Democratic Socialists of Your Party

We originally founded as Democratic Socialists of Your Party (DSYP) as a leading national faction in the founding process of Your Party. 

This page contains our all of our published content of our work as DSYP.

Members of Democratic Socialists have full access to the DSYP internal archive on a read-only basis. 

Please email us if you'd like to make a request for a copy of some, or all of the archive which we are happy to share for example, for academic research purposes.

Political Statement

We recognise that the interests of the working class cannot be reliably and sustainably secured within the constraints of capitalism and instead require the development of an alternative economic model based on democratic planning and the socialisation of the means of production, distribution and exchange, alongside the abolition of the profit motive and private capital – ie, socialism.

We seek to constitute this party as a radically democratic body, rooted in the democratic traditions of the working class (which includes all those that depend on employment for survival, as well as the unemployed, disabled/long terms sick, stay-at-home carers, students and retired people) and as such we view the current constitutional order as a fundamental impediment to our democratic needs and goals.

We will campaign and stand in elections in order to raise the possibility of a democratic and socialist alternative to the authoritarian and capitalist society of today. But our party will not enter coalitions with other parties at any level of government and will not participate in any government without the explicit guarantee of the implementation of its democratic programme in full. We refuse to become responsible for the management of capitalism and continued immiseration of the working class and its allies.

This party will also take a role in organising the class beyond the present limitations of the electoral realm, i.e. in the workplace, the home, and on our streets – seeking to defend and advance the cause of the working class wherever it finds itself under threat from the onslaught of reaction, with complete solidarity and defence of the most marginalised sections of our class in particular, notably migrants and trans people, who are under daily assault, by allying with and supporting the many organisations and movements that exist to struggle against it.

We recognise however that this alone will not be enough. Capitalism is organised internationally: therefore this party must be thoroughly internationalist, anti-imperialist, and anti-racist – that means being explicitly and uncompromisingly anti-Zionist, too. The working class in Britain can only hope to advance its interests by organising together with the working class of other countries, beginning with our nearest neighbours on the continent.

This party therefore puts forward the following immediate demands which form the minimum precondition for it to enter government:

1. Abolition of the monarchy and the House of Lords. Parliament elected by PR with MPs’ salaries set to the median wage.

2. A constituent assembly to draft a constitution and democratise society from top to bottom, enshrining our fundamental rights.

3. Repeal of laws criminalising protest and expanded police powers. Police and intelligence agencies must be made to be democratically accountable.

4. A true living wage and a move to a 4 day working week to guarantee full employment and a fuller, freer, life for everyone.

5. An end to homelessness and the abolition of private rent. Housing will be decommodified and made a fundamental right for all.

6. An end to cynical austerity and privatisation, with sustained investment into the NHS and our other public services, while bringing critical public infrastructure into public ownership.

7. Comprehensive protections for the oppressed and marginalised to guarantee their empowerment and full participation in society.

8. Parliamentary inquiries to establish criminal culpability for the manifold failures and crimes of the British state and ruling class.

9. Withdrawal from NATO and all imperialist wars, withdrawal of recognition of the State of Israel and practical solidarity with the oppressed people of the world.

10. Transition of the military-industrial sector towards production for the peace rather than war and towards industry that will protect and preserve our planet.

Constitution

A Vision for Maximum Democracy

1. Focus on Working-Class Self-Emancipation

The Party’s primary purpose is to be the political vehicle for the working class in all its diversity. We aim to end the tyranny and domination of capital and believe the working class must be the main agent of its own liberation, not a passive beneficiary of others’ actions.

2. Big Tent Socialist Unity

The Party is explicitly multi-tendency, seeking to unite a wide spectrum of the left, from the left wing of social democracy right through to revolutionary socialists. We welcome various activists, including anti-fascists, climate campaigners, and trade unionists, into a unitary, radically democratic and socialist party.

3. Grassroots-Led, Bottom-Up, Membership-funded Structures

The Party stands in elections but refuses to be defined by them. We view the class struggle at the workplace, in communities, and on the streets as being of equal importance to electoral politics, preparing for a multidimensional nationwide struggle for power.

