New york city. Good evening, everyone. Thank you so much for coming out tonight to Mcnally Jackson books here at the seaport. Were really happy you came out and tonight, we are celebrating the release of we own the future democratic socialism american style. Were excited to have with us kate aronoff and michael smith, failing the working class, particularly people of color on marginalized. And exemplified by the growing members of democratic socialists of america and the popularity of politicians like Bernie Sanders and alexandria ocasiocortez. They explore how this energy might be channelled to a future that might be more inclusive. Eagletainer beyond the age of trump and beyond. Let me introduce our guests tonight. Journalist kate aronoffs writing in the guardian, jacobian, new york times, shes the coeditor of we own the future, democratic socialism american style, and she lives in brooklyn. Michael denzel smith, the author of invisible man got the whole word watching and he has written for the new york times, atlantic complex, paris review, harpers, the new republic, the guardian and the root and he has been a featured commentator, npr, cnn, cnbc, and lives in brooklyn. Now let me hand over the mic and a word to our guests, i want to say that after the discussion there will be some words by michael bennett, who is here from the dsa. And later on, there will be a q a and after that, there will be a book signing and when the q a happens, ill come back up here and hand the mic to whoever has a question so cspan, who is filming tonight, will actually be able to record your questions. All right. Thank you so much. [applaus [applause]. Good evening. Hi, kate. Hi. So capitalism, i take it youre not a fan . For sure, no. Tell me why. Its a good, big question that people have written many books about. What we argue in the book and what i happen to think, is that capitalism has sort of uniquely failed us on many fronts. So theres a sort of logic which is built in to a lot of sort of western thought. What capitalism does is sort of, i was talking to recently put it, it just extracts, it extracts, it extracts and it gives very little back, right . And so for centuries now the Economic System we happen to live within has extracted lapped, its extracted labor, and in order to heal the sort of massive profit making apparatus in the most, you know, basic sense. And so what we argue in the book is theres a lot of theories, right, about what comes after capitalism, what you do to sort of transcend capitalism or whatever, you know adjective or add verb adverb how you want to get around that. We as coauthors or as coeditors come to different conclusions about that personally. Our contributors to come to different sort of ideas about that, but what we sort of all agree on, sort of common ground, is that we have to replace capitalism as societys operating system. What does that mean . To do that, it means to prioritize something other than the volumous accumulation of profits in society and theres been a pushback, for as long as weve had capitolism, from labor, socialist movement. Theres push and pull what capitalism can do. We think that its time for history to sort of flip that and prioritizing people, and prioritizing the planet in order to build a society which is basically sustainable, which this one clearly isnt if were to believe any climate scientists writing out there. So the book spends time thinking about the different ways it can do that and so, initially when we were coming up with sort of ideas where well begin at, we wrote a list of 50 Different Things many of which that didnt make it in there and that made it in the book. Rather than thinking about what does it look like to have sports under democratic system and what does it look like to have health care under democratic socialism, we really ask people to think about it through the lens of their expertise, so not saying focus on this issue and thats it, but what is it what does it like to develop a society through this, and ask people to talk about what they want to talk about. I was very happy to see a lot of kind of overlap between that and people sort of coalescing around that. Because capitalism is such is holistic system, and you know, sort of smartly has gotten rid of the idea of political economy, the idea that the economy in politics and society are things that are intimately bound off one another, its hard to think about what those connections are, and thinking about silos, and what i hope comes out from the sort of collection much these essays is that its really hard to move on any of these fronts without moving on all of them effectively and having a real vision, which i think is what socialism has been good at historically, a vision where were going, and thats what we try to communicate. A couple of things that you said that im going to pick up on a little later. But i want to ask, you are sort of honing in on the idea of socialism, democratic socialism, which is at the very least in the past, i dont know, decade or a little over a decade, theres been a resurgence of an interest or like a critique that is grounded in a democratic socialist tradition. But im curious, why socialism in particular as anticapitalist, as opposed to other traditional anticapitalist . I would hone in on two things, i think that one is, as the collection points out a long, long history in the United States of socialism. So, you know, people who in early america were inspired by folks like robert owen, kind of utopian socialist out of the uk. And people inspired by marx and virtually everyone who thinks of themselves in that tradition reaching from people wb deboise, to a. Philip randolph and the antiwar movement, thats been American History. Sometimes more openly than others of course, organizers in the 50s and 60s were not always waving socialist flags around. So i think we see that sort of coming up at this moment when, you know, people who are our age or even a little bit older dont have the same kind of hangups that are baked into people who lived through, you know, this period where it was illegal or you could be deported for being a communist or a socialist. I think that had a