By Jonathan Nack, IndyBay.org, June 15th, 2016 (via American Third Party Report):
In a major development, the Green Party took a key step towards declaring itself Eco-socialist. The party’s National Committee voted Sunday night to approve a proposed amendment to the party’s platform entitled “Ecological Economics.” The proposed platform position declares that the Green Party is anti-capitalist and in favor of a decentralized vision socialism.
The proposal to amend the 2016 platform will go to the Green Party National Convention for a final vote. The convention will be held in Houston, Texas, August 4-7, a week after the Democratic Party’s National Convention. Almost 78 percent of the National Committee voted in favor of sending the proposal to the convention (76 voted “yes,” 22 voted “no,” with 9 voting to “abstain,” on Proposal 835).
Read the rest of the article here.
“I attribute this to Sanders making the idea of socialism an acceptable mainstream part of US political culture again. And I wonder how much of this effort is aimed at winning over people Bernie Sanders radicalized?”
That’s exactly what’s going on. And truth be told, the kind of “green” they want is going to require heavy government regulation of business, finance and industry. Ergo, socialism. Why keep denying it?
Joshua K, I wonder the samething. The US GP as reconstituted by the Association of State Green Parties in 1996-1997 was pretty explicitly “green” neo-Keynsian Make capitalism less predatory and barbaric.
I know in some state parties there are a lot of non-affiliated socialists and Trotskyist party members involved at the state and local levels. I noticed that 20+% of the central committee voted No. And the GP of the US is structurally based on a federation of state parties (and the delegates to the nat con are selected from state members, I wonder how this openly anti-capitalist turn is playing in the state parties? Imo particularly California and New York State?
I wonder if there will be any significant number of delegates at the Green Party convention who oppose this amendment on substantive grounds, that is, believing that Green values are compatible with capitalism. Or will this amendment pass routinely, because the delegates will overwhelmingly support socialism over capitalism?
As the US GP is technically a federation of state parties I’ll be interested to see if any of them, particularly California embrace this new anti-capitalist turn?
And I can’t find any comment abt this Left turn from the GP’s “presumptive” POTUS nominee Stein.
I attribute this to Sanders making the idea of socialism an acceptable mainstream part of US political culture again. And I wonder how much of this effort is aimed at winning over people Bernie Sanders radicalized?
Yes, yes, yes!
This new Proudhonian direction is exactly what the Green Party should be taking. They need to abandon centralized government and embrace presidential candidates more like Darryl Perry instead of Jill Stein.
Really just a superficial change to their platform. I think almost everybody knows the Green Party is a cross between left-libertarianism, environmentalism, and Democratic Socialism.
After Jill Stein declared her support for gun control that was really all I needed to know.
https://www.isidewith.com/candidate-guide/jill-stein/domestic-policy/gun-control