Power flows from the ground up, with local branches being properly resourced. Local Party Organisations (LPOs) are the fundamental units of membership and engines of our member-led democracy. LPOs receive statutory funding directly from national membership fees (50%) and proportional to the number of members in the respective LPO. This empowers local parties to take the lead in organising in their communities, building connections not simply for elections but for meaningful change on the issues that matter in their neighbourhood.

Regional Party Organisations (RPO) are convened, organised and funded by LPOs, ensuring that power flows from the LPOs to the regions, giving the grassroots full control over how the party is structured and run at each level.

4. Member Sovereignty through a Supreme Conference

The National Conference is the highest decision-making body, holding ultimate authority over all other party structures. This core principle ensures that the membership, through democratically chosen delegates from LPOs, is firmly in the driving seat of the Party, setting its overall political direction and policies.

5. Robust Protection of Internal Dissent and Factions

The constitution guarantees members the right to form open factions and to publicly express views contrary to Party policy. Members have rights to freedom of speech, expression, association and dissent, and can organise to change decisions they disagree with, provided they respect the democratic legitimacy of those decisions while they are in force.

6. Scotland and Wales: The Right to Organise Nationally

We recognise and appreciate the unique historical, cultural and political contexts of Scotland and Wales. If LPOs in these areas wish to create countrywide organisations, we support their right to do so, providing that the mandate for this comes from collective grassroots democracy from LPOs rather than being enforced by unaccountable national party bureaucrats.

Members from these areas have the power to create countrywide organisations, by requesting through their LPOs, a special conference to decide on the level of autonomy and funding they require within the wider Your Party structures. In our model, power flows from the grassroots to the national party and it is the LPOs that set the agenda of the national party, not the other way around.

7. Strict Accountability and Leadership Renewal

The Party enforces strong accountability and prevents the concentration of power. This is achieved through:

• Mandatory Reselections: All public office holders face mandatory reselection.

• A “People’s Whip”: Socialists in Office (SIO) Committees connect, advise, and guide elected officials to ensure they act in accordance with Party principles.

• Leadership Refresh: Members of the executive National Political Committee (NPC) are subject to a consecutive two-term limit to encourage new leadership.

8.  Led by the Membership, with Codified Diversity

The Party’s leadership structure ensures members are in charge, not MPs. The two National Co-Chairs are elected by Conference, and the National Political Committee (NPC) is composed of individual at-large members, also elected by Conference under a delegated system.

MPs can stand for election to the NPC but have no reserved seats. This leadership is also mandated to be diverse: of the 16 at-large NPC members, no more than eight can be cis-gender men, and at least five must identify as an ethnic or racial minority. A nationally constituted Youth Section embeds the voice of young people within the Party.

9. Commitment to Proportional and Democratic Elections

All internal party elections and candidate selections are conducted using the Single Transferable Vote (STV) system under the Droop quota; this method is commonly known as the Scottish STV system. This ensures a more proportional and representative outcome. While most elections use a secret ballot, votes at the National Conference are held openly to ensure delegate accountability.

The delegate system is based on the principle of One Member, One Vote (OMOV). We define OMOV as the equal right for all members to participate in democratic deliberations and decision making. Whilst votes for the leadership are cast by delegates, these delegates are subject to direct election by all member meetings of LPOs, and their votes at Conference recorded for those that elected them to inspect and hold them to account on.

By electing leadership in this way, members have the chance to make informed decisions on the strategic options put in front of them through democratic dialogue with their fellow party members.

10. Democratic Disciplinary and Accountability Procedures

In cases involving allegations of member misconduct that contravene the rules of the party, the NPC will deliberate, judge and rule on outcomes. All outcomes will be reviewed by a unique Discipline and Grievance Commission (DGC), which serves an ombudsman function.

This body, composed of a jury of 11 peers chosen by sortition, is composed of regular members who review cases and provide public recommendations to the NPC, ensuring member-led oversight of the disciplinary process. The DGC will review all disciplinary cases coming from the NPC and will publish an annual public report of recommendations on general and specific cases. However, in cases that require safeguarding, in which it will maintain confidentiality in all reporting.

Members will also be able to submit motions to appeal NPC rulings on these matters at the National Conference, except where safeguarding and confidentiality applies.

