Points of Unity of the Democratic Socialists

What We Stand For

Last updated: 13 May 2026

1. We stand for socialism – and the defeat of capitalism.

By this we mean a society whereby ultimately the entire economy is owned socially and run democratically by the working class: the end of profit and privately-owned production, thereby increasingly enabling the decentralisation of power, wealth and prosperity. We do so for the cause of liberation of workers and humanity at large; and in order to save the habitability of the planet from capitalism's accelerating dependence on commodifying nature and warmongering over dwindling profits. We must not limit ourselves to using reforms to soften the harshest edges of capitalism but rather stand for an independent class politics that fights for our collective self-emancipation.

2. We organise for a party that is internationalist, anti-imperialist, and anti-racist – that also means being explicitly and uncompromisingly anti-Zionist.

We strive for a total restructuring of society, recognising that the interests of our class can only be secured on a global scale and through the closest cooperation between workers of all countries, irrespective of race or gender. We seek to turn the world upside down for good, not merely tip the balance momentarily in the favour of the working class. Our party must reflect this spirit of solidarity and universalism in its programme.

3. We are committed to fighting the ecological disaster capitalism has inflicted on our planet with socialism; a democratically planned economy that places human need and planetary survival above profit.

Capitalism’s relentless drive for accumulation is fundamentally incompatible with the long term survival of life on our planet and has produced a climate crisis that disproportionately devastates the global south. We fight for a rapid, just transition to a sustainable economy under democratic control, where production is planned in the interests of the majority. This means public ownership of key industries, international cooperation to transfer resources and technology with a recognition of the historic responsibility of those in advanced capitalist countries.

4. We fight for the liberation of the exploited and oppressed everywhere.

We must reject all prejudices and divisions used to justify oppression and impede working-class unity, and fight for the liberation of the exploited and oppressed at home and abroad. We reject the cynical and self-defeating logic of selling out the interests of any oppressed group for tactical gain. That means rejecting any compromise with bigotry and chauvinism within the party, be it transphobia, misogyny, racism, xenophobia or ableism, and championing any work to promote and develop the unity of the whole working class. Liberation can only be for all, or it is for no one.

5. We stand for women’s liberation as an essential and inseparable part of the struggle for socialism.

Women’s oppression is rooted in and reproduced by class society, sustained through unpaid domestic labour, economic inequality, and systemic violence. We reject any and all attempts to drive a wedge between the struggle for women’s and trans liberation. We fight to dismantle all structures that perpetuate gender oppression, including patriarchy in both society and within our own movement. This means championing full social, economic and reproductive rights, the socialisation of care and domestic labour and equal participation of women in all spheres of political and social life. We struggle for a movement and party that places women’s liberation at its core, understanding that the liberation of the working class is impossible without the liberation of women.

6. We make mass political education a strategic priority.

We see education not as a process of telling people what to think, but equipping them with the tools through which to critique the world, as a means of empowering all people to become creative intellectuals and effective organisers in their own right.

7. We work to create a party with meaningful & radical democracy where members have full control of the party’s direction.

We oppose the model of internal dictatorship within traditional political parties and instead demand a collective leadership at every level of party life: elected, recallable and accountable to the membership. Members must have the right to freedom of information, association, discussion, dissent and the freedom to critique the party’s programme and organise to change it, provided they also accept fighting for it as the democratically-determined expression of the party's goals.

8. We need a party that unites the entire British left.

From radical social democrats leftwards in a pluralistic, multi-tendency party, with all members having the right to organise into open factions, be they temporary or permanent, at all levels of the party. The moment has never been more urgent, and this opportunity cannot be wasted.

9. We will campaign for a unitary political party, based on individual membership, with an equal right to participation in democratic deliberations and decision making for all.

We oppose it being an umbrella electoral alliance of local fiefdoms dominated by grandees unaccountable to the members and the party’s programme; or a federal structure in which affiliated organisations with block votes hold veto.

10. We fight for a mass socialist party: that stands in elections, but is not defined by them.

Socialist candidates must represent the socialist movement, and the party must dig trenches in society, seeking to centre itself organically at the heart of working class life and working class struggles. It cannot succeed based on electoralism alone.

11. We recognise the whole left and a future socialist party must adopt a new left strategy: treating British politics as a comprehensive struggle for power, not just elected office.

We believe this can only be achieved by a democratically developed and accepted socialist programme that guides all party work. We stand in fundamental opposition to the British constitutional order and the repressive state structures through which capital rules over labour and nature. We commit ourselves wholeheartedly to the fight for a democratic republic, in which popular control from below is unfrustrated and undistorted. We believe the party should only enter government on the basis that it can overturn the constitutional order and institute this republic, representing the minimum of its socialist programme.