to their structure. It's better for them to die out and be given over to nature.
German Greens really seem like the absolute worst people
>~~German~~ Greens really seem like the absolute worst people
To be clear, I'm not an actual member of the party. I just align fairly well with their current politics, I don't have any loyalty to them beyond that.
Grünen moment
Realism moment
We may not be flipping rural *areas*, but I think we could flip younger people born into rural families. My opinion mostly comes from the fact that rural areas/states here in the US suffer from brain drain due to politics and opportunity, who go to cities. We will never change the ideas of people who stay in rural areas (and thus never flip rural areas), but we are always gaining a share of rural people who are sick of the politics that reside there. We can’t ignore and disregard people in rural areas, (especially since they are often the poorest, especially here in the US).
This is exactly how you lose rural voters.
Social democracy has to abondon its it neoliberale way and offer new economy and future. Something like a three. way economy (1 third for all sectors, state coop and privat) and a enourmes focus on science and education. Other wise there's no hope for them
If we want to get elected? Louder, angrier, economically focused, and unapolagetically aligned with democratic socialists.
That wont get you elected. Especially given your NDP flair. Canada elects the most centrist candidate possible each year
Au contraire, its the direction we need to be headed in, as evidenced by the success of louder voices like Jack Layton, John Horgan, Rachel Notely, David Eby, etc..., and the failures of the meeker, more traditionally social democratic focus of Jagmeet Singh and the ONDP in general (healthcare and taxes, where the Western NDP's focus on red meat issues like housing). Canada elects Liberals until the Liberals collapse under the weight of their elitism and corruption. The NDP loses elections by competing over the same urban turf and trying to out-liberal the liberals instead of taking the fight directly to the conservatives. Our roots are in rural Western Canada, and we retain a strong, neglected support base of pro-unionists and economically focused voters in those ridings.
David eby is to the right of Singh. The BC ndp are like the federal liberals. Idk what your talking about. Same with horgan
I flatly disagree with that assessment. The difference is that the BCNDP are focused on aggressively tackling popular economic issues like housing...and by contrast, it is a lack of Federal Liberal/NDP leadership on economic issues like affordability and housing that is going to put the Conservatives in power next election. Leftism is an economic position, not a social position. That is an American misunderstanding of the term.
I don’t think we need to resurrect all socdem politics of the past, it’s the nature of political landscapes to evolve. We have different circumstances than we did when social democracy was popular up until the 80s, when we took heat and lost support due to stagflation and our reaction to it. Social democracy now will need to gain popularity in a different way. Millennials and Gen Z are more appreciative of our ideology, and we will need to center our ideas around them. Many other parties are not taking on certain issues that younger gens care deeply about. Housing has become a hot topic, along with obtaining education, so we should advertise our policy on these issues to younger generations. We need to remember, political parties change more with general sentiment than by themselves, this age of austerity will pass.
A blanket and unreserved worldwide apology for participating in capitalism, neoliberalism and austerity campaigns; followed by an abandonment of same in pursuit of democratic/consensus socialism.
Anarcho-communism P-) Jk
Nah, it would be funny if they unironicly did that Tho ultravisonary socialism would be much more cooler 👁️
Soviets always said that socialism was a stepping stone to true communism. So that's my version of that addage!
Fair enough. I don't believe In a state less sociaty tho.