The DGC receives a standing budget for compensating its members and for seeking independent legal advice. The budget and size of the DGC is approved by conference.

Rules & Standing Orders

Our proposed Rules and Standing Orders for Your Party are now available to download.

Organisational Strategy

Read our proposed amendments to the Organisational Strategy for Your Party.

Socialist Unity Platform

Socialist Unity Platform formed from a series of negotiations convened by the Democratic Socialists of Your Party who believe that unity between workers’ and socialist movements, groups and organisations will build power to intervene in Your Party.

This process started with unity negotiations at The World Transformed in October 2025 with a United Proposal from Your Party Groups. Democratic Socialists of Your Party built on this success to widen unity negotiations with open invitations to groups across the British Left and Your Party proto-branches.

Signatories ratifying the Socialist Unity Platform

Our platform has come together to fight for grassroots democracy in Your Party, with a majority in support of the document known originally as the Sheffield Demands—a series of amendments to the Your Party founding documents that address the need for maximum working class democracy. These were ratified by a clear majority (with no votes against) at a meeting held on 15 November 2025.

Since this meeting, members and representatives of the following groups support the Socialist Unity Platform:

• Bolshevik Tendency

• Campaign for a Mass Workers Party

• Communist Party of Great Britain

• Democratic Bloc

• Democratic and Socialist Network

• Democratic Socialists of Your Party

• Greater Manchester Left Caucus

• Haringey Socialist Alliance

• Marxist Strategy

• Merseyside Pensioners Alliance

• Platform for a Democratic Party

• Sheffield Left

• Socialist Alternative

• Socialist Workers Party

• Spartacist League

• Trans Liberation Group

Individuals from the following Your Party proto-branches in:

• Cambridge

• Chesterfield

• Doncaster

• Glasgow North

• Lewisham

• Liverpool

• Newton Ayecliffe & Spennymoor

• Oxford

• Scarborough

• Sheffield

Members and representatives from other groups that were unable to attend are being contacted and we expect this list to change. If you are part of a group that supports our platform, please email us at democraticunityyp@gmail.com to send a representative to our regular meetings.

Your Party Founding Conference

Do you support the Socialist Unity Platform? Get involved and join us with supporting our interventions at Your Party Founding Conference:

• Tell us if you’re going to Liverpool – whether or not you’ve been sortitioned to attend Founding Conference

• We’ll be in contact to invite you to a online meeting taking place on Thursday 27 November.

• There will be a rally on Friday 28 November with Zarah Sultana at the Holiday Inn where we’ll need volunteers to promote the platform.

• We are hosting a fringe event in Liverpool on Saturday 29 November, 10:00-22:00 at the Roddick Rooms, 54 St James Street.

View the fringe programme

Central Executive Committee Elections

The Your Party Central Executive Committee (CEC) elections will run from 9 February to 23 February.

The elections are for a collective leadership body which will be composed of four office holder positions (for MPs/councillors), two representatives from each region of England, along with one from Scotland and one from Wales.

The Grassroots Left slate

We are endorsing the Grassroots Left slate in these CEC elections and standing five candidates of our own within the slate.

Our participation in the Grassroots Left slate emerged off the back of initial discussions with other caucuses within Your Party that began at the The World Transformed conference in October. Following the Your Party Founding Conference in November 2025 we discussed the potential for some form of grassroots engagement with the CEC elections.

Elements of this ultimately came together with some of the forces from the Socialist Unity Platform (which we worked as part of at conference) and with Zarah Sultana to agree on the need for a coherent Grassroots Left slate around a shared platform to contest the CEC elections.

Why we are participating in the Grassroots Left slate

This election represents a real opportunity to shape the founding direction of Your Party by developing it into a genuinely democratic organisation and bringing to an end the bureaucratic approaches we’ve seen from the national leadership which have held back the proper political and branch level development of the party.

We need Your Party to be a space in which we can work in an open and engaged way at both the branch and national level to build and win the organisation to the politics of democratic socialism outlined in our political statement. This is the political basis we believe YP needs in order to develop into a real mass socialist party.

But this work requires the democratic space in which to operate.