profound affect on the american left or how you relate to the word socialism, a tiny, tiny influence on the left. So now that we are past that moment thankfully, millennials and not just millennials, but are comfortable with that term. We have people like Bernie Sanders who is identified for a democratic socialist for long time winning sort of the vote under 35 by double digits in, you know, this election and the past election or polls for this election. And so its a thing that keeps coming up. And the period in which were living in is sort of like a post2008 moment. You saw emergence of these by occupy wall street in 2011. Black lives in 2013 and 2014 and onward and the rights movement, sort of 2015. Wave of teachers strikes starting in chicago. These moments sort of kick off, but are coming from different places, right, so people who are involved in all of these movements come from organizing traditions which are much, much older and have their roots in many cases in organized labor and unions built by socialists and maybe purged at some point, but socialist roots sort of all of these things. So i think there is this real sort of that pops up again once this sort of manages to cool down and people want an alternative and its not enough to say we dont want this, dont want that. Socialism is to say that theres something were working toward like i said before. Something idiosyncratic to the u. S. Weve never had for many of those reasons we are talking about, weve never had a democratic socialist party. Weve had socialist party, but we have not contested for power in meaningful way. We dont have like france, which is austerity and so theres a different kind of resonance to socialism here thats a little more novel and fun than it is in a country where, you know, the socialists were the ones who cut your or you know, implemented tuition hikes or cut your Welfare Benefits or cut Public Services in any number of ways, so you dont have that hangup either of living with like a socialist party. And what to figure out what does an american socialist. Did you ever consider calling it american socialism is a little more fun . [laughter] you said in the introduction that you deliberately dont offer a definition of socialism and you dont ask any of the contributors to really do so either. Can you walk us through the reasoning for that . Yeah, i think part of this comes from, at least for me, from reporting a lot on this resurgence, in the u. S. , for dsa, and you know, hes enlisted things from the labor party in u. K. That comes out of british socialism, but i think it would be a little dishonest, honestly on our parts, especially for a collection of essays, to sort of posit authoritative definition of socialism when we see its really a pluralistic movement at this point, right. Even dsa is sort of self consciously pluralistic not falling into the sectarian trap of having five different little groups all fighting with each other. You know, theres a commitment to having this vehicle, which men have to Work Together and fights and debates and real sort of battles in it, but theres a commitment to having some kind of institutional forum. And people identify with socialism for a lot of Different Reasons and it means a lot of Different Things to a lot of people. So, you know, we convene this collection of people, i think, in part, because we were curious. What do people make of this, and how do they read that through the stuff that theyve been writing about and thinking about for a very long time and land in different places. People in the collection range from sort of, you know, one identifies as social democrats or people who are libertarian socialists, maybe kind of have things theres a wide range in some way reference, i dont know, of Socialism Means in america today. Theres a wide range of topics and i think it you hit some of the notes that are pretty expected talking about workers rights and were talking about, you know, corporate greed, were talking about, you know, democracy, were talking about things that immediately attribute or associate with a socialist intellectual tradition and organizing tradition. But theres also the right to a good life and its touching on ideas of what art looks like under socialism, like you mentioned, like sports. Essentially, i think, what life looks like with things that we do with one another, things that bring us joy and imagining those under a socialist organizing principle, whats important to you about like theorizing what that life looks like . Yeah, yeah, i think, you know, i have been doing activism, well, since college. I think i certainly fell into it climate and i think theres a sort of tendency to sort of struggle in a certain way and think about like were always, you know going up against, whether its the boss, the corporation or, you know, the state or whatever it is, were always sort of in constant battle. And theres a lot of critique, a lot of saying the way we dont want things to be. I think some of the most inspired moments in social history is when its possible to imagine something else, a new way of organizing society that is not just people just do not exist in the workplace, do not just exist in corporations. We have all of these other things that fill our time and that those two have been really taken over by profit motive, by many things and i think, you know, this gets at the question of sports really well and just how capitalism has managed to sort of brew itself into this thing that should be fun, but isnt anymore, unfortunately, for most the people who play, play sports and any sort of like even semi professional capacity. To watch. Well, to watch i dont really. Im not really a sports person about you i can appreciate it. But, yeah, but we also have to, you know, be thinking not just about the parts of life that are hardest, but what does it look like to have a good life, it comes from the tradition and thinking about it in a holistic way, were not just sort of outside of our relationship to work. Can get is rightfully talked about a lot, but there are other things to throw in there. I do think so in particular, things that are touched on in the book are reimagining things that