Left-Wing Thinkers Say Their Party Has Lost the Working Class

The Center for Citizenship and Constitutional Government (CCCG) hosted a debate on October 28 titled “Socialism, Populism, Centrism? The Future of Left Politics in America.” The event was co-sponsored by the Notre Dame Democracy Initiative, and was held less than a week before the November 3 midterm elections.

Bhaskar Sunkara is a prominent left-wing journalist and the founding editor of Jacobin, president of The Nation, and the author of The Socialist Manifesto. He is also the former vice chair of the Democratic Socialists of America, the nation’s largest socialist group, which favors public ownership of major industries and an elimination of the branches of government. During the debate, Sunkara described himself as being “on the far left” and called his vision “fundamentally social democratic.”

Defending the centrist position on the panel was Matt Yglesias. Yglesias is a self-described left-wing pragmatist who founded Vox, is the author of the Slow Boring newsletter, and is a contributing opinion writer for The New York Times. During the debate, Yglesias referred to himself and his allies as “DC moderates.”