That is why we are backing and participating in the Grassroots Left slate – it represents a real opportunity to take forward this work and shift the party in the democratic direction we need.

If the Grassroots Left slate is successful this concretely this would mean:

• Charting out a socialist, anti-imperialist and radically democratic vision of society for YP to fight for

• Empowering the branches by recognising them, giving them access to data and ensuring they are properly funded

• Convening a proper democratic founding conference to allow YP members to fully shape the political and organisational character of the party

• Preventing witch-hunts against the left in YP, ensuring it can be a party of the whole left in which we can advance our politics openly

Get involved

To make this successful we need people to take the campaign into their own hands at the regional level:

• Sign up to get involved with the Grassroots Left slate—this will get you looped into local organising chats, coordinating events in the region, phone banking etc.

• Speak to others locally and in your branch—encourage them to read up on and vote for the Grassroots Left, and consider bringing a motion of support to your branch.

• Spread the word on social media locally in regional groups—sharing content and discussing with others.

What next?

The CEC elections are a central fight, but they are far from the end. 

Our work will remain crucial—both in pushing to hold CEC representatives (whoever they end up being) clearly accountable to members, and in working to build democratic socialist politics at the branch and national level.

This work needs members shaping it. If you’re interested, get join the Democratic Socialists of Your Party.

Our Platform for the CEC Elections

Our candidates are running on the Grassroots Left shared platform—this platform emerged through discussion between the groups involved and represents the collective political basis all candidates are running on.

As DSYP our candidates will also build on that platform by advancing the political basis and programme contained in our Political Statement and proposed Constitution for Your Party.

Outlined below are the key areas our candidates will push forward on top of the Grassroots Left platform.

Political platform

We advance a programme of concrete political demands we will fight for YP to adopt:

• Abolition of the monarchy and the House of Lords. Parliament elected by PR with MPs’ salaries set to the median wage.

• A constituent assembly to draft a constitution and democratise society from top to bottom, enshrining our fundamental rights.

• Repeal of laws criminalising protest and expanded police powers. Police and intelligence agencies must be made to be democratically accountable.

• A true living wage and a move to a 4 day working week to guarantee full employment and a fuller, freer, life for everyone.

• An end to homelessness and the abolition of private rent. Housing will be decommodified and made a fundamental right for all.

• An end to cynical austerity and privatisation, with sustained investment into the NHS and our other public services, while bringing critical public infrastructure into public ownership.

• Comprehensive protections for the oppressed and marginalised to guarantee their empowerment and full participation in society.

• Parliamentary inquiries to establish criminal culpability for the manifold failures and crimes of the British state and ruling class.

• Withdrawal from NATO and all imperialist wars, withdrawal of recognition of the State of Israel and practical solidarity with the oppressed people of the world.

• Transition of the military-industrial sector towards production for the peace rather than war and towards industry that will protect and preserve our planet

For a Worker’s Wage

As Democratic Socialists, we recognise the politicians in this country have drifted from the interests of its constituents they are supposed to represent. As people across this country work double jobs in order to make ends meet and others skip meals, politicians in the Houses of Parliament have had their salaries increase year after year all whilst doing nothing to improve the lives of those they are meant to speak for. In order for elected officials of Your Party to not make the same mistake of drifting from its working class base, elected officials in Parliament will take a “Worker’s Wage” no higher than the median wage in the area they live – anything they receive over that amount will go back into the party.

Likewise, Democratic Socialists recognise in the past political parties, including those meant to represent the working class, have often built up a large bureaucracy of paid party staff who are ostensibly tasked with the day to day managing of the party infrastructure at the national, regional and local level. This includes anything from managing the party tech platform to organising party events to scheduling on behalf of elected officials. Despite their “apolitical” nature, these party staff get to make political decisions without the democratic input of Your Party membership. We firmly oppose this and instead we fight for a member-led party that is committed to the cause of working class liberation. As such, party staff are expected to take a “Worker’s Wage” no higher than the median wage in the area they live.

For Socialist Schools

We recognise it is in the interest of the ruling class to keep the working class disorientated, uneducated and fragmented, to prevent any threat to their power. In order for this to change, Your Party must offer political education to its members. Everything the working class need to fight for their liberation including but limited to public speaking skills, how to run a democratic meeting, how to organise in their workplace and learning from the successes and failures of previous generations with classes and debate on the history of socialist movement.