will bring us joy, trying to see what that looks like as a nonexploitive thing, whatever. Theres another part of this, were talking about a total restructuring of a society. Were reorienting ourselves like ideally toward different modes of interacting with one another, different modes of engaging in governing and economics and all of the things that are listed, health care, so forth and so on. So, we are theres i think what im trying to get at is like we have a politics now that essentially promises people that nothing will change. Thats the idea is that i can vote for me because you will be comfortable in exactly the way that you are you understand comfort now, right . And so youre in this collection is saying, theres a whole different vision, right. So your life will change. How honest do we have to be then about what gets lost . Yeah, i mean, i think about this question a lot around climate, right . Because that has always been showing sacrifice, for as long as we talk about the environment in the u. S. And arguably and many other places. Theres a sort of notional idea that things will be better in the future, but in the meantime, you have to give up your cars, your hamburgers, you know, its a matter of sacrifice and its sort of like a quality where youre chased enough, basically, in your Consumer Habits that you will manifest a glorious future. Maybe in like slightly less religious terms, but its just, you know, i think that the idea that we cant have other life has been of the most successful project, thats the thing like the idea that things will never get better, that they cant ever get better. As Margaret Thatcher said, there is no alternative, that has been really effective. Its really powerful. Its a powerful narrative to think that, you know, your conditions cant changes, that our conditions cant change and that theres nothing, nothing in this world that could make that make society be organized any differently than it is now and its a sort of like rewriting of history almost, right . Because we know that humans organized themselves in very different ways and do organize themselves in different ways in different places and throughout history, right . Capitalism is a blip of roughly speaking on in the history of humanity and the history of the earth and to think about it, i think its helpful to put it so much damage. Yeah, in 30 years we have threatened to make the planet unlivable. Yeah, were capitalism is very productive. Never tell you that capitalism hasnt done things, because it really has theyre not good for you unless youre be dead by 2050. Exactly. So, no, i think i might have wandered off from the original point, but i think that is what socialism does, it says that there is alternative and there are many alternative and we can beat this and i think in an i digs to having a vision that sort of is a commitment to fighting for it, right, a commitment to saying, i think contra a lot of even liberal or progressive thought that theres a us and theres a them. There are certain people who have made out very well, the majority of people have not, right, this is the most sort of enduring occupy wall street with 99 versus the 1 . Theres a small strat tum of society that things are working out and for most its not. And organizing collectively is the way to change that. Hi, everyone. Though i am a member of dsa im actually a member as the chair of 501, 3c devoted to socialist education and we are happy to be here represented tonight to support this project foshl through the dsa fund though i dont speak for dsa i was having a meeting with the National Director at dsa and she sends greetings of solidarity. Because together dsa and dsa fund are around the book making Copies Available to our member. Because the book, we are the future, is part of the socialistic process, a collective process, its great we could bring so many people to this movement through thinking and writing about what youve done. The book brings together a lot of authors from various points of view talking about an array of issues important to democratic socialists and people promoting the book are part of a collective, you have the new press, you have Mcnally Jackson, dsa, dsa fund, most importantly the editors and authors in our events here tonight, dissent magazine. It takes a collective to make things happen and one of the most important things i think that this book can do is make that clear this is an intersectional movement that brings together people of a variety of differences and experiences and id especially like to say that its important in this moment for us to recognize that while the other side may have a lot more Financial Resources than we do, we have people power. And its people power that i helped bring this together for a multitendency Democratic Socialist Movement in the face of neo fascism in the Republican Party and the democratic mainstream. We have to bring that together so we can indeed own the future. Thank you for everyone involved in this event and this project, and all of you who came here tonight. Lets now open up for a q a and please remember, speak into the mic so ill be happy to hand this over to anyone who would like to ask a question. Thank you. I wanted to ask about the role of race, historically in terms of why the u. S. Doesnt have a socialist party and thinking of the communist organizing of the south. And the tension between two distinct equally exciting things coming together for a multiracial working class, understand themselves as a class, versus very specific projects, like a black radical project and things that are articulated that, can be articulated, but arent necessarily for soccial does that make sense. Talking about when im speaking, yeah, what we sort of argue in the book is that any American Democratic socialism has to look different than it has elsewhere, socialism has elsewhere for two very specific reasons. So one is that this country is built on foundation of genocide and theft of land and of bodies, so first of indigenous slaughter when settlers first arrived here and second of slavery, right. And so these two things are foundational to how american capitalism is built and not only that, like