For an Accessibility Commission

We fight for a world where disabled people can live, work and thrive with dignity and joy as the minimum. For this to happen, Your Party must itself be a place where disabled members can organise without prejudice and where accessibility is not a box ticking exercise. We propose the Accessibility Commission, an elected body of disabled members, tasked with setting and supporting party units and elected office holders to meet accessibility standards across all levels of the Party. It shall also have the power to audit and review all party events.

For a Discipline and Grievance Commission

We must learn from the past and this includes not repeating the mistake of having disciplinary processes weaponised against its members unfairly and for factional motivations. The CEC must establish fair disciplinary processes, subject to amendment and approval by Conference, that protects due process and natural justice. They must also establish a Discipline and Grievance Commission, based on a jury of 11 members, which will provide independent oversight, review of all disciplinary actions and make public recommendations for action to be taken where it identifies mistakes or failings.

Our Candidates for the CEC Elections

Democratic Socialists are endorsing all the candidates of the Grassroots Left slate and we are standing five candidates as part of the slate.

Anahita Zardoshti, London

Anahita Zardoshti is a grassroots socialist organiser, a member of the Democratic Socialists of Your Party and a committed anti-fascist and anti-imperialist activist. She is a founder and Chair of the Your Party Islington proto-branch and has helped build a rapidly growing local organisation, that mobilises for the hunger strikers for Palestine, runs mass listening campaigns, supports local strikes, and develops political education and cultural programmes. Shaped by her experience growing up in Iran, Anahita is committed to fighting against all forms of oppression. She argues for a democratic, member-led party that empowers branches, funds grassroots activity, and keeps its leadership rooted in the working class.

Graham Jones, West Midlands

Graham Jones is a socialist organiser from Shropshire with experience in housing, mental health, community education and Palestine solidarity work. He is the author of Shock Doctrine of the Left and Red Enlightenment, and is currently boycotting his publisher as part of the Boycott Watkins campaign for Palestine. Graham’s priorities are political education, grassroots leadership development, and building democratic, effective party structures. A disabled organiser, a member of the LGBTQ+ community, and carer, he brings a strong commitment to inclusion, solidarity and principled socialist organisation.

Ian Spencer, North East of England

Ian Spencer is standing for election to the CEC because he believes Your Party must be a democratic, mass socialist party committed to working-class power and internationalism, with production organised to meet human need and protect the environment. He supports the Grassroots Left slate and argues for principled left unity, with members free to organise openly in platforms and tendencies. He opposes censorship, secrecy, and the recent expulsions of SWP members, and supports their immediate reinstatement.

If elected, he pledges to publish regular open reports and to campaign for a democratic conference in 2026, with future conferences made up of democratically elected branch delegates. A retired nurse and teacher, he has been a UCU rep and is Finance Officer and trustee of the People’s Bookshop in Durham. He joined Your Party on its first day, has a background in local government as both a Labour and independent socialist parish councillor, and is active in PSC and Stop the War. He contributes to the Weekly Worker and has taught Marxist political economy through universities and the Why Marx? education series.

Max Shanly, South East of England

Max Shanly is a socialist organiser and writer with eighteen years’ experience in the workers’ movement. A computer technician by trade, he became politically active after confronting the limits of workplace trade unionism. He served on the Young Labour National Committee from 2013–18, was Zarah Sultana’s running mate in the 2016 Young Labour elections, and worked as Deputy Director of Operations on Jeremy Corbyn’s second leadership campaign. Now a leading figure in the Democratic Socialists of Your Party, Max focuses on socialist theory, organisation, and deepening democracy within the movement.

Chloe Braddock, North West of England

Chloe Braddock is a socialist organiser with a background in tenant unionism, anti-imperialist organising and anti-fascist struggle. She has been a leading figure in the Democratic Socialists of Your Party and has worked across the wider socialist movement, gaining a clear view of where today’s struggles are being fought. Chloe argues for a politically bold, radically democratic party rooted in rank-and-file power. She believes real change is built through organising in communities and on the streets, not by chasing electoral office alone.